Africa’s role in the development of the global digital economy requires bold decisions if the continentis to influence global affairs, the global economy and the global imagination. This was the vision of economic change outlined inregulators to become enablers and move to change the laws to allow for the future digital economy, based on aspects such as mobility in vehicles, drones, smart grids, and cloud computing.
There is an enormous digital divide. About half of the world’s population have no access to the internet, and most of those are women in developing countries. The future is online, but more than 250-million fewer women than men have access to the internet, a critical requirement for social and economic participation, and so are excluded.
The report claims sex-segregated data sets on budget, health and crime are unavailable and that in Sub-Saharan Africa 373 out of 375 data sets are closed. Such data sets are needed to support the advocacy objectives of women.calls for agritech to transform farming across the continent, yet only 14 out of 54 African countries have drone regulations in place, many of which are obstructive, even banning civilians from operating them.
Initiatives are in place at the University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business, which runs an ICT training programme for regulators, policymakers, and parliamentarians.regulatory priority as few African countries — apart from SA — possess the legal and institutional structure to take it on.