World Dialogue on Regulation

The Acacia Initiative has published its report The Acacia Atlas: Mapping the Growth of ICT in Africa on-line. The Atlas provides a graphical overview of a wide range of aspects relating to development of ICT on the African continent over the past 10 years. It provides a starting point for professionals who want to understand the ICT developments and problems ofthe continent.

Africa is large and diverse, with 52 countries ranging from the Arab countries in the North, through the Great Lakes countries in the centre to the almost western world of South Africa. Africa is characterised by an enormous diversity of cultures, languages, and landscapes. From a ICT perspective the diversity is also enormous. South Africa has a well developed infrastructure while in the centre of the continent the situation is less rosy.

In the publication The Acacia Atlas: Mapping African ICT growth of the International Development Research Center (IDRC) the magnitude of the differences become apparent and visible.

In the Acacia Atlas, 32 maps from different sources are brought together. IDRC is not alone in producing maps of ICT Development in Africa. The International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), and the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD) are among the key institutions that set out to map the growth of ICT's in everything from policy-making to power lines. The maps look at the development of ICT in Africa from different angles and where possible show snaphots highlighting the changes over the years.

A large part of the Atlas is dedicated to the telecom infrastructure ofthe continent. The map on page 23 shows the dramatic increase in the GSM coverage since 2001. Remarkable is the enormous change in East Africa, where we see that Rwanda, Burundi and Uganda now have almost 100% coverage. At the same time we observe the challenges of the governments and telecom providers in Angola, the Central African Republic, Sudan and Somalia. In these countries there is virtually no access to mobile telephony outside the capital cities and some large towns. The Atlas also provides a nice overview and three very detailed maps of the Telecom Transmission Networks. These maps clearly indicate the problem areas for universal access. Large parts of the continent are deprived of any traditional telecom access.

Where traditional telecom infrastructure shows large voids, the satellite coverage has hugely increased in the last 10 years. At present every inch of the continent is covered by satellite bandwidth by 54 satellites (map 27), but restrictive telecom policies stop this supporting Africa's development. This also contributes to the excessive costs for internet access (map 15).

As the overall picture is one positive development for information and communication access, the map showing the Status of the National ICT Policies (map 11) provides an image that is too positive. The map seem to list the existence of National ICT policy documents instead of ratified ICT policies. As we have seen in Kenya, for example, the ratification process can take a long time. Moreover, the map would increase in value if it was enriched with information about regulatory agencies.

The Acacia Atlas is an important reference book for all who are professionally involved in the ICT4D arena in Africa. It is recommended that all decision-makers keep a copy on their  desks to remind them that ICT at a continental level still has a lot of challenges ahead.