Addressing economic challenges key to delivering digital communication in Africa

With Africa’s data traffic expected to grow by over 20 times in the next 5 years, ICT companies are now deploying all strategies possible to grasp a fair share of the market.

According to satellite services provider Intelsat, 40 per cent unique subscribers are projected to come from rural and harder to reach regions and therefore the need to connect these areas.

Delegates attending the Africacom 2015 expo in Cape Town emphasized on the need to include rural communities in companies’ growth strategies rather than treat them as disadvantaged minority in order to empower such people to grow and connect in the digital space.

Jean Philippe Gillet Vice President, Sales for Europe, Middle East and Africa says expanding rural coverage can be achieved at significantly low costs through using single source for network installation, integration, maintenance and monitoring services.

To ensure better coverage of remote areas, most telecoms are now investing in social and economic development of local ecosystem.

For instance, Vodacom in South Africa is providing free solar chargers to the rural communities to power their low cost devices and in turn ensure the subscribers stay connected.

Vodacom’s Executive Head of sustainability Suraya Hamdulay says part of the moves the Group has taken to ensure remote communities access their network is using solar panels to power base stations in areas that are not connected to electricity.

The connectivity issue in harder to reach areas will however, remain a challenge for telecoms with the massive shift from voice to data as more and more subscribers find it convenient to use internet services rather than the conventional voice calls.

It is estimated that by 2019, 72 per cent of mobile data traffic will be from videos, which calls for high speed and high volume data connectivity.

Ian Mash, Huawei’s Vice President of Business and Network Consulting in UK says to achieve a better connected Africa will call for pro-activity from all players including investment by Governments, Public-private partnerships, implementing supportive policies and tax incentives as well as skills training.

Communities that are not served with sufficient resources either because of economic reasons, poor electricity connection or merely bad perception of the impact of the internet will have to be brought into the loop in order to bridge the persistent digital divide.

One of the flagship projects being deployed by social website Facebook in ensuring internet for all is the free basics app that can be accessed free of charge.

Facebook’s Director of Private partnerships Ime Archibong, who was also speaking during the Africacom 2015 expo said connectivity is the key issue in reaching rural populations and enabling people build their lives.

With Free Basics, people will now have access to useful services with information about health, education, news, finance and more without data charges.

The 18^th annual expo attracted over 10,000 delegates from around the world and focused on issues affecting companies in Africa’s digital market including services, efficiency, profitability, customer experience, partnerships and policy.