By Paolo von Schirach
President, Global Policy Institute; Professor of Political Science and International Relations at Bay Atlantic University, both in Washington, DC
Washington, DC – December 17, 2024 –The internet revolution affected every aspect of business, corporate organizations, government activities, military operations, and the lives of people in developed countries. To a lesser extent, it also changed the lives of hundreds of millions in emerging economies, depending on the degree of internet adoption and related costs and fees for companies and average consumers.
Fast changes
In the span of just a few decades, internet related technology evolved at fantastic speed. We went from copper telephone lines to satellites and fiber optic cables. These technology upgrades expanded enormously the amount of data that can be carried, and the transmission speed.
Very quickly we switched from (long forgotten) bulky and slow PCs with floppy disks to wireless internet delivered to us via small and super powerful smart phones. Almost everyone on this planet, albeit in varying degrees, is on board.
With one huge exception: Africa. Regrettably, internet adoption across the African Continent is only 37 per cent, compared to 67 per cent in the rest of the world, with peaks close to 100 per cent in the most advanced countries. This means that most Africans are not enjoying the cost savings, the productivity gains, and the greater efficiencies resulting from informatization. This is a huge problem.
Africa is behind
An interesting piece (December 14, 2024), on Freethink by Kristin Houser helps us understand how limited and expensive internet penetration prevents Africa from accelerating the speed of its development efforts.
A timeline included in the article cites the milestones that give us an idea of the slow progress:
2001 – More than half of the population of North America is now online. In sub-Saharan Africa, internet adoption is still less than 1%.
2009 – The submarine Seacom cable connecting East Africa to Europe and India becomes operational. Prior to this, East Africa was the only major region in the world without broadband internet access, leaving residents dependent on costly, unreliable satellite internet.
2013 – The African Internet Exchange System (AXIS) project launches. Its “internet exchange points” allow some nations in Africa to more than double the amount of internet traffic they route locally, from 30% to more than 70%, by 2020. This helps lower internet costs.
2020 – With the COVID-19 pandemic forcing a global shutdown, UNICEF reports that nine out of 10 school-age children in sub-Saharan Africa do not have access to the internet at home.
2021 – While 64% of sub-Saharan Africans now own a smartphone, the average cost of mobile data in the area — $6.44/mb — is higher than in any other region in the world, preventing many owners from using the devices to get online.
2024 – In sub-Saharan Africa, just 37% of people are online, compared to 67% globally. The rate of adoption is accelerating, though, and Google-backed researchers predict that 70% of the region’s population will be online by 2030.
This last bullet is aspirational, rather than factual. Google predicts the doubling of internet penetration in just a few years. This may be possible. But it would require enormous investments and successful coordination among many actors spread across the Continent.
Sadly, notwithstanding decades of efforts by multiple donors, NGOs and charities, Africa remains mostly underdeveloped and quite poor. Needless to say, assuming success, a dramatic increase in internet penetration most likely would boost the pace of Africa’s economic development.
Further behind
However, the challenges are quite daunting. In the developed world technology progresses at incredible speed, making any catch-up effort on the part of Lesser Developed Countries, LDCs, more challenging. Indeed, while Africa lags behind, the advanced economies have entered a new phase. America and China compete in the effort to develop the most advanced forms of Artificial Intelligence, AI. For sure, AI will radically revolutionize every aspect of production and industrial organization, while most Africans still lack any internet connection, fast or slow as it may be.
According to the Freethink article cited above:
“Getting sub-Saharan Africans online is the first step to closing that gap, and despite its still-low internet adoption numbers, the region is trending in the right direction — a Google-funded report by Public First, a public policy research agency, has predicted that more than half the area’s population will be online by 2026…To close the digital divide, the region first needs affordable, high-speed internet access. Its residents then need to be taught the skills needed to take advantage of the digital world.”
Google to the rescue
And here is Google’s plan. In 2007 the IT giant began to operate in Africa. Since then, it established partnerships that enabled millions to gain access, while providing funds for training a local workforce that would help in the efforts to support and grow Africa’s digital infrastructure.
Furthermore, Google created Equiano a new undersea fiber optic cable connecting Africa to Europe. Finally, as the article says: “In 2021, the tech giant announced its biggest initiative yet: a $1 billion investment over the next five years into Africa’s digital transformation.. In May 2024, Google announced its next big project as part of the investment: building Umoja, the first subsea fiber-optic cable between Africa and Australia. This will help address the two biggest barriers to closing the digital divide in the region: high data costs and connectivity challenges.”
Self-interest
These huge investments by Google and others are not about philanthropy. They are in large measure about creating a large cadre of young professionals trained in their products and systems. This means new markets and additional profits down the line.
Still, these IT investments will help Africa, as a new generation of tech-savvy entrepreneurs will engage in a vast effort to modernize the Continent’s economy via the creation of new companies seamlessly connected to the global economy.
Clearly, high speed, low cost internet alone will not be enough to fuel development. However, it should be clear to all that without state-of-the-art connectivity, no development strategy will succeed.
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