The Demand Side of ICT

Abstract

This chapter uses the results of the university survey to show from the public-private perspective the public-private differential in the demand for ICT, trend and determinants in Sudanese universities. Our findings prove the first hypothesis in Chap. 1 on the presence of significant public-private differential between public and private universities in Sudan in the demand for and impacts of ICT. Our findings prove our second hypothesis in Chap. 1 which implies that demand for the four ICT modes: fixed telephone, mobile telephone and Internet is characterised by considerable dynamism: it shows a dynamic increasing trend and significant structural change over time amongst public and private university staff in Sudan. We confirm the incidence of structural change in the demand for ICT by scrutinising the historical use of the four ICT modes, which implies that fixed telephone was used earlier as an old or more traditional and long-standing ICT mode, but then there is a gradual shift towards using other new, more recent ICT modes such as computer, mobile and Internet respectively amongst academic teaching staff, support staff and students. We find that the personal use of mobile telephone, Internet and computers show an increasing trend, while the personal use of fixed telephone shows an opposite decreasing trend. We find that the personal use of mobile telephone is growing faster than Internet, computers and fixed telephone respectively. This result seems consistent with the reported increasing trend of the use of mobile and Internet at the aggregate macro level in Sudan and also consistent with the observed increasing trend at the regional and international levels. Our findings are consistent with the conventional stylised facts in the theoretical literature concerning the positive income effect or the positive relationship between income and the demand for ICT; the negative price effect or the negative relationship between price and the demand for ICT; the cross price effects or substitution-complementary effects and rationality of consumers. Our findings verify the third hypothesis in Chap. 1 that the demand for the four ICT modes amongst public and private university staff in Sudan is determined by income, education attainment level, age, and gender. Our results prove the fourth hypothesis in Chap. 1 that the demand for or the use of Internet shows positive significant correlations with the use of telephone and the use of/spending on IT (computer) shows positive significant correlations (complementary relationships) with both telecommunication and ICT training amongst public and private university staff in Sudanese universities. Our results are consistent with the findings in theoretical and empirical endogenous growth literature on the correlation between ICT components and human capital.