Experts Tie Broadband Penetration to Regulatory Efficiency

Experts have opined that regulatory efficiency holds the key to broadband penetration in the telecom sector.

This is as Nigeria ranks tops in the foreign direct investment (FDI) inflow in sub-Sahara Africa in the IT sector hitting an all time high of $25bn in 2012.

Authors Ronda Zelezny Green and Sonia Jorge, in their paper: “Regulators Hold the Key to Mobile Broadband Development in Africa Africa & Middle East Telecom Insider / Vol. 4, No 7 – October Edition;” stated that despite the glut of fibre transcending the African continent, broadband penetration has not hit a high note.

The duo noted that “while no one regulatory body has been free of missteps in this arena, a case study from Kenya provides examples of regulator actions that are helping to move their mobile broadband agendas forward in important respects.”

Kenya currently attracts more international IT vendors, who make the country their African hub.

Bitange Ndemo, Kenya’s permanent secretary, in the ministry of Information recently launched a grand project called Konza City which the country calls its’ version of the US Silicon Valley; a technology district with “office buildings for technology companies and innovation labs, as well as manufacturing plants, artificial rivers and eventually homes, schools, churches and mosques.”

The government also acquired a “2,000 hectare plot of land for the project about 60 kilometres from the capital, Nairobi and is now seeking to hire a master developer to find investors and arrange the construction. The project will come together in two phases and will take about 20 years to complete.”

Ndemo said he was inspired following a visit to the actual Silicon Valley, in California.

Both Green and Jorge said the aim of their “Insider is to highlight best practices that regulators in Africa should consider as they change regulations that will play a large role in determining the levels of access to mobile broadband on the continent through the end of the decade.”

Before now, Nigeria’s rise to the top ladder of Africa mobile market has been attributed largely to regulatory efficiency and transparency in business-to-business dealings. Nigeria’s success in its first open mobile licencing auction in 2001 had greatly led to the rush in FDI inflow into the nation’s cofers.

“While the arrival of the undersea cables has already made a discernible impact in many of the countries that have been able to connect to these lines, the fate of the evolution of mobile broadband in Africa undoubtedly rests with regulators in the markets where the cables are or could be deployed,” said Green and Jorge.

Nigeria currently runs three private undersea cables live: MainOne, Glo1 and WACS. Their availability has greatly enhanced bandwidth capacity, but they are greatly under-subscribed owning poor infrastructure to uplink the fibre to up-country from the shores of Lagos.

Ms. Funke Ope, CEO of MainOne last year blamed big telecom operators who refuse to share infrastructure to the fibres to be linked to most of the country. Nigeria lacks public investment policy on telecom infrastructure.