Ethiopia's plans for the kalub gas project unfair
Mohamud H. Khalif · Review of African Political Economy · 2000
In this connection, ISPs are calling for the discontinuation of telecommunication monopolies in various African countries to allow for a competitive playground that will affect the tariffs downward. The low level of education and especially computer literacy is an impeding factor to ecommerce. The cost of both personal computer and surfing the Internet is also curtailing many Africans from being ecommerce players. The low use of credit cards in Africa also impedes e-commerce. E-commerce eliminates the need for cash transactions in favour of credit cards where the buyer only needs to feed his/her credit card number into the net while the bank facilitate funds transfer. However in Africa, credit cards use is still minimal. In general, misinformation, ignorance and the high incidence of poverty are factors that continue to affect Africa's capacity of exploiting information technology opportunities. To address some of these problems, the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in its 1999 Human Development Report proposes what it calls a 'bit-tax' on high volume e-mail users. These funds will then be diverted into developing information technology in developing countries. ? Newslink Africa, London.