Looking past the turbulent history of Ethiopia, one that has been impacted by famine, drought and war, there is evidence today which confirms that this East African region has fully embraced ICT to advance itself and establish a secure position amongst developing economies with high-growth potential.
However, challenges do remain – including slow response by government to mobile money adoption, infrastructure, connectivity, as well as the country’s repressive stance on digital freedoms, particularly social networking and the internet.
It was only at the beginning of 2013 when Ethiopia’s government approved mobile money in the country, allowing banks and micro-finance institutions to provide transaction-based banking online.
The 2013 Web Index, brought out by the World Wide Web Foundation, gave Ethiopia an overall ranking of 80th position out of 81 countries (taking into account several sub-indexes including universal access, relevant content and impact & empowerment). The country also scored 12.9 in terms of freedom and openness, the criteria of which includes the degree to which users have rights to online information, their ability to express opinion, as well as safety and privacy.
The internet brimmed with information and reports in mid-2012 when news broke of the Ethiopian government’s intention to ban Skype and other VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) services, as well as video chat platforms, for businesses.
source: www.itnewsafrica.com
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