Eusage Index Ethiopian Case

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E-usage Index Ethiopian Case
The Challenge of Universal Access African
Solutions For Africa Experiences from and
E-usage in Selected Countries Nairobi Safrai
Club-Kenya 1-4 March 2005

• Lishan Adam

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E-usage Index

• Follow up on sector performance review and
  (supply side)
• Evaluated sector performance against policy
  objectives SPR/2004 - 2005
• Addressing the real and current challenges of
  access - from policy and supply perspectives
• Looking at indicators of access
• E-usage access
• How the interventions by operators, regulators
  and governments impact on users and consumers
• What are the emerging usage patterns in response
  to services

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Key e-usage question

• Where, when, what (access) - (computers, cyber
  café, post, telephone, cell phones)
• For what purpose? - demand ( information,
  Internet, communication)
• What factors impact on users and consumers of ICT
  technologies?
• How much are users and consumers prepared to
  allocate to a basket of communication
  technologies?
• How do consumers access communications
  technologies?
• What strategies have the poor adopted to access
  communications?
• What sort of livelihoods (sanitation, housing,
  electricity, water, sewerage)

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Survey sample

• Major town (capital) (59) other urban (31) and
  rural areas (10)
• Addis Ababa, Assosa, Jijiga, Dire Dawa, Harar,
  Mekele and Nazreth
• Two framer associations outside of Addis Ababa
  (Nefas Silk and Akaki) and remote areas close to
  Assosa, Mekele, Nazreth, and Harar
• 1793 households with 8888 individuals
• 4.9 persons per household

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Questionnaire

• Translated into Amharic
• Descriptors of household - household size, age,
  gender, vocation and incomes of member of
  household including email access,
• Household living condition attributes water,
  sanitation, waste disposal etc.
• Household communications means phones, post,
  computers, Internet access
• Communication means of individual household
  members email access, mobile phones usage,
  access to cyber cafés, public and community
  access points, etc.

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Field work

• Writing letters to various administrative bodies
• Recruitment and training of mappers and
  enumerators
• Mapping - 20
• Identification of households to be surveyed
• Deployment of enumerators - 130 (Gender bias)
• Field supervision
• Data - entry, cleaning, weighting and analysis
• Reporting

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Demographics

• 49.8 of female and 51.2 male
• Fifty-one percent under 19 years ages
• 15 and 29 years of age represented about a third
  of the sample
• One-third (31) of the individuals surveyed were
  married and half of those (18.3) were single.
• Thirty percent of those surveyed attended schools
  
• About 40 of those surveyed indicated that they
  have difficulty reading a newspaper out of which
  32.7 cannot read at all

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Demographics (income)

• Only a fraction (2.2) were employed by
  non-family members full-time. The majority were
  self-employed (12.6) throughout the year
• Agriculture and informal trade are the most
  important sectors of employment.
• The informal nature of the economy was also
  confirmed through income patterns. About a
  quarter (23) of those surveyed earned less than
  US13 (Birr 100) a month and those that earned
  over a US100 (Birr 865) represented about 1.14.

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Penetration

• Household penetration of 5.1
• 0.1 of those surveyed indicated that they had
  Internet access
• Household penetration of mobile phone was 0.3 of
  which about 71 were pre-paid and 27 contract
  subscriptions
• 2.2 of those surveyed said that a member of the
  household has access to computers.
• Only 0.1 of those surveyed indicated that they
  used cyber cafés

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Expense

• Average monthly subscription and rental charge
  for fixed telephone line was Birr 67 (US8) 50
  of the Average Revenue Per User of Birr 144
  (US16) reported by the incumbent.
• Over 10 of GDP PPP (US720)
• Average revenue per subscriber (ARPU) for
  pre-paid was Birr 70 (US8 cf earning of 13 of
  quarter) while that of contract cellular
  subscribers was Birr 216 (US25). Reported ARPU
  Birr 135 (US15) quarter of the GDP when
  adjusted to PPP
• The average spend on the Internet is Birr 222
  (US26) per month - twice the average earning
• Average cyber café spend is Birr 16 (US2) a
  week) 15 of average earning

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Public phone

• Use of public pay phones is the highest (17.4)
  followed by private kiosks 14.5. About .2 of
  those surveyed indicated that they had access to
  cheaper rates through VOIP.
• Most people walk 30 to 60 minutes to get to the
  public pay phones , VOIP users walk for over two
  hours
• Rural people walk for over two hours to get to
  public phones
• Private kiosks are regarded as expensive but more
  convenient than public pay phones or community
  telecentres. Private phones are often closer to
  customers. Moreover those who attend private
  phones provide added features such as taking
  messages, facilitating incoming calls or
  beeping.

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Other findings

• A third of those who reported mobile ownership
  were fully employed by a non-family member
• Frequency of use of the phones also increases
  with the level of education (52 of those who
  indicated mobile ownership had a college
  education)
• Significant gender gap in use of mobile phones
  and email. Three-quarters of mobile users were
  men. Seventy percent of those who had access to
  email were men.

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Conclusions

• Increasing use of public access points -
  Telephones remain the most important tool for
  transfer of remittances
• Demand for mobile and fixed phones is far greater
  than what was historically anticipated
• The low level of Internet penetration points to a
  high cost, slow speed and low quality of service.
  
• Universal service targets and telephone expansion
  plans should be based on knowledge of the actual
  pattern of usage of communication services.