20 Nov 2016

The Minister of Infrastructure and Housing dDevelopment, Mr Nonofo Molefhi, says data protection is essential.

Giving a keynote address at the ContinuitySA Botswana 10th anniversary celebration in Gaborone recently, he said it was important for companies to develop their services and take advantage of the use of ICT.

Mr Molefhi stated that ContinuitySA focused on business continuity management.

He said their services were not day to day consumer products and services, therefore indicating that they had to find clients in need of their services.

The minister said at times, businesses as such could be tough to maintain resulting in companies going back to their country of origin.

“As ContinuitySA you have to prove to clients that what you offer is worthy it so as to attract their attention,” he said.

Mr Molefhi said he believed that the company had a large base of clients from private companies to government departments, which he said was commendable because government had tighten up the e- government services.

He noted that government had invested so much on undersea cables, adding that the hope was that when they reach Botswana there would be a reduction in internet charges.

The minister said BOFINET was  installing internet cables to the rest of the country so that internet services would be accessible to every Motswana.

He applauded ContinuitySA for donating ICT equipment to schools as part of their Corporate Social Responsibility.

He further stated that it was important that as the company embarked on their CSR they invested in developing and up skilling children so that they become conversant with ICT.

ContinuitySA CEO, Mr Michael Davies stated that the world was affected by cyber crime where there was a lot of hacking that needed backup systems in place.

He highlighted that their company offered services in bandwidth standby, infrastructure services and continuity training among others to ensure that companies always have backup plan.

He said disasters such as floods, electricity cuts, public sector strike, fuel shortage can impact on business tremendously.

He therefore encouraged businesses to have documented recovery plan which should be tested regularly.

“Business continuity is a must have for all companies therefore companies should come up with ways to build business resilience,” he said. ENDS