They will come to Mauritius because the country satisfies the main criteria for any investor to succeed in their investment venture. These are:
- Mauritius is a country where all democratic norms are respected;
- There is high political stability;
- A low bracket fiscal regime;
- All profits from the venture can be moved in and out of the country without any restrictions;
- High tech IT technologies/tools needed by the investor’s business can be brought to Mauritius without any tax levied on them;
- We have a young bilingual and intelligent population which is ideal for businesses;
- Direct flights are provided to/from Mauritius to most famous business destinations worldwide twice a day. Besides, fast internet enables smooth video conferencing.
It is also interesting to note what reputed independent sources have to say about Mauritius which is ranked 47th by the World Economic Forum. For instance, Gartner considers the country as a safe ICT destination; Everest considers it as the cheapest francophone IT destination. Mauritius has obtained the Tiga Award and is rated 1st in Africa in terms of IT penetration within government services.
Coming to that, what does e-government mean for the country?
The world is becoming a global village; it is the survival of the fittest. There is no place for amateurism. Let’s take taxation, for instance. Before, it would take one month for the Mauritius Revenue Authority (MRA) to process statements of income, including three whole weeks only to open the envelopes. This resulted in problematic issues such as bounced cheques. But now, thanks to e-filing, 75% of tax payments are made online.
What about cybercrime and ICT security?
Many seminars have been organised by the government to promote ICT security best practice methods from around the world and to raise cybercrime awareness amongst companies. Besides, legislation is tough. A Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) was created to prohibit piracy from occurring in various services such as internet banking and mobile phone credit reloads. We also felt the need to protect children. In this regard, government has implemented a new filtering technology, the Centralised Online Content Filtering Solution, to prevent people from accessing paedophile sites. A black screen erupts whenever people attempt to go on such sites. When the technology was introduced in December 2010, a total of around 1,200 hits per day were recorded on those websites, then eventually as access was denied this figure fell to less than 100 hits per day.
What is your opinion on our dependency on one central Internet Service Provider, Mauritius Telecom?
For me, when we talk about democratization of information, it should mean much more than having two more private ISP operators such as Emtel and MTML, besides the central one. It means that every potential ISP operator should have access to the undersea cable connecting Mauritius to the world. This is now possible via the “open access policy” to the undersea cable facility.
The government's aim is to encourage competition amongst the operators through the “open access policy” so that ultimately, quality internet services are delivered at a lower cost to the population.
Recently, Emtel has been purchasing extra bandwidth via Indefeasible Right of Use (IRU) acquisition from Mauritius Telecom. The latter had sole right of access to some of the bandwidths within the SAFE cable but now, some of these bandwidth rights are also owned by Emtel. Another company, Belgacom, has expressed an interest in buying some bandwidths.
What about costs which determine access to those facilities. Are they affordable to young thriving companies?
Let's take corporate line prices. Mauritius Telecom, 256Kbps ADSL costs Rs 27, 000, excluding VAT per month while Emtel, 256Kbps ADSL costs Rs 15, 000, excluding VAT per month. This represents a difference of 44% on the prices and is also true for other lines. Emtel has induced competition in the market allowing companies to operate cheaper and thus promoting Mauritius as a competitive ICT destination. We want to introduce the virtuous cycle: cheaper operating costs, more profits, more employment, and in the end, Mauritians will benefit.
In the same vein, Lion 2 is coming at the end of the year to complement the existing SAFE cable and Lion 1 in terms of crude bandwidth capacity. The government is also very interested to connect Mauritius with the “Seacom cable”. An Optical cable providing 10 Mbps interconnecting the country with the rest of the world will be made available. “Optic fibre to the home” will start from 10Mbps.
The Ministry aims to achieve a double digit figure growth, 14%-15% of the GDP for the IT sector by 2013. This is a huge figure if we consider that the financial sector, one of the main pillars of the economy, contributes to 10% of GDP.
How do you intend to achieve these figures if our IT graduates from overseas refuse to come back and work in Mauritius due to the low pay bracket?
Today, the biggest problem that the ICT sector is facing in Mauritius is a lack of manpower. We have less than 30% of the required workforce capacity. The main problem with graduates from our universities is that they require a certain amount of training before being assigned critical jobs since even a small IT error can have a dramatic impact on business operations. To compensate, the government is launching an ICT academy in the coming weeks. It will be an industry-driven institution whereby it will act as a bridge between IT students and the IT sector. Graduates of the ICT academy will be automatically provided a job at the end of their training. Moreover, the academy will also cater for students with only Forms IV and V level of education.
Do you think that Mauritius should specialize in a few IT skills?
The IT sector is very young in Mauritius; it is only 15 years old compared to other industries in Mauritius. We need space and time. Still, the government is encouraging the use of ICT in many fields.
For instance, the government recently introduced the SMS Alert system to monitor absenteeism in colleges. Indeed, truancy from school is being monitored through e-register. Every morning, whenever students are late or absent their parents are immediately notified via SMS.
How about the “one laptop per child” project?
Harsh economic conditions prevented the government from achieving this goal. To compensate for this, 150 computer clubs have been created mainly in rural areas where children, jobless women and others have free access to Internet in community centres. Primary and secondary schools also have connected computer clubs. Through the PIAP project, post offices also provide access to Internet. We are also proposing free Wi-Fi in different parts of the country.
Any final words?
Our prime target was to make the ICT sector to the third position in the Mauritian economy in five years’ time. Interestingly, we achieved this in only 15 months.
I just want to contribute to the vision of the government which is “putting people first”. If along the way, we can contribute to reduce carbon emissions, provide value added services at a lower cost to customers, it’s even better.
---
Quelle/Source: Defi Media, 26.08.2011
Bitte besuchen Sie/Please visit:
