General

At present, a new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation characterized by digitalization, networking and intelligence are reshaping the global competitive landscape, and digital transformation has become the driving force for innovative, inclusive and sustainable development. Especially after the outbreak of COVID-19, digitalization has become the main factor for countries to resume operation to a certain extent, and an important means to maintain trade economy and social services. In 2020, the global Internet bandwidth will increase by 35%, 9 percentage points higher than that of the previous year, and digital solutions will be used more. The global digital transformation is facing major development opportunities. For Africa, innovation and digital transformation can not only create more employment opportunities, but also help eradicate poverty, promote gender equality, accelerate the flow of goods and services, and help promote the implementation of the African Union Agenda 2063.

In recent years, African countries have made positive progress in digital transformation. Before the outbreak of the COVID-19, Africa's digital development was rapid, and the COVID-19 stimulated Africa's digital transformation to a certain extent, accelerating the trend of digitalization, market integration and regional cooperation. According to Huacheng Import and Export Data Observation, so far, there are more than 640 active science and technology centers in the African continent, and four African cities have ranked among the top 100 cities in the global financial service ecosystem technology innovation. According to statistics, the gross domestic product of mobile technology and services accounted for 9% of Africa's GDP in 2019, contributing more than 155 billion US dollars, and supporting nearly 3.8 million jobs directly or indirectly. According to the data released by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development in August 2020, since the outbreak of COVID-19, the business volume of some e-commerce platforms in Africa has achieved triple digit growth. It is predicted that the digital economy will contribute nearly US $180 billion to Africa's GDP by 2025 and reach US $712 billion by 2050.

However, the digital divide still exists, and there is a high imbalance in the level of digital development between Africa and other regions and between African countries. The gap in digital preparation and insufficient financing support for digital transformation have left many African countries on the edge of the global digital economy. According to the report of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), about 30% of the remote rural population in Africa may never be able to use terrestrial optical networks in a cost-effective way, while 19% of the population in sub-Saharan Africa still cannot use mobile broadband. According to the Africa Digital Transformation Strategy, nearly 300 million Africans live in areas more than 50 kilometers away from the optical fiber or optical fiber broadband connection. In addition, most communication network technologies in African countries are at the level of 2G and 3G, 4G technology is applied in a small range, and 5G technology is basically not applied. The current situation of Internet use in Africa is that the network performance is not high, the tariff is high, and the bandwidth is obviously insufficient. The low popularity and use of the Internet have greatly affected the level and effectiveness of Africa's digital transformation. Huacheng Import and Export Data Observation Report.

At the same time, Africa's digital transformation faces a long-term and huge funding gap. In terms of financing scale, financing for digital transformation has increased significantly. During the five-year period from 2015 to 2019, the total amount of digital-related official development financing (ODA) from bilateral and multilateral donors and charitable foundations was 18.6 billion US dollars. Compared with other regions, Africa received the largest amount of digital bilateral development financing (37.9%). However, there is still a huge gap between the development financing for Africa's digital transformation and Africa's financial needs in this field. Because according to the data of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), only 17.8% of the population in Africa can access the Internet at present, and to ensure that the remaining 1.1 billion people can access the Internet by 2030, it will require at least 100 billion dollars of financial support.

In addition, the lack of equity and inclusiveness has made it difficult for vulnerable groups in Africa to achieve digital prosperity. Vulnerable groups in Africa have fewer opportunities to participate in digital production and income, especially for women and youth. According to the report of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the mobile phone penetration rate and Internet penetration rate of women in developing countries are 14% and 43% lower than those of men, and the difference continues to expand, especially in the least developed countries. In Africa, the digital gap between the sexes (men and women) in accessing effective data through the Internet is as high as 11.7%, and the Internet penetration rate of young people (aged 15-24) is only 39.6%. In addition, although African youth are large in size, their education level is low, and the brain drain is serious, which makes it difficult for the young generation to be competent for digital related work. The digital divide between different sexes and ages has seriously restricted Africa's ability to use digital transformation to achieve economic and social development, which has increasingly highlighted the importance of bridging the digital divide and promoting fair and inclusive digital transformation.

Based on this, the international community should face up to the difficulties faced by Africa's digital transformation, increase support for Africa's digital-related fields, help Africa build more digital infrastructure, pay attention to the implementation of the United Nations "2030 Sustainable Development Goals", and help Africa take the fast train of digital economic development, Huacheng Import and Export Data Observation Report.