Closing the digital divide – NRZ can play a role

NRZ can create a subsidiary called SteamTel, a name derived from the locomotives that were powered by steam known as isitimela. SteamTel can be a commercially run telecoms business unit.

Privatisation

Worldwide most rail operators provide telecommunications capacity to wherever the railway line goes. In South Africa a company called Transnet runs and operates a highly profitable data, internet and voice. The concept or logic is based on the fact that the NRZ already has nationwide infrastructure that connects the major centres in Zimbabwe. The communications division company of it then rides on back of the NRZ infrastructure in the same way that Powertel was conceived on providing communications links that relies on the ZESA electricity national grid. So Powertel did not have to worry about the backbone of their network since ZESA already had the grid network that transports electricity from generation points to the distribution network electricity grid.

This is the same with transmedia, which rides on the back of the ZBC broadcasting infrastructure.

Presently Zimbabwe has 3 GSM , 1 Fixed Line operator and more than 8 Data and Internet service providers. So the introduction of another telecoms operator might sound unnecessary and from an end user point of view .But at a carrier level it makes more sense.

Presently the only company that provides high speed connectivity to the world-wide web outside Zimbabwe by fibre is Powertel which is connected via Botswana Telecoms. Other players setting up fibre connections to the under sea cables include Ecoweb via Liquid Telecom who are digging trenches all over and laying fibre cables that enable high speed Internet connections to Facebook hosted in San Jose in California. So is Africom laying fibre via Mutare to the Indian Ocean.

Layout

NRZ already has its own radio communications network for signalling and communications that uses radio and fixed connections. This network consists of very high rise towers that sends and receives signals to different points for certain distances.

NRZ would need to install base stations wherever they have a railway station specifically to provide digital services such as email , internet , fax and most importantly voice. Making calls over a fibre network is pretty easy and trivial .The average person in Zimbabwe now is familiar with SMS which currently costs 10 cents per message, which should really be the price of a call per minute. Incumbent operators have performed dismally when it comes to delivering true broadband connectivity .The reason for their failures range from lack of capital right through to outright incompetence and taking end users for granted.

Feasibility

The digital divide in Zimbabwe is far from being bridged. The millions of mobile users in the country is a good indication and a positive development that makes it possible for people in the most remotest areas where there is cellular coverage to send text messages to their beloved ones in London.

But beyond SMS and making voice calls that are extremely over priced, it is time that the digital push moves into the next gear of availing email, Internet, fax and video services. The other day driving to Bulawayo from Harare as I went past Ntabazinduna I realised that the Ecoweb fibre line is a few kilometres from the community. This literally means a connection from the main line to the business centre could deliver Skype and Facebook to this rural community.

Economic Opportunities

This is an opportunity for smaller towns like Chegutu and Plumtree to out jump over crowded Harare metro using digital power. Needless to repeat, fibre optics brings along the capacity to carry huge amounts of data, voice and video over long distances at lighting speeds literally.

Consider if a town like Plumtree is connected to the fibre network. This would mean businesses based in Plumtree could offer call centre services to companies based in the US or UK. A call centre is a setup where phone agents sitting in front of a computer can make and receive calls using high speed data connections like the Internet that the rail brings. The geographical location of a call centre is immaterial. That is why thousands of companies in the US out sourced their call centre services to companies in India, Malasyia and now Kenya, South Africa and many more. Zimbabwe is an ideal destination for this kind of phone support service because of two factors. One is English language and our literacy levels. So if the same Plumtree call centre model is replicated in all smaller towns nationwide along the railway line with fibre reach, then who says job creation has to be in restricted to Harare alone.

These are long term projects and plans that must be under taken at a national level. These are not quick money hit and run kind of projects. These kind of plans require those in charge of resources and those who make national decisions to see beyond their eyelids. This is not a get rich quick scheme. Digital competence is the best opportunity that Africa has to catch up and with the rest of the world.

It is a total waste of time and money to talk about turning around the economy when people have no access to information to effect that turn around. To market and sell their products by way of exports that generate the much needed forex, create employment and improve the average quality of lives.

Towns like Chegutu, Gwanda, Marondera, Bulawayo, Gweru, Kwekwe, Kadoma, Mutare, Rusape, Victoria Falls, Hwange can now setup digitally based businesses that do not require an A2 farm allocation. We cant all be farmers can we?

Partnering Option

Considering that there is already a dozen data, Internet and voice operators in Zimbabwe maybe SteamTel can partner or even acquire an existing licensed operator. This way we avoid having too many operators offering shoddy service at prohibitive prices.

Competition breeds competence and product improvement and eliminates complacency on part of service providers whom I must say they are taking the public for granted.

The NRZ needs a major clean up. It could look at merging or partnering with operators like Telco Internet, Broadlands, Aquiva Wireless, Taurai Commms, Africom. This could form the basis of the second land line operator given the dismal service delivery by our fixed line operator,Telone, still being run along the tried and tested failing parastatals models of the likes of ZESA, PTC, ZBC, Zisco and NRZ.

SteamTel would operate as a private telecommunications network and offer services such as wireless services, which offer broadband and narrow band, fixed wireless access, trunk radio network, radio network planning, and engineering and spectrum management services most of which they are already doing at a low level.

This way no one monster will monopolise the digital market and peg service at prices that are “morally illegal”.

How do we expect to export agricultural goods when the farmer out there does not even know where the external markets are because he has no means of even sending an email to the potential buyer about the grade or price of his orange produce?

And maybe for a change this will be the first telecommunications company whose head quarters will be in Bulawayo where NRZ headquarters is.

Editors note: Robert Ndlovu is a ICT consultant formerly based in California , USA and now offering knowledge based consultancy for African based organisations, governments and businesses in the digital inclusiveness plans bridging the digital divide.