The communication industry in Kenya

I remember when I first opened an email account. That was in 1999 and in Nairobi. A friend of mine, he is now based in the States, helped me open a Yahoo account. It must have been either in Norwich Union House or the building next to it – Union Towers? These are the places I would later frequent for my browsing. And, I got addicted to the internet. I still can’t stay a whole day without logging into the internet.

The cost of browsing was as high as KES 5 per minute. The rate has since significantly gone down with some café charging as low as 50 cents a minute with most asking for KES 1 per minute. Thus, the same amount you would have needed for an hour on the internet, then, would now grant you between 5 and 10 hours. And that is indeed laudable.

So much has since happened, especially with the advent of the mobile revolution in Kenya, just at the turn of the millennium. Almost everyone in Kenya now owns a mobile phone. An interesting comment I once read, regarding this, was on the Guardian’s website. A couple had visited Kenya as tourists. One day while in Kenya, they left their phones behind and wanted to get in touch with the hotel. They therefore asked some local residents for a phone and “Hundreds of phones suddenly came out of their pockets (the locals), even the shoeless ones!”

With some hindsight, I think the situation would probably have been different if the former Kenya Postal and Telecommunication Company wouldn’t be a corrupt bureaucracy. KPTC’s specialty seemed to have been renting seeking rather than service provision, and they seemed to have hopelessly faired even in that regard. Anyway, they are still to recover from that lack of foresight. All the same it is good that almost everyone can now afford a mobile phone and do not need to bribe some crooked official to access the same.

While the cost of mobile telephony was exorbitant in the initial stages, it has now considerably reduced. Actually, calling across networks then would cost in excess of KES 30 per minute. But this drawback has since been redressed, naturally. We currently have 4 mobile telephone companies. And in competing for market share, each company tries to outdo the other which is always good for the consumer. Indeed, you can now call across networks with as low as KES 3 per minute; a 1000 percent decrease in the cost just like with the internet.

The internet industry has also witnessed some other significant developments besides cost reduction. The archaic dial up connections is no longer in use. With the arrival of the fibre optic cable in Kenya recently, high speed broadband connections is currently the newest fad in the country. Connecting to the World Wide Web is also possible from mobile phones. Luckily, you don’t even need a smart phone to access the internet from your handsets.

The cost of browsing from the phone, while in Kenya, is relatively cheaper as compared to Dubai. Here, in Dubai, it is much cheaper getting access to the internet through broadband connections. But, if you wish to surf the web from your phone then you have to pay exceedingly higher than what guys ‘cough’ in Kenya. On the other hand, unlike in Dubai, getting connected though broadband in Kenya is definitely beyond the reach of many a national.

My friend tells me it’s all got to do with the mass market; the higher the demand the lower the cost and vice versa. Of course, you don’t need to be an economist to know that. Anyway, we need to invest in cheaper computers for our people. The value of a computer literate society that has access to readily available hardware and software is enormous. The government therefore, in the spirit of Vision 2030, needs to invest - and heavily at that - in this industry. I am certain, as do others, that this has a profound effect on the economy of a country.