Moreover, during the same period, the number of mobile internet subscribers in Sub-Saharan Africa more than doubled, rising from 120 million to 270 million people. This highlights how mobile represents a growing platform to accelerate Sub-Saharan Africa’s progress on the SDGs and to drive socioeconomic advancement in areas such as healthcare, education, digital commerce, industrial automation and smart city infrastructure. This is evidenced by the continued uptake of mobile money, which reached 763 million registered accounts in the region in 2022 (a year-on-year increase of 17%).
Despite strong progress in a number of areas, Sub-Saharan Africa remains the region with the largest usage gap and coverage gap, impeding progress across a range of SDGs. Additionally, Sub-Saharan Africa has the second-largest gender gap, with the difference between male and female mobile ownership remaining relatively unchanged since 2017. This limits the region’s progress on SDG 5: Gender Equality and SDG 10: Reduced Inequalities.
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Source: GSMA Intelligence
Key drivers of SDG mobile impact scores
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Source: GSMA Intelligence
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Source: GSMA Intelligence
Data is sourced from the GSMA Intelligence Consumers in Focus Survey. The number of users is calculated by multiplying unique mobile subscribers by the percentage of survey respondents that performed a particular activity (e.g. reading the news) on a mobile phone. Unique subscriber data is sourced from GSMA Intelligence, combining data reported by mobile operators with the annual GSMA Intelligence Consumers in Focus Survey. The percentages show the proportion of mobile users engaging in a particular activity.
Case Studies
Patience
Fridah
Florence
Aletcenter
Valentine
GSMA Innovation Fund for Mobile Internet Adoption and Digital Inclusion
Supporting waterless flush sanitation through mobile technology - Loowatt video
In 2015, Loowatt was awarded a grant from the GSMA Mobile for Development Utilities programme to develop a suite of mobile services to track its waste collection processes, collect payments with mobile money and communicate better with its customers. Loowatt, in partnership with Airtel Madagascar, uses mobile technology to support the service and maintenance of waterless household toilets. Customers use mobile money to pay for collection services and SMS to schedule collections and maintenance. Loowatt personnel use the mobile app and web platform to manage operations and track waste from households to the treatment facility.
Digitising billing and meter reading for water utilities – Wonderkid
In May 2015, the GSMA Mobile for Development Utilities Innovation Fund awarded a grant to Wonderkid to help it develop a suite of mobile tools for four water utilities in Kenya. The grant supported a complaint management and tracking system that allows customers to report maintenance and upkeep issues. It also offered a mobile app for meter readers that allows meters to be photographed, helping to address disputes and verify meter readers’ activities in real time. A self-meter reading and payment system allows users to send their own meter reading via SMS and receive a preliminary bill with instructions for paying via mobile money using Safaricom’s M-Pesa.
Using mobile money to bring clean water to rural Ghana – Safe Water Network
Providing pit emptying services through a GIS-enabled app - KCCA
Affordable, clean cooking through mobile technology in Tanzania – KopaGas
Changing lives through mobile-enabled solar-powered irrigation in Kenya - SunCulture
Delivering water to urban homes through smart metering and mobile payments - CityTaps
Ahlan Simsim, by Sesame Workshop - a groundbreaking initiative that delivers early learning and nurturing care to children and caregivers affected by the Syrian conflict.
Community Solar Hubs
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Orange and SNV (Netherlands Development Organisation) scale up digital agriculture advisory service
Smallholder farmers are an integral part of our food system, producing more than 30% of food globally. However, they remain financially excluded and increasingly vulnerable to changing climate patterns that affect their yields. Digital advisory services can help smallholder farmers overcome these challenges, drawing on a variety of sources to support agricultural decision-making.
Garbal is a digital advisory service for pastoralists and smallholder farmers launched by SNV (Netherlands Development Organisation) in partnership with Orange.
It was launched in Mali in 2017, followed by Burkina Faso in 2019. Delivered through USSD and a call centre, Garbal is a digital-only service offering data on market prices, pasture quality and herd concentrations. It also provides information on techniques and practices for farming and livestock production, in addition to geo-satellite data on biomass availability, agro-meteorological information and weather forecasts. Garbal users pay a modest fee to access the service via SMS, airtime and mobile data. During the Covid-19 pandemic, existing partnerships between digital advisory providers, governments and development agencies deepened to support farmers in new ways. The organisations behind the Garbal service were already collaborating closely with the respective governments in Mali and Burkina Faso to design and define content, but in the early stages of the pandemic, they worked together to push health-related advice to farmers. This established Garbal as a channel for communicating messages of public interest to the pastoralists subscribed to the service. For example, after the recent decision in Benin to end cross-border movement of livestock, Garbal was used to keep pastoralists informed of movement restrictions and conditions.
To date, Garbal has received over 300,000 calls.[7] There was an uptick in activity in the first year of the pandemic and the number of calls received by its call centre increased further in 2021 (a 32% increase year on year).[8] Covid-related enquiries fell by 60% in 2021, indicating that pastoralists and smallholder farmers saw the value of the service beyond a source of information related to Covid-19. Overall, the service offers farmers and pastoralists more predictability and allows them to make decisions accurately with instant access to reliable information.
Case Study
Huawei and Unesco aim to improve access to digital education services in Africa
The Covid-19 pandemic disrupted education systems globally, intensifying existing educational challenges and inequalities. For instance, the lack of access to connectivity and devices hindered the ability of at least one third of students to engage in remote learning.[17]
Huawei and Unesco are collaborating with the education ministries of Egypt, Ethiopia and Ghana, along with other stakeholders, to implement a three-year project (2020–2023) focused on developing technology-enabled open school systems.[18] This initiative aims to create resilient and accessible school systems, enabling comprehensive education in both normal situations and times of crisis.
By 2024, the aim is to develop more than 140 digital courses that benefit over 40 schools and over 14,000 students and teachers.
Safaricom supports IoT-based smart water system
With growing pressure on the world’s limited resources, utility companies are seeking new ways to better match supply and demand, harness cleaner energy sources and reduce costs. Mobile technologies will be pivotal to achieving these objectives, underpinned by the growing role of IoT solutions.
Safaricom has partnered with the Kenya Water Institute to deploy a smart water system at the institute’s Nairobi and Kitui campuses. The smart water system will be used to facilitate practical training as well as for running a smart water management curriculum for students at the institution.
The smart water meters used as part of this deployment provide an effective way of collecting data in real time. This helps ensure effective monitoring of utility consumption data, thereby detecting loss and leakage, ensuring accurate billing, enhancing revenue collection, improving operational efficiency and, as a result, saving costs. Rolling out similar solutions across Kenya’s water network can support the country’s progress on SDG 6.
MTN launches digital skills academy to boost youth employment
Among Sub-Saharan Africa's population of 200 million young people, around 38 million are currently not engaged in any form of education, employment or training. This figure is on the rise, with young women being disproportionately affected, as reported by the International Labour Organization. The Broadband Commission for Sustainable Development emphasises that by 2025, at least 60% of both youth and adults must possess a minimum level of proficiency in sustainable digital skills. This level of proficiency is crucial to enable them to fully access and benefit from the wide array of online services and resources available.
In 2022, MTN launched the MTN Skills Academy in collaboration with public and private sector partners to address digital challenges faced by young people. The programme integrates existing ICT programmes to better serve the communities in which MTN operates. It offers career guidance counselling, free online training in digital and financial skills, work readiness support for improved employment prospects, and access to job opportunities in the public and private sectors throughout Africa. The academy promotes inclusivity with low-data usage, zero-rating in select markets, country-specific and multilingual functionality and features catering to people with disabilities.
Over 2,000 people joined the MTN Skills Academy in the first month it launched in Zambia, with the number expected to increase during 2023. MTN aims to reach 1 million people through the initiative by 2025, which includes:
• 500,000 career guidance surveys
• 340,000 digital & financial skills courses
• 150,000 job readiness and mentorship courses
• 14,000 job placement opportunities
• 510 rural outreach hubs.