Africa has low levels of infrastructure development compared to other regions. As of 2007, it had 3.77 main telephone lines per 100 people but 27.48 mobile subscribers per 100, demonstrating mobile is the dominant form of connectivity. Internet penetration was just 5% of the population, far below the global average. While broadband penetration is over 1% in few countries, most of Africa lacks broadband infrastructure. However, mobile growth has been rapid at around 65% annually, showing connectivity is expanding despite challenges. OER projects can help build demand for infrastructure and provide opportunities to strengthen educational capacity even with constraints.

1. Infrastructure in
Africa

4. ICT Indicators from ITU 2007
 Main telephone lines – 3.77/100 people
 Mobile subscribers – 27.48/100 people
 Internet users – 5.34/100 people
 Africa has some 280 million total
telephone subscribers, of which some
260 million (over 85%) are mobile cellular
subscribers, representing the continent
with the highest ratio of mobile to total
telephone subscribers of any region in
the world.
(ITU World Telecommunication/ICT Indicators, 2007)

5. ICT Indicators from ITU 2007
 It is the region with the highest mobile cellular
growth rate. Growth over the past 5 years
averages almost 65% year on year.
 It accounts for 14% of the world’s population,
but for only around 7% of all fixed and mobile
subscribers worldwide.
 It has some 50 million Internet users, for an
Internet penetration of just 5%. Europe’s
Internet penetration is 8 times higher.
 It has a broadband penetration of more than
1% in only a few countries. Broadband
penetration in OECD countries exceeds 18%.
(ITU World Telecommunication/ICT Indicators, 2007)

7. Bandwidth Costs
1997-2001 $ 20 Kbps
2002 $ 13 Kpbs
2003 $ 8.90 Kbps
2004 $ 5.0 Kbps
2004 $ 4.2 Kbps
2005 $ 2.33 Kbps
Future $ 1.00 Kbps or less

9. 51
52
50 UbuntuNet Medium Term Plan
48
33/E22
E5 43/E8
43
36/E20 38/E18 43
E3 E4 49 20 4
37/E19 E13
46/E8 1
38/E18 44 32
39/E15 E2
47 45
2
3
15
Links: 6
17 5
34
Actual 56
19
9 o
14 7
Funded/Costed 16 8
11 13
UA 21
10
29
12
31
24 30
25
Alternative/Later 22 27
28 18
23
26

10. What Does It Mean?
 The data makes it easy to apply a deficit
model to project planning, but we need to
start with what we have and how we can build
off it
 OER projects must work with what is available
now, not demonstrate what would be possible
if only the constraints were different
 BUT paradoxically we must hold in our minds
a vision of a radically different future from the
one that current trends project – change is
always surprising because it takes so much
longer to happen than people think it will but
happens so much quicker than they expect

11. What Does it Mean?
 OER projects will never resolve
infrastructure gaps, but they can help to
build demand
 Given all of the above, the constraint is
not infrastructure, it is institutional
capacity
 OER provides the tools to build that
capacity from any starting point, and the
problem is not a lack of human capacity,
it is a lack of opportunity