In recent weeks, the world press has reported on the potential revolutionary impact of a $650 million broadband project connecting East and Southern Africa to India and Europe. The aim is to spur the African economy, especially through technology innovation.
The fiber-optic cable that just went live is the first of several new undersea connections expected to boost Internet access in Africa between now and mid-2010. The cable is being built by a consortium, controlled primarily by African investors, with expansion costs estimated at $2.4 billion. The expanded Internet service will include Asia and parts of the Middle East.
Imagine the impact on the African continent, where some of the world’s most abject poverty exists.
Jon Gosier, a tech blogger, predicts that East Africa could become an outsourcing hub. “I think you’ll see a wave of creativity and new business opportunities as more and more Africans come online by the millions,” wrote Gosier, founder of a Uganda-based software development firm. “I think in five years or so we’ll be where places like India and Singapore are now.”
However, currently Africa is lagging behind.
In March, the International Telecommunication Union released its latest index comparing developments in “information and communication technologies” (ICT levels) in 154 countries over a five-year period from 2002 to 2007.
Many of the poorer, African countries hardly improved their already low broadband penetration rates over that five-year span. Prior to this new broadband project, only about five percent of the population in some areas used the Internet.
If the excitement is as unabashed as media reports say, it’s because of what Gosier anticipates: Major change, resulting in money in people’s pockets.
It’s not just blog talk. In its report, the Telecommunication Union, too, noted the “close relationship” between ICT levels and GDP. And in June, a World Bank report also noted the correlation between high-speed Internet access and economic growth – pointing to findings that for every 10 percentage points of increase in high-speed access, there is a 1.3 percentage point increase in economic growth.
In Africa, there will many ways to measure growth – such as in the number of children fed, or the number of textbooks in schools, or in medicines dispensed.
To be sure, the work ahead is enormous. While main Internet highways are being built, there will still be challenges reaching isolated areas.
But now there’s a great start. In a part of the world that has suffered so much, it is time for a revolution in the most positive sense.
