CLARITY IN A VISION FOR THE FUTURE OF EAST AFRICAN COUNTRIES: A STORY OF BUDGETS, ECONOMIES AND INFORMATION COMMUNICATION AND TECHNOLOGY.
Global economy
As the global economy sways like a
tanker in high seas, I would like to imagine a domino player stacking domino
chips evenly spaced on a straight line, each preferably representing a European
country, starting with Greece and ending with the most stable Nordic country,
then I would imagine if the first domino was pushed over depending on the
prevailing global situation, they would all fall, with or without austerity
measures.
Such a picture may be crude, but there
is credence in it, according to the World Economic Outlook April 2012,
published by the IMF, global economic growth is expected to constrict from 4 %
in 2011, to about 3.5% in 2012, mainly due to the sliding pendulum oscillating
between the meltdown in Europe and the momentous growth prevailing in some
Asian economies, having said that the optimism is contagious in expecting 2013 to
be generally more positive with a 4.1% estimated growth.
East Africa Community
While that is the case globally, the
EAC seems to be progressing like a steam train without brakes towards
consolidation of the customs union, the common markets and establishment of a
monetary union. With hindsight we seem to have been immune to the happenings in
Europe maybe because we are more economically linked with the emerging markets
in Asia.
The EAC budget for 2012/2013 gives a
lcear indication of the thought pattern of the partner states, for one, there
was an enhanced appreciation of technology in terms of how delivery time can be
reduced once one automates and networks, how consolidation and sharing of
information can create transparency and empower people. For example in the
aviation sector the Safety Oversight Facilitated Integration Application
(SOFIA) project, will facilitate sharing of technical data by all partner
states and enable the public to access some of the essential aviation data in
the region. Same can be said of the Governmental Financial statics (GFS) coding
system and the Budget Preparation Software that are noted in the budget.
Another important element in the budget
is that $ 10.1 million was allocated to the Inter-University Council which will
enhance support to universities on academic and networking systems and also
strengthen university support in ICT application in areas of academic, research
and other administrative functions.
The EAC budget is a good indicator of
how the EAC is advancing and maturing towards a tighter symbiotic relationship
between all the partner states, and at the same time it gives credence that to
advance, technology has to play a critical role.
Kenya
The Kenya Vision 2030, aims to achieve
“a globally competitive and prosperous newly industrializing, middle income
nation by 2030”, and to get there are three key pillars; economic, social and
political governance. Under the economic pillar, Kenya aims to offer business
process off-shoring and IT enabled services globally. To do that competitively,
there is need to develop the populace in the areas of science, technology and innovation;
and provide a sustainable and cheaply accessible infrastructure to ensure that
the services offered are world class, and
that security, transparency and accountability are prevalent.
To this end, the Kenyan budget 2012/13
had a number of items rife for the ICT subsector, which is under the Energy, Infrastructure and Information Communications Technology
(EI&ICT) sector, an enabler of sustained development. In it, Ksh. 7.2
billion was allocated to the Kenya ICT Board and all imported convertors of
analogue to digital TV’s, and imported software were exempted from duty.
In other fronts, measures were implemented to
improve electronic filling of documents at the Lands registry, companies’
registry and other key agencies imperative for business registration. All this
was done with the aim of positioning Kenya as a preferred investment
destination.
The challenges that still stifle Kenya
as it strives to achieve Vision 2030 is inadequate capacity for research, lack
of local infrastructure development capacity, which tend to go hand in hand
with the Education sector, where there is slow ICT integration and adaptation and inadequate infrastructure
and staffing. The Kenyan government hopes that Public Private Partnerships will
assist in the delivery of public infrastructure and social services.
At the end of the day, the ICT subsector
objectives is to provide a knowledge based society, and to ensure the
availability of accessible, efficient, reliable and affordable ICT services in
Kenya.
Other
elements in the budget that also need mention include, in the education sector,
a national ICT Innovation and Integration Centre was established; which aims to
provide increased integration of ICT in education, funds for computers for schools were also availed, due to low
usage of ICT and the need to provision ICT infrastructure at all levels. In the
Public administration and international relations sector, funding was also
allocated to enhance ICT capacity and infrastructure, by funding the extension
of the fiber optic to the counties.
There were
other requests that were placed in the budget but considered as potential
sources of fiscal risks and could be financed “during finalization of detailed
ministerial spending plans if savings are identified and resource envelope
firmed up”. Of interest is the Konza ICT Techno Polis - Construction and civil
works budget of Ksh. 400 million.
Uganda
As Uganda
strives to cut down on the number of business licenses required to start or run
a business, a Business Licensing Reform Committee (BLRC) was set up and its
report published in March 2012, the issues raised were identical to what is experience in
other East Africa countries; things like a lack of coordination between
government agencies and insufficient ICT solutions to integrate and streamline
administrative processes which is a great hindrance to efficient regulation of
business. A majority of regulatory
bodies if electronically setup, are not linked together, to allow the smooth
flow of information across departmental borders.
The
prominent recommendation of this report was to create a business one stop shop
by integrating and automating all business registration processes, which would
reduce time and costs associated with starting and running business. To achieve
this ICT tools were to be employed.
If you
align this with the Ugandan National Development Plan (NDP) 2010/11 – 2014/15,
whose vision it is to transform the Ugandan society from a peasant to a modern
and prosperous society within 30 years. There is a lot that will need to be
done around the low application of science and technology, gender issues,
negative attitude, cultural practices and perceptions and also empower the
population to have more skilled workers.
It is clear
that to achieve the NDP, there is more that needs to be done in terms of
promoting science, technology, innovation and ICT to enhance competitiveness in
the global scene.
If you look
at an Egg analogy depicted in the NDP, one of the primary growth sectors for
the Ugandan economy is ICT business, layered with complimentary, social
services and other enabling sectors in an overlapping manner.
The Ugandan
budget was a whopping 10,885 billion Uganda Shillings, of which only 15.63
billion (inclusive of donor projects) was placed under ICT.
According
to The Background to the Budget 2012/13
Fiscal Year, published by the Ugandan Ministry of Finance, Planning and
Economic Development, over the course
of FY2012/13 and the medium term, the priority actions that the Ugandan
government will undertake include:
a)
capacity building for the use of ICT
within government;
b)
implementation of analogue to digital
migration;
c)
development of an IT data collection,
analysis, reporting and dissemination framework and tool;
d)
operationalising the Cyber laws;
e)
extension of the NBI/EGI
Infrastructure (Phase III);
f)
commercialization of the NBI using a
PPP model;
g)
development of an alternative route to
the sea cable (Optical Fibre Optic Cable to Mutukula);
h)
developing, designing and piloting a
District Business Information Centres (DBICs) model and strategy;
i)
development and dissemination of BPO
operations standards; and
j)
setting up Information Technology
parks to host BPO and related ICT service companies
Tanzania
The
Tanzanian government started the development of the Tanzania Development Vision
2025 back in 1995, with the intent of having attained a high quality of life;
peace, tranquility and national unity; good governance; an educated society
imbued with an ambition to develop; and an economy which is competitive with
sustained growth for the benefit of all people by the year 2025.
In the
development vision it is noted that, “micro-electronic ICT are central to
competitive social and economic transformation. They are a major driving force
for the realization of the vision. However, appropriate skills and capabilities
need to be put in place, which requires adequate investments are made to
improve the quality of science based education and create a knowledge society”.
With this
in mind, the Tanzania budget 2012/13 was eventful, in his maiden speech honorable
Dr. William Mgimwas, proposed to spend a budget of TZs 15,119.6 billion. Of specific note is that he recommended to
under HS Code 8523.80.00 in order to apply the CET rate of 0 percent on
software instead of 25 percent. The measure was intended to encourage
development of ICT in the region and contribute to the economic growth. In the
same breath, Tshs. 4 billion was
allocated to ICT to strengthen communication through ICT so as to improve
access to various services including information access to domestic and
external market, revenue collection, health services, education, financial
services, etc.
A total of
TShs 128.4 billion was allocated in part to ICT to improve the business
environment and allocate specific areas for investments in urban and rural
areas and promote partnerships between public and private sectors. Similar to
what was done in Kenya Set Top boxes were zero rated under the HS Code 8528.71.0.
The measure is intended to facilitate the smooth transition of the EAC Partner
States to move from analog to digital technology by December 2015.
Rwanda
Rwanda is
an example that needs to be emulated, mainly because of the intensity and vigor
with which they embraced the Rwanda Vision 2020, and realized that to move
forth they had to embrace ICT. And not
just that, but they have been adopting a National Information and Communication
Infrastructure Plan (NICI) process, which has seen them go through three five
year rolling plans NICI I(NICI-2005 Plan), NICI II(NICI-2010 Plan) and NICI III(NICI-2015
Plan). The plans are very detailed in
terms of how they aim to become a knowledge based society by 2020. The plans
also emphasize the budgetary costs that define how annually the strategy will
be achieved.
The Rwandan
budget was set at RwF 1,385.3, and the total spend on ICT was higher than the
average in other east African economies.
In
conclusion, according to the Global Information Technology (generated by the World Economic Forum in collaboration with
INSEAD, which was developed to measure the degree to which economies
across the world leverage ICT for increased competitiveness, East Africa
countries still have a long way to go, their individual Networked Readiness
Index (NRI) are; Rwanda 82, Kenya 93, Uganda 110 and Tanzania 123
I recommend that time is invested in studying
the NRI and its essential pillars which will allow us on an annual basis to
cumulatively become more competitive in the global market as East African
countries.
Article
done for CIO East Africa July 2012 Issue
@edwin_moindi
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