Page 57 - ITU Journal - ICT Discoveries - Volume 1, No. 2, December 2018 - Second special issue on Data for Good

ITU JOURNAL: ICT Discoveries, Vol. 1(2), December 2018

DATA FOR GOOD IN AFRICA – TOWARDS INCREASED ACCESS AND ENABLING DATA POLICIES

Babatunde Okunoye , ‘Gbenga Sesan
1
2
1 Paradigm Initiative, Paradigm Initiative
2

Abstract – Data has been rightly acknowledged as the future oil of the global economy. As a result of the
large amounts of data being produced globally by individuals, households, organizations and nations, the
potential for mining insights from aggregated big data has emerged, besides other uses of data. The
potential multifaceted use of data for private and public good is fueled by super-fast telecommunication
networks which power communications and data capture, transfer, storage and processing. However,
while developed economies are pressing ahead to harness the potential of data to transform their societies,
Africa has lagged behind in the harnessing of data for public good. In many African countries, basic access
to data is still a major challenge, and the policy landscape which enables data for public good is largely
lacking. This paper gives an overview of the situation in Africa, where the infrastructure and data policy
deficit is hampering the continent’s efforts towards digital development.

Keywords – Access, equality, inclusiveness, information and communication technologies (ICTs),
information society

management. Supply chain data can reveal which
1. OUR GLOBAL DATA SOCIETY links in a chain could weaken thereby allowing for
proactive and timely countermeasures before a
The 21 century has undoubtedly brought along a real problem manifests [6]. Also, in healthcare,
st
data revolution. The amount of data created daily aggregate societal data has been utilized in large
is simply astonishing, as individuals, households, epidemiological studies to forestall the outbreak of
organizations and nations produce data like never diseases [7]. The enormous potential of data to
previously witnessed in history. It has been catalyze productivity in major global economic
estimated that more data was created in the past sectors has seen experts dub data as the new ‘’oil’’
two years than in all of the preceding history [1]. of the global economy [8].
The sources of this data are as varied and
far-reaching as our mobile devices, financial 2. DATA IN THE DEVELOPED WORLD
transactions, Internet activity, health records and
the rise of the Internet of things (IoT). An The advances and progress of a data-driven
estimated 2.5 Quintillion bytes of data is being economy, as described above, is clearly noticeable
produced daily [2]. There is no doubt that the in developed economies of North America, Europe
massive global proliferation and adoption of and Asia. These economies are backed by an
telecommunication services is a major factor excellent telecommunications infrastructure
behind the surge in data production. About 3.5 backbone and policies, which enables a
billion people are connected to the Internet [3], data-intensive society and economy where
with an estimated 8.4 billion devices and objects or individuals, households, organizations and nations
things connected in 2017 [4], and a projection of are always connected to data and information
between 20 – 30 billion connected things in 2020 which can be stored, shared, and collated in real
[5]. time. Advanced economies in these regions are
eminently placed to fully harness the potential of
Advances in the processing of data and data mining the emerging global data economy.
are creating productivity gains in critical economic
sectors in developed countries. For example, big To give an indication of the state of
data analytics have found important application in telecommunications infrastructure in advanced
the automobile industry’s global supply chain economies, we can take a look at some ICT
statistics such as Internet penetration, active

© International Telecommunication Union, 2018 35