{"id":25566,"date":"2019-04-25T10:15:52","date_gmt":"2019-04-25T09:15:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/?p=25566"},"modified":"2019-04-25T10:15:52","modified_gmt":"2019-04-25T09:15:52","slug":"mobile-powering-economic-growth-and-job-creation-across-west-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/2019\/04\/25\/mobile-powering-economic-growth-and-job-creation-across-west-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"Mobile powering economic growth and job creation across West Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>West Africa\u2019s mobile ecosystem generated more than US$50 billion in economic value last year \u2013 equivalent to 8.7% of the region\u2019s GDP, according to a new GSMA study.<\/p>\n<p>The study found that rising mobile phone ownership and the ongoing migration to mobile broadband networks and services across the region will see the mobile ecosystem\u2019s economic contribution continue to increase over the coming years, forecast to reach almost US$70 billion (9.5% of GDP) by 2023.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe report underlines the vital role the mobile ecosystem is playing in contributing to economic growth, social development and job creation across West Africa,\u201d said Akinwale Goodluck, Head of Sub-Saharan Africa at the GSMA.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTo harness the power of a new generation of mobile users and mobile networks, we urge governments and policymakers in West Africa to develop regulatory frameworks that encourage innovation and investment in the sector, enabling the provision of mobile-powered digital services to citizens across the region.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The report reveals that:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The number of unique mobile subscribers\u00a0across West Africa reached 185 million at the end of 2018, equivalent to 48% of the region\u2019s population. This number is forecast to rise to 248 million by 2025, 54% of the population<\/li>\n<li>Future subscriber growth will largely be driven by young consumers owning a mobile phone for the first time; more than 40% cent of the region\u2019s population are under 18 years old, according to the report<\/li>\n<li>3G will overtake 2G to become the leading mobile technology in West Africa this year, supporting about half of the region\u2019s mobile connections. 4G momentum is also building &#8211; 10 new 4G networks have recently launched in West Africa, including the first ever 4G networks in Burkina Faso, Sierra Leone and Togo<\/li>\n<li>Local mobile operators are increasing investment in their networks and are expected to spend US$8.5 billion (capex) on network infrastructure and services over the next two years (2019\/2020)<\/li>\n<li>West Africa\u2019s mobile ecosystem directly employs around 200,000 people, supports 800,000 jobs in the informal employment sector, and a further 600,000 jobs across the wider economy<\/li>\n<li>Mobile is the primary platform for accessing the internet in West Africa; at the end of 2018, there were around 100 million mobile Internet users in the region, up almost 20 million year-on-year<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>West Africa\u2019s mobile ecosystem generated more than US$50 billion in economic value last year \u2013 equivalent to 8.7% of the region\u2019s GDP, according to a new GSMA study. The study found that rising mobile phone ownership and the ongoing migration to mobile broadband networks and services across the region will see the mobile ecosystem\u2019s economic [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":25567,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[103,399,38,19,54,382,9060],"tags":[6679,1063,165,8756,4646,1026,159,1431,570,946],"class_list":["post-25566","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mobile","category-more-news","category-networking","category-regional-news","category-research","category-telecom","category-west-africa","tag-2g","tag-3g","tag-4g","tag-akinwale-goodluck","tag-burkina-faso","tag-gsma","tag-mobile","tag-sierra-leone","tag-togo","tag-west-africa"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25566","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/25"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25566"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25566\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25568,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25566\/revisions\/25568"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25567"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25566"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25566"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intelligentcio.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25566"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}