The Digital Revolution in Africa: Opportunities and Hurdles

Abstract

The digital revolution is the widespread diffusion of information and communication technologies, and the transformation towards an entirely digitized society. The digital revolution has the capacity to radically develop and change Africa like what first industrial revolution has done to the western countries in the 19th century. Although, for two decades, Africa benefited of steady economic growth sustained by commodity exports and increasingly by structural factors such as demographics, growing internal markets, urbanization and technological developments, Africa still lags behind other regions in providing many of the essential ICTs infrastructures and internet and online services. In this paper, we assess the current trends of the digital transformation in Africa to explore the opportunities and challenges that are encountering the African region in that matter. This study finds that despite that digital revolution in Africa is having many drivers to success and holding bright future opportunities especially in matters of poverty alleviation and business development, still many challenges are hindering its ongoing process.