By Charles Lotara
South Sudan has recorded a remarkable increase in internet penetration percentage with 282,901 Facebook subscribers, leapfrogging Western Sahara and Chad in a recent statistics published by the World Internet Stats.
Africa’s youngest nation climbed to 7.9% down from a mere 4% in 2018, placing it above Chad and Western Sahara with 6.3% and 4.7% respectively. The country sits behind the Democratic Republic of Congo and Madagascar with a difference of 1%.
BuddeComm, an international independent research and consultancy company focusing on telecommunications market and its role within the digital economy says the development of the fixed-line broadband market in Africa has long been stymied by the lack of fixed-line infrastructure in rural and semi-rural regions.
The institution says for years, poor quality of networks in urban areas like the capital Juba where internet users are concentrated, also hampered growth in penetration percentage in those cities and as a result, mobile networks have provided the principal platform for voice and data connectivity.
Henry Lancaster, a digital researcher from BuddeComm says between 90% and 98% of all internet connections in emerging countries like South Sudan are via mobile networks and thus government regulators alike are concentrating on this platform to deliver on their broadband targets.
However, Lancaster notes that progress is being made to increase backhaul capacity on both the international and national levels. This backhaul, he says, is being used to improve fixed-line telecoms as well as to support growing mobile data traffic.
The South Sudan internet connectivity improvement came as the country joins rest of the world to tap into existing terrestrial cables to provide improved links to underserved regions.
Although the national network at the start of a project runs to about 38,000km the telecom regulator perceives that a country needs at least 120,000km of fibre to provide national coverage.
These projects are supported by sympathetic regulatory regimes as well as by governments which understand the key functions of broadband connectivity for economic growth.
Through this awareness countries are placing greater focus on their fibre-based national broadband plans. These efforts are supplemented by small-scale fibre operators which are expanding their investments beyond the wealthy suburbs and business districts.
These efforts aimed at increasing the use of ICTs and developing broadband penetration are crucial to augmenting economic productivity and GDP growth, and further driving a range of benefits based on enhanced social inclusion.