While most of Africa's population has access to mobile phones, the unaffordability of data to use the Internet for content creation, instead of content consumption only, is hampering their participation in the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR), said connectivity and technology group Liquid Intelligent Technologies deputy chairperson Nic Rudnick.

He posed the question during a presentation at Africa Tech Week, being hosted in Cape Town in the week ending November 11, about how Africans would connect to 4IR if mobile phones were currently inhibitors rather than enablers of more content creation, and held back the development of new applications, new financial technologies and new services.

Although the mobile device afforded access to mobile money and other services, it was inherently a consumer device, Rudnick pointed out.  

He said the solution lay in cheaper, faster and uncapped broadband access for millions of Africans; however, he emphasised that it would need to be significantly cheaper, considering the income per capital on the continent.

Rudnick explained that poor mobile data affordability led to rationing of use and that although the cost of broadband had come down, there was only a certain percentage of income per capita available to spend on broadband in most African countries.

Currently, the cost per capita of broadband comprises more than 20% of the average income per capita. “To expect people to participate in 4IR and require them to spend 20% or more of their income to access data and digital services, is unreasonable.

“This compares to Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development countries, which have fixed broadband costs comprising an average 1.5% of per capita income. This is a reasonable benchmark of what people should be spending to have affordable bandwidth and participate in 4IR.

“In half of African countries, 1.5% of per capita income gets you less than 100 MB of data a month. Only in five African countries does 1.5% of income get you more than 1 GB of data a month,” Rudnick noted.

For example, in Kenya, almost 100% of people are connected to the Internet through mobile phones; however, half of mobile users in the country are consuming less than 100 MB of data a month. Only between 3% and 7% of mobile users in Kenya are consuming any data at all in the more remote areas of the country.

In the metropolitan areas, up to 63% of people are consuming more than 100 MB of data a month.

Rudnick questioned what people would be able to do and create if those limits were to be removed and more types of devices become justifiable for households.

Liquid has been working with a United Nations Children’s Fund initiative, called Giga, to connect every school on the continent to the Internet and thereby every young person to information and opportunities. The partners have mapped 250 000 schools in Africa, of which 5 000 are currently live on Liquid’s network.

The company is targeting 145 000 more connections in the next few years, to even the most remotely located villages on the continent.

Liquid deems it vital to connect young people today, to ensure the world has effective contributors to the economy in future.

Meanwhile, on the sidelines of Africa Tech Festival, technology companies Huawei and Informa Tech hosted the fourth Broadband Africa Forum, which had consensus that Africa is on the cusp of a broadband explosion but must address some significant challenges to ensure optimal economic benefits from it.

African Union management information system director Anderson Amlamba said one of the most obvious challenges in rolling out fixed-mobile convergence was network availability.

He proposed that governments work with operators to help ensure efficient and effective operations, rather than hindering operations.

At the forum, more companies announced their commitments to improve connectivity on the African continent, including the Africa Telecom Union (ATU). The union committed to supporting broadband universalization in all African countries and to striving to reach 35% broadband penetration in Africa by 2035.

The ATU has been rolling out broadband across the continent, owing to broadband being critical for economic development and social stability.

“We have over 700-million people across Africa that don’t have access to the Internet. We need to get fibre to a point where it can be combined with other technologies, such as fixed wireless access, to get unconnected people connected,” Amlamba concluded.

Liquid Intelligent Technologies hosted Engineering News in Cape Town for Africa Tech Festival 2022.