18 Nov 2019

Government has made significant information and communication technology (ICT) investments through Botswana Fibre Networks (BOFINET)

In his State-of-the-Nation Address in Gaborone on November 18, President Dr Mokgweetsi Masisi said Botswana had in excess of 10 000km of optical fibre across the country.

“More than 5 000 businesses are already connected through an optical fibre network.  It is only through optical fibre infrastructure that we can meet the requirements of the fourth industrial revolution technologies such as internet-of-things, artificial intelligence, robotics and big data,” he said.

He said more was being done to increase fibre connectivity in homes and develop data centres that would host data in the country.

“BOFINET recently launched an optical fibre connectivity programme to our homes initially targeting 16 000 homes in Gaborone and it is expected to be completed in 2020,” he said

The President said government’s efforts to facilitate the integration of ICT in schools across the country was on-going.

He said government was in partnership with numerous organisations to support school connections and installation of ICT gadgets. This, he said, included the provision of wi-fi, upgrading of bandwidth to a minimum of two megabytes per second.

He said video streaming of lessons had been introduced in three secondary schools while the plan was to add another five schools in 2020 and an additional two in 2021.

“About 41 per cent of primary schools have ICT infrastructure. In Ghanzi, Kgalagadi and Mabutsane, all primary schools have been provided with the internet, local area network and ICT officer. Plans are afoot to cover the whole of the Kweneng District in the next financial year,” he said.

President Masisi, however, noted the bandwidth limitations across all the schools which he said government was collaborating with the Botswana Communications Regulatory Authority (BOCRA), BOFINET and other telecommunication service providers to assist in the enhancement of ICT infrastructure.

Dr Masisi said so far 20 000 tablets and computers had been supplied to 416 primary and secondary schools through the Economic Stimulus Programme and assistance from other stakeholders.

Such stakeholders included Botswana Communications Regulatory Authority and the Universal Access and Service Fund (BOCRA-UASF), Orange Botswana, Human Resource Development Council, the Embassy of Japan and that of South Korea.

In pursuit of promoting access to information, he said 74 public libraries out of 105 offered public access to computers and internet services while over 74 000 people had been trained on basic ICT skills since the inception of the programme in 2009.

“To date, 16 technology libraries have been constructed and are fully operational under the Government’s partnership with the Robert and Sara Rothschild Family Foundation.

All these positive results demonstrate the potential that libraries had to champion efforts towards driving the economy from a resource-based to information and knowledge-based economy,” he said.

He also hailed BotswanaPost for playing a vital role in the delivery of ICT services through its increased service bouquet and delivery channels.

The recent development resulted in the introduction of PosoMoney, a service which leverages on technology to address the challenges faced by the unbanked and the underbanked.

In regard to the Universal Access and Safe Fund, he said, the initiative had facilitated for the provision of services to areas that would otherwise be considered not commercially viable by the network providers and service providers.

“I am delighted to inform you that these initiatives have started to bear fruits.

As of March, the mobile subscription was standing at 1, 149, 673.

This enabled people who would otherwise not have banking accounts such as domestic workers, the elderly and school going children to have access to banking services,” he said. ENDS