Mobile phone use soars in Africa

THE beleaguered African continent continues to make dramatic progress in the field of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs). The technological advances, however has given rise to mobile phones. The African mobile telephone market has been the fastest growing market of all regions that grows twice at the rate of the global market, according to United Nations report. The number of subscribers leaped from 16 million in 2000 to a staggering 250 million in 2007, this is in accordance to the latest figures made available. Mobiles now outnumbered fixed telephone lines by nearly five-to-one in Africa, although it may not be evenly spread across the large continent. The study which was tabled at the month long meeting of the UN’s Economic and Social council that began in early July this year, points out that investment in ICTs infrastructure in Africa has also improved dramatically totaling US$ 8.0 billion in 2005 up from US$ 3.5 billion in 2000. These figures reflect an increasingly vibrant private sector investment environment which has been stimulated by the opening of most African telecommunications markets, coupled wit the establishment of independent regulators in almost 890 percent of the countries in the region.

African continent has increasingly made a dramatic progress on the use of mobile phones for its socio-economic development

Still, according to the Geneva-based International Telecommunications Union (ITU), fewer than four out of every 100 Africans have internet access, while broadband penetration is below one percent.
As a result, Africa’s 90 million inhabitants nearly 14 percent of the world’s population have access to less than a fifth of one percent of the world’s international connectivity. In contrast, Ireland’s four million people have better international connectivity than the entire African continent. The ITU, a specialized agency of the United Nations, believes that ICTs are essential for creating new skills, generating growth and technological change and are also critical; for Africa’s overall economic growth. However, ICT stakeholders have described the spread of mobile telephony as the striking progress of ICTs in Africa that is a big success stories in Africa.
According to them, Africa’s mobile market has been the fastest growing of any region over the last five years, and has grown twice as fast as the global market. It has also been a significant contributor to expanding access opportunities to a vast majority of its population.