As Africa moves to improve connectivity with a view to making modern communication services more accessible and affordable, it appears that current efforts will achieve token results because, besides being under-funded, they tend to address only part of the equation. In most countries, efforts are concentrated on extending the telecoms network, or building community telecentres beyond major towns, while little is being done to boost the supporting infrastructure.

Besides the telecommunications backbone network that enables radio, television, and Internet services, the generic term ‘ICT infrastructure’ entails complementary infrastructure such as roads and electricity that help in spreading the usage of ICT. And if Africa concentrates on telecoms infrastructure while paying lip service to the complementary infrastructure, its efforts may not bear significant fruit.

According to latest figures from the World Bank, up to 77 percent of the population of Sub-Saharan Africa - a total of 526 million people - do not have access to electricity. In effect, these people are locked out of the information society and may remain so for several decades, even as governments seek to implement rural electrification programmes and to subsidise extension of modern communication services to rural and underserved areas.

Energy supply in eastern and southern Africa remains particularly low, but even if production were boosted significantly, there would be no guarantee that the majority of rural dwellers would afford electricity. More than 70 percent of the population in the region live on less than $2 a day, and few of these would afford electricity even if it were extended to their villages. Yet, electricity is needed to run virtually all ICT services available in the region, and its availability could potentially bring in some of the millions of Africans that currently are excluded from the information society.

Percentages of the population that have access to power are telling: In Rwanda it is less than five percent, and Botswana 22 percent, which is slightly above the 17 percent average for the Southern African Development Community (SADC). In Lesotho it is 5.6 percent, with Maseru district boasting of 13.1 percent, while in Uganda it is about seven percent nationally but in rural areas it is ...

 

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