The Kenya Transparency and Communication Infrastructure Project (KTCIP) will, among other things, facilitate connectivity for the country’s emerging business process outsourcing industry, support the creation of digital villages in rural and urban areas and accelerate provision of e-Government services.
Global statistics confirm that sub-Saharan African countries exhibit the lowest ICT adoption velocity. This is principally attributed to socio-economic factors like poverty, illiteracy and inadequate infrastructure.
This variance in ICT adoption and use is christened the digital divide, a concept that describes the separation between the Internots (those who don’t have Internet connectivity) from the Internauts (those who have and effectively use Internet access).
Within the countries themselves, there exist other divides like the rural-urban, gender and age imbalances in ICT access, adoption and use. The digital divide affects the capacities of populations to effectively harness the opportunities borne by the ICT revolution.
Consequently, the Internauts reap more benefits than the Internots who are not only disadvantaged but are also significantly isolated. The situation is so grave that it cannot be ignored any longer.
Therefore, KTCIP is a God-send to bridge the divide and generate equitable business and service opportunities to most, if not all, Kenyans. KTCIP has two fundamental objectives:
- to extend the reach of ICT connectivity and reduce prices of its access; and
- to contribute to the improvement of Government efficiency and transparency through e-Government applications.
It has four main components. The first one, allocated Sh2.2 billion, deals with the development, expansion and improvement of ICT infrastructure all over the country. It will directly support the establishment, proper management and use of digital villages (Sh670 million), provision of technical ICT assistance to the government (Sh536 million), establish a Network Operations Center to manage intra-government communication networks (Sh536 million), build government ICT capacity (Sh268 million) and purchase software licenses for the government’s ICT systems (Sh268 million).
ICT connectivity is the second component and targets universities, technical colleges, business outsourcing as well as government offices and facilities.
It is allocated Sh2.2 billion out of which Sh1.2 billion will be used to boost the broadband capacity of universities and technical colleges and other related social institutions. It will also support the establishment of seamless, effective and affordable inter-university connectivity.
Sh469 million will be used to boost broadband capacity of government users. Currently, these users are accessing voice and Internet through a satellite link dimensioned at 514Kbits shared by about 6,000 computers with access to the Internet serving 170,000 civil servants.
This is too low to make any impact. Sh536 million will be used to support the Business Processing Outsourcing (BPO) industry which has been identified as a key job creation engine for the country.
The third component is aimed at supporting e-Government initiatives to transform government service transparency and delivery. It is allocated Sh2.4 billion of which Sh2 billion will be used on e-Government applications to digitize processes in key government departments like pensions administration, driver’s licence registration, High Court Registrar, company registration, land information and registration systems, among others.
A further Sh268 million will support the establishment of a Government Information Sh201 million will facilitate the development of innovative communication and information applications deployed on mobile phones via SMS and Interactive Voice Recognition (IVR) technologies.
Project administration which is allocated Sh737 million is the fourth component and will support project management, monitoring and evaluation as well as provide price and other contingencies.
The project will be managed by the new Kenya ICT Board in association with other implementing agencies like Communications Commission of Kenya (CCK), Kenya Educational Network (KENET), E-government Secretariat, Kenya BPO Society, and various Government ministries.
This Sh7.8 billion ICT windfall is bound to transform and vastly benefit the ICT sector in Kenya. The potential beneficiaries include a wide range of ICT-related product vendors, service providers, consultants and professionals. Indigenous software, website, content and system developers will also benefit from creating e-Government applications. The emerging BPO operators will finally be guaranteed local work for their call and data centres through KTCIP.
KTCIP is part of the World Bank financed Regional Communications Infrastructure Program (RCIP) designed to improve connectivity of East and Southern Africa. The project was approved by the board of World Bank on April 2 in Washington and was formally signed by the Government on May 23 in Nairobi. The project, which will run for between three to five years, commences July 2007.
Autor(en)/Author(s): Michael Ouma
Quelle/Source: The Standard, 24.06.2007
