Africa has low levels of infrastructure development compared to other regions. As of 2007, it had 3.77 main telephone lines per 100 people but 27.48 mobile subscribers per 100, demonstrating mobile is the dominant form of connectivity. Internet penetration was just 5% of the population, far below the global average. While broadband penetration is over 1% in few countries, most of Africa lacks broadband infrastructure. However, mobile growth has been rapid at around 65% annually, showing connectivity is expanding despite challenges. OER projects can help build demand for infrastructure and provide opportunities to strengthen educational capacity even with constraints.
4. ICT Indicators from ITU 2007
Main telephone lines – 3.77/100 people
Mobile subscribers – 27.48/100 people
Internet users – 5.34/100 people
Africa has some 280 million total
telephone subscribers, of which some
260 million (over 85%) are mobile cellular
subscribers, representing the continent
with the highest ratio of mobile to total
telephone subscribers of any region in
the world.
(ITU World Telecommunication/ICT Indicators, 2007)
5. ICT Indicators from ITU 2007
It is the region with the highest mobile cellular
growth rate. Growth over the past 5 years
averages almost 65% year on year.
It accounts for 14% of the world’s population,
but for only around 7% of all fixed and mobile
subscribers worldwide.
It has some 50 million Internet users, for an
Internet penetration of just 5%. Europe’s
Internet penetration is 8 times higher.
It has a broadband penetration of more than
1% in only a few countries. Broadband
penetration in OECD countries exceeds 18%.
(ITU World Telecommunication/ICT Indicators, 2007)
10. What Does It Mean?
The data makes it easy to apply a deficit
model to project planning, but we need to
start with what we have and how we can build
off it
OER projects must work with what is available
now, not demonstrate what would be possible
if only the constraints were different
BUT paradoxically we must hold in our minds
a vision of a radically different future from the
one that current trends project – change is
always surprising because it takes so much
longer to happen than people think it will but
happens so much quicker than they expect
11. What Does it Mean?
OER projects will never resolve
infrastructure gaps, but they can help to
build demand
Given all of the above, the constraint is
not infrastructure, it is institutional
capacity
OER provides the tools to build that
capacity from any starting point, and the
problem is not a lack of human capacity,
it is a lack of opportunity