ICT News

The extension of ICTs to rural areas will promote development and stem rural-urban migration by Angella Nabwowe.

Though the phenomenon of rural-urban migration is on the increase in Uganda, the trend can be reduced with the extension of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) services to rural busy ‘growth’ centres. According to Hon. Kasamba Mathias, the Member of Parliament (MP) for Kakuuto County in Rakai District, the tendency to migrate to urban areas may be a thing of the past if people are able to access information. “In case of marketing, traders will be able to access information about buyers so it is of paramount importance that services like Internet are extended to the region,” said Hon. Kasamba.

Hon. Kasamba is optimistic that extending Internet services to rural areas would create employment opportunities for many young people and address some of the development needs of the area. He noted that: “Besides accessing information, when you establish Internet Cafes, jobs are created in servicing, repair and maintenance of the technology. Why should people move to Kampala when they have services here?”Willy Kanyike 54, a businessman in Kakuuto said all his siblings had moved to the capital city, Kampala because they couldn’t find competitive schools for their children, and their businesses were collapsing. “People were spreading rumours here that things have changed. If your child studies in a school without a computer, it is a waste of time because they won’t get jobs when they finish. The young ones always board trucks and go to town to look for jobs but I am too old to do that”, he said.Though the Ugandan government has been very instrumental in setting up telecentres in rural areas under the Rural Communications Development Fund (RCDF), Kakuuto County is yet to benefit from this movement. There isn’t any Internet or call centre in the area because of lack of electricity. Hon. Kasamba’s constituency is composed of five sub-counties with a total of fifty primary schools, ten secondary schools and a polytechnic centre. None of them is connected to electricity or Internet hence the absence of computers at these educational institutions.“We have ten busy growth centres which need ICT infrastructure. One of them is Mutukula, which is Uganda’s alternative route to Dar es salaam, Tanzania. There are so many opportunities here, business men from Tanzania and Uganda meet here and there is a customs point, so there is a lot of revenue generation,” said the MP. Uganda has been exporting electricity to Tanzania since 1995, and though Mutukula has no electricity, sadly the high tension power lines pass through the centre. “I have a computer in my office but it is useless because of lack of electricity. World Vision has computer services in their office run on a generator but they are not open to the public and they are winding up operation in 2010,” the MP said. The government has promised to extend electricity supply to Mutukula and Kasensero landing site where there is a fish factory by November 2008.ICT shadow minister Kajeke Wilfred echoed Kasamba’s concerns adding that ICT services are needed in schools for students to get computer knowledge and in communities in terms of dissemination of information. He said the role of ICT in development can not be disputed. “Currently, if you have no computer knowledge, you are doomed. Even if you are a farmer and you don’t have access to information about farm inputs, markets, you are doomed as well”, Kajeke observed. The minister proposed the establishment of satellite towns where services can be extended and leave the rest of the area for agricultural activities. “People are living in scattered villages, so it might be hard to reach every one but we can have demarcated areas where we can put infrastructure in an organized manner”, he proposed.