Several people have spoken of the digital potential of Nigeria. At the 2023 Businessday CEO Forum, Ralph Mupita, the President and CEO of MTN Group, delivered a keynote address to Nigeria’s business leaders. His focus was not on his company’s achievements, but on Nigeria and its potential to become a significant player in the global digital economy.
Mupita’s speech served as a rallying cry and a road map for creating a digital economy that might help Nigeria overtake the United States as the fifth-largest economy in the world. With Nigeria’s Internet Gross Domestic Product (iGDP) currently at 6% and projected to treble by 2050 to reach 145 billion USD, he emphasized the enormous untapped potential in the digital economy.
Africa has the chance to use the digital economy as a catalyst for innovation and prosperity, but if it doesn’t close the digital divide, its economies run the risk of being left behind and stagnating.
According to Mupita, only 1% of the world’s digital economy is currently based in Africa, compared to 68% in the US, 22% in China, and 27% in Asia. He claimed that this gap offered a big opportunity.
Internet Access
The majority of people in Africa continue to lack access to the Internet. In 2022, only 23% of rural Africans, including Nigerians, utilized the Internet. Too few people have digital IDs or transaction accounts, preventing them from using essential services and participating in online commerce.
‘Traditional’ firms are only gradually embracing digital technology and platforms to increase productivity and sales, and digital entrepreneurs find it difficult to acquire finance. Few governments are purposefully and strategically funding the growth of digital services, entrepreneurship, infrastructure, and skills.
Africa’s youth must be given the digital skills and access to markets they need to prosper in an increasingly digitized global economy if they are to become today’s innovators, entrepreneurs, and leaders.
Big Data
Ralph Mupita called attention to the lack of modern digital capabilities, like cloud computing and artificial intelligence, in Nigeria and across the African continent. Mupita underlined the importance of developing digital skills to progress the digital economy, noting that by 2030, there will be an estimated 230 million “digital jobs” in Sub-Saharan Africa alone.
Governments must come up with more responsive and efficient ways to provide services and communicate with the public. To engage with the hundreds of millions of customers who were previously out of reach due to geography or low income, businesses must use digitally-centered business strategies.
“The potential is immense. The path is clear,” Mupita stated in concluding his presentation. “The future of Nigeria lies in its digital economy. And with strategic intent, collaborative effort, and a shared vision, that future is within reach.”
Digital Gap
As the biggest economy in Africa with one of the largest populations of young people in the world, Nigeria is well-positioned to develop a strong digital economy, which would have a transformational impact on the country.
Nigeria is capturing only a fraction of its digital economic potential and will need to make strategic investments to develop a dynamic, transformative digital economy, according to a new World Bank assessment.
Digital technologies offer a chance to disrupt this trajectory – unlocking new pathways for rapid economic growth, innovation, job creation, and access to services that would have been unimaginable only a decade ago. Yet there is also a growing ‘digital divide’, and increased cyber risks, which need urgent and coordinated action to mitigate.
Affordability, literacy, and digital skills are the most frequently cited as key barriers by those aware of mobile internet but not using it, which highlights that a strong collective effort is needed for Nigeria to compete. Mobile internet connectivity has improved over the last few years, but the gaps are still wide, and we must continue to step up our efforts to tackle the barriers to mobile internet adoption and use for greater digital inclusion.
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