Government commits to upscaling technological infrastructure for efficient service delivery

Mombasa,

Wednesday, October 25, 2023

KNA by Chari Suche

The Ministry of Information, Communications and The Digital economy is making major strides calculated to ensure that Kenya continues to harness the potential of technology for better livelihoods and standards of living.

Speaking during the opening ceremony of the 14th Annual ICT Management and Leadership Conference of the Computer Society of Kenya, the Cabinet Secretary Eliud Owalo said that the government has started to provide physical technological infrastructure, and meaningful inclusive connectivity.

Owalo said the government has also come up with feasible and sustainable interventions in the market place to ensure that Kenya becomes a perpetual net consumer of ICT equipment and software.

He said the ministry has partnered with technological companies and the private sector to embark on local smart enabled telephones which based on feasibility studies that the ministry undertook shows that the phones will hit the market at a unit cost of about Sh6000.

“We are rolling out cheap smart enabled smartphones and we believe that within our konza techno policy in partnership with the private sector we should be able to embark on local manufacture of ICT equipment for a beginning and eventually we should be able to go the full way of manufacturing ICT infrastructure,” he said.

Owalo added that the ministry is currently rolling out 100,000 kilometers of Fiber Optic Backbone Infrastructure that is targeting health facilities, schools, and the judiciary, among other public institutions.

He disclosed that alongside this is the ongoing rolling out of 25,000 public WIFI hotspots, that are targeting markets, bus parks and other public spaces.

“Focus is also on providing 1450 village digital hubs geared towards spurring e-commerce, creative and the digital economy. We are also training youth in digital technology, and finding for them well paying digitally enabled jobs from around the world,” he said.

The CS said the effort is embedded in the objective of making the government of Kenya paperless, climate friendly, and saving people from spending time and money in search of government services.

He said people should be able to get as many of the services as they desire and particularly from the government, from the comforts of their homes, or places of work.

He added that other emerging developments in digital technology include such innovations as big data analytics, Internet of Things (IoT), Artificial Intelligence (AI), and block chain, among others.

He said the emergence of these technologies are making it easy for quick and efficient decision making, providing opportunities for real time situations and process monitoring and analyses that optimize resource use, enhanced disaster preparedness, and tracking of progress toward advancing in pursuit of the UN’s global Sustainable Development Goals.

“As government, we are focused on making the gains from these technologies part of our day-to-day benefits,” he added.

The CS noted that the ICT landscape in Kenya is evolving apace adding that technology now promises to play an indispensable role in the progress of the country.

“We are witnessing tremendous growth and impact in internet penetration into society, digital literacy, and adoption of new technologies in various sectors-from banking, to education and healthcare, and on to agriculture and governance, among other spheres,” he said.

He said, as the digital landscape continues to expand, Kenya must remain at the forefront of innovation, because the technology is permeating all aspects of life, work and even play.

He added that the country’s promising internet driven ecosystem is a testament to the innovative spirit of Kenyan entrepreneurs, while the established tech companies continue to make their mark on the global stage.

He said there will be no longer need to have manual processors in the country since by the end of the year, all government services will have been boarded on the E-citizen platform.

He said there should be a mechanism of authenticating people’s identity for ease of accessing government services from the comfort of their homes.

Courtesy; KNA