1. No category

Journal of Economic Research
www.advancejournals.org
Open Access Scientific Publisher
Research Article
THE ROLE OF TECHNOLOGY IN THE SUSTAINABLE ECONOMIC
DEVELOPMENT: THE CASE OF AFRICA
Sally Farid1
1
Institute of African Researches and Studies, Cairo University, Egypt
Correspondence should be addressed to Sally Farid
Received March 20, 2015; Accepted April 28, 2015; Published April 04, 2015;
Copyright: © 2015 Sally Farid et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons
Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the
original work is properly cited.
Cite This Article: Farid, S. (2015). The Role of Technology in the Sustainable Economic Development: the Case of
Africa. Journal of Economic Research, 1(1). 1-9
ABSTRACT
The purpose of this paper is to study under what conditions technological innovation can foster and promote sustainable
development. It considers all forms of technological innovations that are potentially conducive to sustainable development.
This article examines how technology has contributed in promoting sustainable economic development and particularly in
Africa. It presents the concept of Sustainable Economic Development and the Sustainable Economic Development
Strategies, discusses existing technologies in sustainable development, shows the role of technology in sustainable
development, and presents the information and communication technology to promote economic development in Africa and
the obstacles to set up policies for innovation and technology in Africa. Several working methods were used; one aspect
common to all the methods used is that we have favored a multidisciplinary approach, which takes account of technological,
ecological, economic, institutional and social aspects.
KEY WORDS: Technology, Sustainable Economic Development, ICT in Africa.
INTRODUCTION
M
aking technological innovation serve sustainable
development is a complex challenge, because the concepts
of innovation and sustainable development both cover
several aspects. In this day and age, the role of technology
in improving the lives of people cannot be underestimated.
Most people, including minorities, more than ever before
are now buying goods and services online, sending
messages across the globe to loved ones, sending emails to
donor agencies for support and receiving instant replies
(Ebeling, 2003). The issue of network technology has been
one of the fundamental problems affecting development in
Africa since 1960. These issues of connectivity and
networking are some of the fundamental setbacks that the
grassroot developing companies in Africa are facing since
the Internet boom of the early 1990s (Moodley, 2002 &
2005). With this boom, communication for developmental
issues has been strengthened. However, there have been
some setbacks in terms of Internet literacy and accessibility
(Lister, 2002). Not everyone in the third world has the
knowledge and ability to use the computer, let alone
owning one. This entire notion of the digital divide has
affected development adversely (Wilkins, 2000).
This article examines how technology has contributed in
promoting sustainable economic development and
particularly in Africa. This is an initial exploratory study
that is accomplished through a critical literature review.
The methods were used, in the theoretical approach, based
on the discussion of current literature; we give priority to a
confrontation of sources from different fields, particularly
confrontation between social studies on innovation and
studies on sustainable development. To characterize the
technologies conducive to sustainable development, an
inventory of innovations was taken on the basis of a sample
of articles in the specialized press, and a method of
classification was developed. A comparative analysis grid
was drafted to review some African Countries.
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This paper is divided into six parts; Part one presents the
concept of Sustainable Economic Development and the
Sustainable Economic Development Strategies. Part two
discusses
existing
technologies
in
sustainable
development. Part three shows the role of technology in
sustainable development. Part four presents the
information and communication technology to promote
economic development in Africa. Part five discusses the
obstacles and the challenges to set up policies for
innovation and technology in Africa. Part six provides
conclusion.
PART
ONE:
THE
CONCEPT
OF
SUSTAINABLE
ECONOMIC
DEVELOPMENT AND THE SUSTAINABLE
ECONOMIC
DEVELOPMENT
STRATEGIES
During the past decade, Global Urban Development
(GUD) has created a systematic approach to Sustainable
Economic Development Strategies. The key GUD insight
is the recognition that an effective response to the global
environmental/climate crisis can be the greatest economic
opportunity of the 21st Century.
Global Urban Development (GUD) has formulated a
framework for Sustainable Economic Development
Strategies to assist communities, cities, counties, regions,
states, provinces, and nations to accelerate progress toward
a sustainable economy. From the GUD perspective, there
are three basic forms of Sustainability:
Sustainability 1.0—Environmental Protection.
Sustainability 2.0—Climate Action.
Sustainability 3.0—Sustainable Economic Development.
Sustainability 3.0—Sustainable Economic Development—
combines two seemingly disparate ideas into a powerful
new concept, connecting the environment/climate crisis
with the opportunity for large-scale economic prosperity—
asserting that the imperative to address the
environment/climate crisis offers the greatest economic
opportunity of the 21st Century (Nixon & Weiss).
2
Sustainable Economic Development Strategies generate
substantial economic and employment growth and
sustainable business and community development by
demonstrating that innovation, efficiency, and conservation
in the use and reuse of all natural and human resources is
the best way to increase jobs, incomes, productivity, and
competitiveness. In addition, Sustainable Economic
Development Strategies are the most cost-effective method
of promoting renewable energy and clean technologies,
protecting the environment, and preventing harmful
impacts from climate change. By implementing
Sustainable Economic Development Strategies based on
technological innovation and resource efficiency, places
can grow their economies, improve their standards of
living, and expand businesses, jobs, and incomes (Nixon &
Weiss).
The 4 Core Objectives of Sustainable Economic
Development
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Global Urban Development has evolved the Sustainable
Economic Development Strategic Framework to provide a
comprehensive methodology for assisting in the design and
implementation of Sustainable Economic Development
Strategies focused on four core objectives, which GUD
refers to as the Four Greens:
i.
ii.
iii.
iv.
Green Savings: Encouraging businesses, families,
communities, and governments to cut costs and
save money by efficiently using renewable
resources and by reducing and reusing waste, with
the goal of all businesses becoming Green
Businesses.
Green
Opportunities:
Growing Cleantech
companies, jobs, and incomes through business
development and expansion of the markets for
products and services that conserve resources and
prevent pollution.
Green Talent: Investing in the fundamental assets
of education, research, technological innovation,
and modern entrepreneurial and workforce skills,
because people are now the world’s most vital
green economic resource.
Green Places: Promoting Eco-Smart Development
that features low-impact, mixed-use, resourceefficient design and utilizes multi-modal
transportation, sustainable infrastructure, and
green energy to protect and enhance the natural
and built environment, leading to communities
and regions that are more attractive, livable,
healthy, vibrant, prosperous, and productive.
Green Savings addresses the demand side of markets for
green products and services, while Green Opportunities
deals with the supply side of green markets. Green Talent
focuses on the human resources dimension of green
markets, and Green Places focuses on the geographic
dimension of green markets both of them relate to the
demand side and to the supply side (Nixon & Weiss).
Sustainable Economic Development Strategies
It is also very important to pay close attention to the
business model that is built into each Sustainable
Economic Development Strategy. A Sustainable Economic
Development Strategy should not just result in costs.
Rather the Strategy should generate the revenues to pay for
implementing the strategy and/or provide a return on the
investment of the funds needed to implement the Strategy.
It is legitimate for governments to use a portion of
increases in business permits and other licensing fees,
property taxes, sales taxes, transfer taxes, income taxes,
valued added taxes, and other sources of revenue—directly
or indirectly attributable to a Sustainable Economic
Development Strategy—as a way to pay for its expenses.
However, it is also important for the Sustainable Economic
Development Strategy to look for all of the other potential
sources of income and financial support to supplement
government expenditures. The Sustainable Economic
Development Strategy as a whole and each of the
Initiatives and Actions to be incorporated in the Strategy
should include an aggressive pursuit of ways to generate
and support income (Nixon & Weiss).
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PART
TWO:
TECHNOLOGIES
DEVELOPMENT.
THE
EXISTING
IN
SUSTAINABLE
The existing global innovation system fails to meet the
need for innovation and access to technologies required to
meet sustainable development goals. Harvey Brooks’
(1980) definition of technology is "knowledge of how to
fulfill certain human purposes in a specifiable and
reproducible way". The term "innovation" broadly to
encompass not only the processes by which new
technologies are invented, but also the processes by which
a pool of inventions gets narrowed down for further
development, produced, initially adopted, transitioned into
sustained use, and then becomes either adapted so that
they are better-suited to end-user needs or retired in favor
of another technology. In general, for systems of
innovation to support sustainable development, they must
do more than promote invention. Technologies and their
benefits must be also accessible and well-adapted,
particularly for use by the poorest or most vulnerable, and
they must ultimately be integrated into local contexts that
will
vary
economically,
politically
and
culturally (Harindranath & Sein, 2007).
This pattern of uneven and insufficient innovation is due in
part to several distinct dynamics. First, many technologies
provide positive externalities that transcend the control of
firms or individual nation states, and are therefore subject
to free-rider problems that lead to under-production by
both markets and national innovation systems. Second, in
comparison to industrialized countries, developing
countries tend to offer smaller market incentives to private
inventors and have weaker national innovation systems to
encourage domestic invention, leading to fewer or poorlyadapted technologies for use in such countries. Third,
incentive systems for innovation can reward inventors, but
at the cost of end-user access—for example, high prices for
inventions can impede access for the populations most in
need of new technologies, such as medicines, off-grid
energy supply or water purification devices (Harindranath
& Sein, 2007).
Addressing these problems requires effective institutional
arrangements at local, national and global levels. In recent
years, these challenges of harnessing technological
innovation for sustainable development have begun to be
addressed through a variety of "interventions" in the global
innovation system.
Examples include financing
arrangements, networks of scientific researchers, prioritysetting processes, measures to facilitate sustained use and
widespread access to a technology, international aid and
trade agreements, and feedback loops connecting end-users
and inventors/adapters. In general, these interventions
have altered the rules, norms, resources or organizational
configurations that shape the behavior of major actors,
including governments, private firms, researchers and endusers. While the past decade has seen a number of new
system interventions piloted in a wide range of sectors,
they are generally poorly described, little known beyond
their respective sectors and therefore not contributing as
much as they might to understanding or strengthening the
global innovation system for sustainable development.
Knowledge of what is most likely to work is either
insufficient, or fragmented across different sectors, such
that the global innovation system continues to
underperform relative to its potential or the scope of
sustainability needs (Harindranath & Sein, 2007).
Environment and development issues are always complex
problems requiring information from many sources. The
following dimensions are as many points of view to take
into account:
i.
ii.
iii.
iv.
v.
Disciplines
(economical,
environmental,
sociological, institutional),
Period,
time
and
cycles
(generations,
irreversibility, recovery time),
Space and scale (global dimensions, finished
worlds, charge capacity),
Translation tools, models and languages for
assessing the relations and for bringing together
the basic information in a coherent framework;
Communication between actors interest conflicts,
different levels of power, of background or
personality, of political orientation (Kestemont &
Hecq, 1996).
Information technology tools and communication
infrastructures, and especially the World Wide Computer
Network (Internet) can help the individuals, and mainly
the decision makers to improve their capacity to 'think
globally', or to interact with different representative groups
in order to find, step by step, the best possible solutions for
a more sustainable development. The only problem today
is that the communication capacity of the entire human
information technology system is too low in comparison
with the fluxes of information needed for sustainable
development. Agenda 21 (UNEP, 1992) and the United
Nations Commission on Sustainable Development (1995)
agreed that a set of new indicators would be necessary for
sustainable decisions. Basic data are more close to the
reality, but are not workable for the decision makers.
Derived data, indicators and indices give a more readable
image of the reality and can be compared, aggregated,
combined, discussed, presented in charts and maps for a
better implication of the different actors involved in the
decision making process. Indices and indicators are more
visible, even if they are far from the reality (Kestemont &
Hecq, 1996).
The challenges of
innovation policies
sustainable
development
for
Sustainable development poses many challenges for
collective monitoring systems and incentives to innovate:
i.
ii.
iii.
Filling market gaps as concerns technologies
conducive to sustainable development, by using
various schemes to narrow the gap between the
private return and the return to society, between
the current and future generations.
Supporting dissemination of clean technologies,
low on consumption of resources, by favoring the
dissemination of information and knowledge.
Promoting technological diversity, to avoid
getting locked into technologies which may
present long-term risks.
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iv.
v.
vi.
Reinforcing the long-term innovation capacity by
favoring the development of skills and strategic
prospecting.
Laying down procedures to improve coherence of
the various agents, to encourage appropriation of
technologies by users and by society.
Encouraging citizen participation in developing
effective scenarios for a social-economic
assessment of technological choices (Patris, et al.
2001).
PART
THREE:
TECHNOLOGY
DEVELOPMENT
THE
ROLE
OF
IN
SUSTAINABLE
Sustainable development policies seek to change the nature
of economic growth rather than limit it. They are premised
on the belief that continual growth in a finite world is
possible through the powers of technology, which will
enable us to find new sources or provide alternatives if a
particular resource appears to be running out. Otherwise,
technology will help us use and reuse what we have left in
the most efficient manner. The tools of sustainable
development are aimed at achieving technological changes
such as recycling, waste minimization, substitution of
materials, changed production processes, pollution control
and more efficient usage of resources used (Beder, 1994).
To allow communication for sustainable development, it is
necessary today to improve:
i.
ii.
iii.
iv.
Information storage and processing infrastructure,
Communication channels and terminals (80% of
the world's population have no access to the
telephone);
Interactive
communication
efficiency
and
velocity.
Standardization (of data, of metadata, of
interchange protocols and formats,);
The two first points will depend on:
i.
ii.
reduction of the costs of IT;
policy of equal distribution between the rich and
the poor.
The evolution of the IT market shows a drastic reduction of
the costs implied (if compared with their performances):
telephone terminals are now accessible for average villages
in Africa but computer or internet terminals are already too
expensive for even the poorest people (Kestemont & Hecq,
1996).
4
Improving information technology is a way to improve the
decision making process to be more reliable and less risky
in its results, because it would accelerate the way of
making reliable information from ground measurements,
and allow more transparency in the modelling processes.
Higher the communication capacity, higher the potential of
humanity's
sustainable
development.
Information
technology gives powerful tools - for sustainable
development (Kestemont & Hecq, 1996).
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Obstacles to the distribution of technologies conducive to
sustainable development are not principally due to a deficit
in available technologies. These technologies have very
different degrees of maturity. The maturity, demonstration
and validation phases have an important weight on factors
which explain the success or failure of the dissemination of
innovations. The effects of environmental policies on
innovation are undeniably positive, but the responses of
companies are very flexible (Patris, et al. 2001).
The Policies to stimulate technological innovation
conducive to sustainable development must take account of
the flexibility of the responses to environmental constraints
and the diversity of strategies. A strong point of innovation
policies is that they can play an integrating role with regard
to industrial policies and environmental policies, and they
can influence urban planning, employment and vocational
training policies. Another strong point is their capacity to
induce anticipation of future technologies. Transformation
of policies to stimulate innovation can be seen from two
standpoints. On one hand, criteria on the quality of the
environment and sustainable development have made a
significant, but still insufficient, breakthrough in the
traditional schemes for supporting innovation: aids and
subsidies, financial incentives, guidance systems. In
addition, new types of actions are appearing or being
reinforced: clustering, consortiums of R&D across several
sectors, voluntary agreements, public/private partnerships,
communication actions, organization of interaction
between researchers and users. Conversely, it seems that
human resource and skill management, particularly the
development of skills, and the mobility of R&D personnel
and the capacity to communicate, are still weak links in the
chain of the innovation process conducive to sustainable
development (Patris, et al. 2001).
Conceptualizing ICT in the Development Context
The framework developed by Harindranath and Sein
(2007), presents three different conceptualizations of ICT:
its use, how it is viewed and how it impacts development
(see Figure 1). With regard to ICT use, they draw at least
four different conceptualizations of the use of ICT in
national development from the literature: as a commodity,
as supporting development activities, as a driver of the
economy, and directed at specific development activities.
With regard to how ICT is viewed, they use the
classification of the ICT artifact proposed by Orlikowski
and Iacono (2001) in terms of four different
conceptualizations: tool view, computational view,
ensemble view, and proxy view. They then argue that
these views of ICT represent a hierarchy when applied in
the context of national development. With regard to impact
of ICT on national development, they use the framework
proposed by Malone and Rockart (1991) and adopted by
Sein and Ahmad (2001) and developed by Harindranath
and Sein (2004) in the context of ICT and national
development.
Journal of Economic Research
Figure 1: Integrative framework of ICT in development (Harindranath & Sein, 2007)
This model posits that new technologies impact society
through three effects: the first order or primary effect (i.e.,
simple substitution of old technology by the new), the
second order or secondary effect (i.e., an increase in the
phenomenon enabled by the technology) and the third
order or tertiary effect i.e., the generation of new
technology related businesses and societal change
(Harindranath & Sein, 2007).
Firstly, the manner in which ICT is viewed represents a
hierarchy in that the tool and computational views, while
essential for understanding the ICT artifact, do not have
much developmental impact, that we need to move up
from the tool and computational view to the ensemble and
ultimately the proxy view, where the proxy view is defined
in terms of knowledge creation. Secondly, the manner in
which ICT is used categorizes how different types of ICTrelated development initiatives can be applied to affect
development. Thirdly, although the impact concept has a
hierarchy by definition (i.e., the tertiary effect of a new
technology has a greater impact on society than the
secondary effect), the primary and secondary effects are
necessary conditions for development, but not sufficient.
So we need to look at the tertiary effects for an
understanding of ICT influence on national development
which they conceptualize in terms of human development
(Harindranath & Sein, 2007).
PART FOUR: THE INFORMATION AND
COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY TO
PROMOTE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
IN AFRICA
Africa is still lacking behind in superhighway technology.
Even though there is some glimmer of hope in the horizon
with the example of South Africa, Senegal in the sub
Saharan region of Africa and almost all the Northern
countries like Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco and Libya, there
are still inherent problems with respect to the Internet. The
Internet enjoys greater utility in the western countries due
in part to the increase subscription rates. Almost all
households have telephone lines and many users have the
wireless personal communication services like cellular
phones, palm pilots, laptop computers that can easily be
connected to the Internet. These gadgets are also present in
most African countries, but the cost of purchasing and
maintaining them is a lot more expensive for them when
compared to situations in the West. This is one of the
reasons why the Internet is going to take a while before
becoming a vital communicative medium in Africa. For the
purpose of economic development in terms of creating
telecenters for Africa’s goods and services, there are
advantages as well as disadvantages (Langmia, 2005).
The advantage of using the Internet to sell Africa’s goods is
that turnover rates will rapidly increase. Most buyers who
love certain ethnic items in Africa but who are living in
Europe can just go online and purchase them and have
them delivered right home within a short period of time.
The only problem lies with transportation and security.
With the low accountability, breakdown in communication
and poor quality or poor products that Africa is certainly
being confronted with, it becomes difficult to achieve the
dream of technological revolution (Langmia, 2005).
The same argument can be applied to the study by Faux
(2005). He claims that Africa does not need to pass
through the needle of industrialization like Europe but
actually experience a leap to gaining developmental
growth through technology. The question is how that is
possible when fundamental issues of economic, social and
political backwardness still haunt the continent? Bribery
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and corruption remain the cankerworm that impedes
development in the continent. Authorities in Africa have
allowed lawlessness and lack of accountability by public
officials to go unchecked. The case of Mumbutu Sese Seko
of former Zaire and Sani Abacha of Nigeria who siphoned
their countries wealth with impunity are cases in point.
Numerous cases of this nature are still abounds in the
continent. Adjibolosoo (2005) corroborates this point when
he states that ‚scholars of development theory often
suggest that African countries (ACs) are unable to achieve
real progress because there are too many incidents of
embezzlement, bribery and corruption‛ (p. 91).
How can technology progress be possible when the
infrastructures that go along with Internet like basic
telephone lines are still a distant dream to a vast majority
of Africans? For technology like the Internet to gain a
foothold in the African continent, Africa needs to resolve
the problems of bureaucracy, dictatorship, economic
stagnations, war, literacy crisis and cultural importations.
The western powers need to stop manipulating Africa as an
ancillary continent that must succumb to western models
of modernity. Africa’s cultural, economic and social worth
ought to be recognized as vital for her development. This is
why other scholars have proposed alternative model for
Africa when foreign models fail to reconcile with existing
structures. The development communication model by
Melkote, (2000) could be implemented in Africa. He
proposed a participatory communication development
model which entails bilateral interchange of knowledge.
‚Participatory decision making required knowledge
sharing between the ‚experts‛ and the ‚beneficiaries‛ of
development projects‛ (p.41).
PART FIVE: THE OBSTACLES AND
CHALLENGES TO SET UP POLICIES FOR
INNOVATION AND TECHNOLOGY IN
AFRICA
Conradie and Jacobs (2003) have outlined six challenges
that Africa is facing. The first of these challenges is striking
a balance between technology and the need for local
development. Most African countries face the challenge of
bringing ICT to the rural areas. The need to satisfy the
exigencies of the local indigenes and at the same time
develop other sectors of the economy that do not warrant
technology is one of the main tasks that the country is
facing. One of the major setbacks for technology is
consulting with local chiefs and councilors and making
them see the need for Internet in their area.
6
Conradie and Jacobs (2003) argue that since technology is
coming from outside, it does not address the local
problems. Some of these local problems involve literacy in
technology. The number of Internet illiteracy in Africa is
alarming given the fact that educational quest for most of
them in the past had been sacrificed in the fight for
liberation. Now that another new education (Internet
communication) is coming to the fore front, there has to be
adequate infrastructure within the rural setting itself to
educate the people on how to use the technology. Another
problem that Africa is facing is long queues to the Internet
cafes that are formed in the rural areas. The number of
people willing to have access outweighs the number of
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computers that are at their disposal. Hall (1998) makes this
assertion about Africa’s problems and the Internet:
Africa’s information infrastructure is by far least developed
in the world, that Africans have the smallest number of
telephone lines per capita, the most restricted access to
computer equipment, the most primitive information
networks, and the most inaccessible media systems. (p.2)
Lovink and Riemens (1996) have outlined one of the many
hurdles that Africa is facing. They emphasize that America
through NAFTA is linking herself with the South
American continents; Japan is integrating with the ‘great
Asian Commonwealth while the European Union is
moving away from the Atlantics. Africa will then be left
alone to face her own destiny. Since technology has to do
with connectivity, it is only anybody’s guess to chart the
technological future of Africa.
The other challenge that Africa is facing according to
Conradie and Jacobs (2003) is the fact that many rural
areas in Africa do not yet form part of the national
electricity grid. This is particularly an acute problem since
technology and the Internet can only be very effective if it
is generated by electricity. Africa must first ensure that the
rural areas are electrified before investing on dialup
Internet technology. Canessa, Postogna and Radicella
(1999) have introduced another difficulty that is besetting
the Internet business for development in Africa: The
bandwidth for the limited telecommunication lines is
causing congestion and making reception and transmission
very slow. To optimize the use of the limited bandwidth
seems to be the way out for such a problem.
With these kinds of ailment plaguing the continent, there is
the need for Africa to tackle the fundamental problems first
before bringing in technology to help development. There
are still other problems associated with connectivity in
Africa in general. These problems range from the issue of
integrating the local languages into the system, varying and
updating the contents of materials that are posted on the
websites and most importantly, the question of security
(Kamel and Weigler, 2001).
One of the ways to bring most Africans to benefit from the
new technology without falling prey to the digital divide
syndrome is creating telecenters that would bring people
together to meet in specifically designed areas to
communicate with others at home and abroad. Senegal
seems to be the leading country in Africa that is exploiting
this initiative (Benjamin, 2000). These telecenters are
found both in the urban as well as in the rural. Almost all
the remote corners of the country have telecenters
supported by private companies. This initiative by Senegal
could be interpreted as a way to promote democracy in the
society. However, McCormick (2002) disagrees with the
whole notion of using the Internet to promote democracy.
She argues that the vast majority of Internet users in Africa
are male and so the question of promoting democracy
through the Internet is misleading.
Though the challenges for using the Internet for
development in Africa abound, other scholars have seen
some burgeoning growth with respect to the use of the
Internet. In spite of the rather bleak picture on the future of
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the Internet, De Beer (2001) has seen the positive effect of
governmental input in bringing about social change
through the Internet in Africa. The government subsidized
the Personal Information Terminal (PIT) introduced by the
ministry of Communication and promoted the setting up of
the media development and diversity agency (MDDA)
charged with training expertise with new technological
skills, to help educate the grass root population. The result
of that endeavor will, in the near future, yield dividend
because: The MDDA will support projects that enable
media to promote democratic and socioeconomic rights
through their operations and/or content, such that the
public and communities are empowered to actively
participate in development. This would include, for
example, promoting race and gender equality, education,
health care, improved basic services, job creation and
environmental awareness. (p.149)
This is indicative of the fact that a new technological face
lift for Africa is in the offing. The key challenge is
spreading this new skill to the rural masses so that in the
long run the gap between the literate and the illiterate is
narrowed. In a study of Faux (2005), he states that Africa
does not need to go through the industrial stages that
Europe went through in order to be economically self
sufficient. Africa, according to him can make a leap into
the superhighway technology and gain fast economic
growth. Africa is still experiencing economic slow growth.
The slow pace of economic growth in the continent is
blamed on national leaders who still carry neocolonial
mentality. Meaningful development they believe should
still be top down. The North should still design and
implement developmental programs in the continent.
However, this implementation, most times, are marred by
inefficiencies and corruption.
One of the main findings for this paper has been the
positive as well as the negative contributions of the
Internet in bringing about developmental changes in
Africa. The sub Saharan Africa has the most inaccessible
media systems in the world has further complicated the
issue of looking up to technology as the solution to Africa’s
economic, social and political developments. The
telephone lines per capita in Africa are the lowest in the
world has again painted a bleak picture of the role of the
Internet as a force to foster development. This is because
the Internet system that can be cheap for everyone to afford
in Africa can only be the dialup. Cable modem and
broadband could be very expensive to manage in a system
where government subsidies for improving the media
systems are hard to come by (Langmia, 2005).
Another significant finding for this paper has been the
research work done by Lovink and Riemens (1996). Their
study about the unions of the Americas under the NAFTA
treaty, the Japanese and the Asian treaties and the
European countries getting together to form a bloc has
further aggravated the African connectivity problems. The
fact that these countries are getting together to mutually
link with each other is very helpful for development. They
may have to share one spectrum and maybe one media
policy. This could help reduce individual subscription rates
thereby reducing the gap of digital divide. When Africa is
compartmentalized and working in isolation there is every
reason to suppose that it will be expensive for individuals
to get connected to the Internet so as to communicate
easily, buy and sell goods and services online, advertise
online, and debate online. This finding also shows the hard
and difficult road that the continent has to trudge.
Adams (1996) has pointed out another problem that Africa
must wrestle with in order to smoothly use the Internet as
a tool for development. She suggests that if Africa could
first of all tackle the fundamental problems of debt and
declining resources, then it is on the right track to use the
Internet. Africa should wait to tackle this endless struggle
with debt crisis and rescheduling with the Britton Woods
before bringing technological development to children in
public schools, universities and government. The issue of
Africa’s debt burden can be overcome by equitable
distribution of scarce human resources like oil wealth.
Nigeria is presently undergoing an oil crisis because the
people who are the primary beneficiary of the wealth like
in the people of the Niger Delta are being sidelined and the
oil companies and government officials are looting the
wealth. The same situation pertains in South Africa as
DeBeers and Oppenheimer are still monopolizing the
diamond production and ‚to protect their earnings from
Africa, these companies branched out and ‚globalized‛
their tentacles, long before the word ‚globalization had
even been invented‛ (Cameron, 2000, p. 30).
But a more important finding has been that of Kamel and
Wiegler (2001). They have looked at another issue
concerning digital divide. To them, digital divide does not
only mean the absence of access or the lack of it. Rather,
digital divide has primarily to do with the lack of local
languages being introduced or integrated in the Internet.
This can cause a significant setback to a population like
that of Africa that have numerous indigenous languages
and most of these languages are not French or English. The
absence of African languages in the pool of Internet
integrated languages of operation has greatly affected the
way the populace can use it for communicative and
developmental purposes.
Other significant findings of this paper are the issue of
imports and exports of software and hardware that can
effectively run the ICT systems. In fact, according to
Benner (2003), Globalization has come to impose certain
burden on the local industries to abide by what obtains in
the entire world without taking cognizance of the fact that
there are uniqueness that has to be addressed with respect
to individual nations and continents. Now that Africa is
embracing globalization, it has to sacrifice internal growth.
The growing rate of imports of western goods is damaging
the rapid expansion of local produce.
This is what creates a worrisome situation. Instead of
depending on the West for the manufacture of the software
and hardware, South Africa could develop her own
manufacture industry with the support of the West and in
that case, the rest of Africa can then import relatively
cheap software and hardware from South Africa through a
free market system that enable free movements of goods
and services. The telecommunication regulatory policies in
South Africa have been liberalized in a way that exports of
communication services are encouraged. Presently, South
Africa’s phone company MTN has expended its services to
some African countries including Cameroon. With this
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7
Journal of Economic Research
gesture, Hodge (2000) sees hope in the horizon. He
maintains that ‚so far all network operators are expanding
into African markets, with MTN the most significant
player‛ (p.378). With this, African telecommunication
markets would no longer be dependent on the West.
Another significant factor about South Africa’s
telecommunication policy is that it had signed the WTO
telecommunication agreement on commitment to market
liberalization (Hodge, 2000). These are positive insights to
job creation and efficient productivity for the South Africa
and the continent of Africa.
Lastly, among all the rather negative findings about the use
of the Internet in bringing about social change in Africa in
general, there has been a positive finding in the work of De
Beers (2001). He has found the great role the Internet
plays in changing lives and moving the community forward
in South Africa through the MMDA. This media agency
trains grassroots personnel as experts who should go about
teaching the grass root members how to use the Internet.
This is the key to introduce the Internet to the people who
are still getting use to western style technology.
In addition to a positive finding in the work of Aker and
Mbiti (2010), they found that Mobile phone usage in subSaharan Africa has grown significantly over the past
decade and now covers 60 percent of the population. They
show that mobile phones have the potential to benefit
consumer and producer welfare, and perhaps broader
economic development. One of the most direct economic
impacts of mobile phones in Africa is through job creation.
With an increase in the number of mobile phone operators
and greater mobile phone coverage, labor demand within
these sectors has increased. For example, formal sector
employment in the private transport and communications
sector in Kenya rose by 130 percent between 2003 and
2007, suggesting that mobile phones have contributed to
job creation. Finally, improved communications among
members of a social network can also affect social learning,
which can in turn influence the rate of technology
adoption, especially of cash crops.
PART SIX: CONCLUSION
8
It would appear that so long as sustainable development is
restricted to minimal low-cost adjustments that do not
require value changes, institutional changes or any sort of
radical cultural adjustment, the environment will continue
to be degraded. Unless substantial change occurs, the
present generation may not be able to pass on an
equivalent stock of environmental goods to the next
generation. Even if people put their faith in the ability of
human ingenuity in the form of technology to be able to
preserve their lifestyles and ensure an ever increasing level
of consumption for everyone, they cannot ignore the
necessity to redesign our technological systems rather than
continue to apply technological fixes that are seldom
satisfactory in the long term. Technological optimism does
not escape the need for fundamental social change and a
shift in priorities. That was the mistake many in the
Appropriate Technology Movement made. It takes more
than the existence of appropriate or clean technologies to
ensure their widespread adoption.
JER 02|Volume 1|Issue 1|2015
In the past, innovation has been fostered through public
and private mechanisms (such as patent laws, public
research grants, subsidies for end-users, and research
networks), primarily operating at the national level in a
handful of industrialized countries and a few international
organizations. Such efforts have had widely varying levels
of success in terms of meeting global sustainability needs,
but have proven inadequate overall for the purpose of
advancing sustainable development.
African governments have perhaps been slow to wake up
to the challenges and opportunities opened up by the
emergence of the IT industry. However, what becomes
clear from is that no growth can take place without a
favorable environment being put in place by government.
This includes the formulation of a coherent national policy
on information, establishing regulations, which allow for
competition and investment, and lasting political stability.
African governments are faced with the challenge of
creating this environment before they can take advantage
of the opportunities and benefits offered by access to the
Internet, e-mail, and other applications of the new
technologies.
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