…As Nigeria targets 70m broadband user base by 2017
Global Mobile Money Adoption (GMMA)’s survey has shown that over 30 million mobile money customers undertook 224.2 million transactions, totaling $4.6 billion during the month of June 2012 alone. The report revealed that the industry is also becoming increasingly competitive, with 40 markets having at least two different mobile money services available with 81.8 million registered mobile money customers globally, while the total number of deployments on a global basis is growing by almost 38 per cent.
The report identified six services with more than 1 million active customer accounts and in the last 12 months, three of these services have crossed the 1 million active customers threshold. The number of active customer accounts the survey said growing rapidly which is a positive sign indicating that customers are realizing the benefits from mobile money services. The mobile money industry continues to expand at an unparalleled rate, with 150 live mobile money services for the unbanked, 41 of which were launched in 2012.
There are 56.9 million registered customers in sub-Saharan Africa and in June 2012. In terms of geographical spread, more than half of all countries in sub-Saharan Africa have live deployments and 37 per cent of the 166 mobile networks operators in the region have already launched mobile money. Mobile money services are available in 34 of the 47 countries in the region and penetration will continue to grow in the region, since the majority of planned deployments are also in sub-Saharan Africa.
The research also found that there are now more mobile money accounts than bank accounts in Kenya, Madagascar, Tanzania and Uganda, and more mobile money agent outlets than bank branches in at least 28 countries. As part of a larger plan aimed at migrating telecom consumers from voice calls to data traffic, Nigeria plans to grow its broadband user base to about 70 million by 2017, up from its current level of 46 million.
Minister of Communications Technology, Mrs. Omobola Johnson, disclosed this recently, saying it is part of an initiative being executed by the CT ministry to expand internet access to the over 160 million population, which will also include encouraging more private investment in telecom infrastructure in the largely un-served rural communities. Johnson stated: “Nigeria has the capacity to grow broadband consumption to about 30 per cent in the coming years. The ministry has a complete ICT policy thrust in place which aims also to increase broadband penetration in the country.”