Apply ICTs for African rural sustainability

THE Provision of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) to rural people is a key towards accelerating social-economic development. But it is very sad to note that rural people continues to suffer from the disadvantages in the access to these superhighways. The ICT services and the accessibility of the relevant communication components such as computers connected with the internet, fixed and mobile telephones, faxes etc, are less established in most rural communities in Africa. People need channels of communication in rural areas for a variety of reasons including access to agricultural commodities and prices, education, livelihood and healthcare in order to maintain social networks as well as participating in democratic process. In broader terms, ICTs refers to any technique or knowledge used to create, store, manage and disseminate information in the society and about 95 percent of the global economic activities are integrated by the use of the ICTs And to have these ideas workable, governments have to give priorities in their national budgets to effectively build communication links such as roads for a smooth accessibility of both telephones and electricity. Reliable ICT facilities and services requires a reliable energy supply, the standard approach by operators and mobile phone system in rural areas has been successful following the installation of diesel operated generators.

Computers connected with the internet is a good resourceful tool for African development goals.

In Tanzania for example, it is vivid to note that due to poor infrastructural facilities, coupled with illiteracy and extreme poverty, these are among the most critical persistent elements that constrains access of ICTs in rural areas. Economic analysts say that this is due to the fact that the investments in the sector is more focused on corporate customers in urban areas and not individuals in rural areas where the majority lives. To some extent, the problem is more aggravated by investors who wants to make quick money rather than take the trouble to develop technologies suitable for the local market. As the situation persists, the ICT’s application deteriorates an aspect that cause the services rendered to be expensive. Though Tanzanian government removed tariffs in all imported computers and accessories in past national budgets about six yeas ago, this fiscal push has not so far turned out to become a powerful incentive for attracting ICT investors in rural areas. Among the most cited reasons by the private sector is lack of reliable electricity and the high cost of establishing infrastructure and expensive bandwidth services.
The ICT stakeholders have observed the situation saying that, due to the insufficiency about the awareness on the use of the ICTs tools among the poor people in rural community in the country, who covers 90 percent of the country’s population lack experience to spearhead national development. Instead most people tend to make use of other ICTs such as television for luxury. The government through its various initiatives towards the digital divide has recognized the most crucial role the sector play for the national development and has taken steps to address the issue from the grassroots level. As from 2007, the fourth phase government has made a tremendous progress towards democratizing accessibility and support the applications of ICT when it formed a separate ministry of Information and Technology to deal with ICT matters as well as other areas related to it in the country. A new Universal Communication Access Fund (UCAF) would be established with a view to supporting indigenous Tanzanians who wish to set up ICT projects and other communication facilities in rural areas. Once the existence of the fund is realized, it would facilitate the provision of efficient ICT infrastructure and communication services at low and affordable costs to the remote areas in the country from the district level. The trend of government in regard to ICT has been to connect their network up to the regional scale for both internet and data. To realize these ICT benefits, a number of issues need to be adequately addressed such as the development of efficient and sustainable national ICT infrastructure networks.

Computer accessibility is a way through to curb with the impending social problems existing in societies. Unlike in African countries, the access to these superhighways is limited mostly due to the growing poverty stricken situation.

ICT is good for the poor as well for big business and few years ago it was difficult to convince investors that it was a good business to introduce mobile phone services to urban Tanzania. With the persisting problem of rural ICT access, people are faced with a number of difficulties of reaching these markets, but these could be overcome by new wireless ICT infrastructures that are affordable and user friendly, says an ICT consultant Engineer Ronald Kisuka a Kenyan national working in the country. According to him, the current Tanzanian ICT situation requires urgent steps to enable Tanzanians to participate meaningfully in the knowledge economy, recognizing that the country has low levels of humans capital development, local content creation, poor infrastructure and access which together lead to high costs of participation. The dangers posed by the digital divide and the risk of being excluded further from the knowledge and special development has propelled the government to put in place a new framework through which coordinating mechanism and harmonized strategies might be nurtured.