Strategic Application of ICT for Economic Development in Africa

1. ITU Workshop on “ICT Innovations in Emerging Economies” (Tunis, Tunisia, 28 – 31 January 2014) Strategic Application of ICT for Economic Development in Africa ALI YAHIAOUI , Chief ICT Officer, African Development Bank a.yahiaoui@afdb.org ali.yahiaoui1505@gmail.com

2. Presentation Outline • AfDB Group Overview • Connect Africa Summit –Kigali 2007 • Transform Africa Summit – Kigali 2013 • Strategic Application of ICT in Africa -E-Transform Africa Study

3. African Development Bank Group - Our Assistance to Africa

4. AfDB Focus and Strategy Governance Infrastructure Regional Integration Private sector Development Higher Education and Science & Technology

5. Strategic Thrust for the Bank’s ICT Medium Term Strategy & Action Plan Medium -term Focus ICT Priority Areas Country Focus Gender, climate change

6. 2. Connect Africa Summit 2007 • In 2007 Connect Africa Summit in Kigali, five goals were set : • Goal 1: Interconnect all African capitals and major cities with ICT broadband infrastructure and strengthen connectivity to the rest of the world by 2012 • Goal 2: Connect African villages to broadband ICT services by 2012 and implement initiatives such as community telecentres and villages phones • Goal 3: Adopt key regulatory measures that promote affordable, widespread access to a full range of broadband ICT services • Goal 4: Support the development of a critical mass of ICT skills required by the knowledge economy through the establishment of ICT centers of excellence and ICT-capacity building and training centers • Goal 5: Adopt a national e-strategy, including a cyber security framework, and deploy at least one flagship e-government service as well as e-education and e-health services using accessible technologies in each country in Africa by 2012, with the aim of making multiple e-government and other e-services widely available by 2015.

7. 3. Transform Africa Summit –Kigali 2013 • From 2007 – 2013 Africa concentrated on building ICT national broadband backbone/regional infrastructures • Objectives of the Trans –Africa Summit: • To pool together International participants to set a new agenda for Africa to leapfrog development challenges through the use and uptake of Broadband and related services. • To leverage on the progress registered in connectivity since the Connect Africa Summit and use technology to reduce poverty, enhance participation, improve service delivery and create prosperity for our people • To accelerate sustainable socioeconomic development on the continent and usher Africa into the knowledge economy through affordable access to Broadband and usage of Information and Communications Technologies (ICT).

8. Transform Summit 2013.. • Outcome of the Summit • The Transform Africa Summit agreed on a manifesto comprising five principles. • Principle 1: To put ICT at the center of our national socio-economic development agenda • Principle 2: To improve access to ICT especially Broadband to build on the continent’s progress in connectivity especially in underserved areas • Principle 3: To improve accountability, efficiency and open Develop and implement national e-Government policies and open Data initiatives. • Principle 4: To put the Private Sector First: foster an enabling environment for private investments to drive job creation, productivity and competitiveness supported. • Principle 5: To leverage ICT to promote sustainable development

9. 4. eTransform Africa Study: Objectives • Take stock of emerging uses and applications of ICTs that are having transformative effects on social and economic development • Identify key ICT applications (Africa and worldwide) that have the potential for replications and scaling up • Identify constraints that negatively impact ICT adoption and scaling up, including in policy and regulatory environment • Develop a common framework among stakeholders, development partners and the donor community for future ICT interventions

10. Sectors and Case Studies

11. Lessons from the eTransform sectoral studies • i. Agriculture • Case studies : • Analysis of the use of RFID tags for tracking livestock in Botswana • ICT sensor networks used in water management for irrigation • The cases show how ICT can help address some of the challenges facing agriculture and food security in Africa. • Esoko( in Ghana) is another good example of ICT in improving agricultural market information services • ii. Climate Change • Case studies: Malawi, Senegal and Uganda. • ICTs role to the impacts of climate change on the potential consequences of climate change, vulnerability to projected impacts, identifying priorities for adaptation

12. Lessons from the sectoral studies • iii. Education • Case studies in South Africa and Uganda. • A critical element concerns : • - access learning materials and collaboration platforms. • - Connectivity for accessing learning resources. • iv. Health • Case studies of Ethiopia and Mali. • Example: as exemplified by the IKON teleradiology program in Mali. • v. Modernizing Government through ICT • Case studies: • Integrated financial management systems in Malawi; • electronic tax filing in South Africa.

13. Lessons from the sectoral studies vi. Financial Services • Case studies : Senegal, Kenya. • Mobile banking has reached a tipping point in Africa and now is the time for policy makers to act boldly. • Financial inclusion has improved in Kenya - where active bank accounts have grown fourfold since 2007 aided by some 17 million M-PESA mobile money accounts.

14. Lessons from the sectoral studies • Regional trade and Integration • The cross-cutting study included case studies of Botswana, Kenya and Senegal • The studies focused • on ICT use in • governance, logistics • and cross-border • information exchange • mechanisms. ICTs and trade – the supporting environment

15. Lessons from the sectoral studies viii. ICT Competitiveness Case studies of Kenya, Morocco and Nigeria. Provided the African ICT market continues its impressive double-digit growth, the market could be worth more than US$150 billion by 2016.

16. 5. CONCLUSION • Africa’s challenge for this decade is to build on the mobile success story and broadband progress to complete the transformation. • Now is the time for rigorous evaluation, replication, innovation and scaling up of best practice. • To be able to do this it will require: • i) reducing the cost of access for mobile broadband • ii) supporting government private-sector collaboration • iii) improving the eCommerce environment • iv) enhancing ICT labor market skills • v) encouraging innovative business models that drive employment, such as microwork and BPO • vi) creating spaces that support ICT entrepreneurship, such as ICT incubators, and local ICT development clusters.