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In a statement issued on Monday, November 27, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) reiterated its support for Ethiopia's digitization efforts. "We work in tandem with the government as the country has a national digital strategy. We work with them and then we address all of the specific requests that come to ITU and that is how we actually work in Ethiopia and the entire continent," explained Anne-Rachel Inné (pictured), ITU Regional Director for Africa.
Cameroonian e-health startup Waspito has completed a $2.5 million funding round, we learn from a LinkedIn post by founder, Jean Lobe Lobe. The funds will finance tech upgrades and expansion into new markets. "We intend to continue expanding in Cameroon and Côte d'Ivoire, and launch our activities in Senegal and Gabon," explained a Waspito executive.
Kenyan fish farming startup AquaRech announced last week the successful completion of a $1.7 million funding round. "The funding and partnership provided by our investors will promote the growth of our mobile-enabled platform, which is unlocking barriers faced by smallholder fish farmers and bringing the various value chain actors together while remaining farmer-centric," explained Dave Okech, who founded the startup in 2019.
Nigerian agritech startup UfarmX, announced on Tuesday, November 14 its expansion into Senegal. The operation was facilitated by a $1.7 million investment from the Senegalese subsidiary of United Bank for Africa.
Last November 2, DRC Prime Minister Sama Lukonde Kyenge officially inaugurated a data center built by Huwaei at the Ministry of Finance headquarters in the framework of a project to modernize ICT infrastructure.
The data center, financed by the Export-Import Bank of China, will centralize, merge, secure, and store the activities of the country's financial authorities.
Pan-African payments gateway MFS Africa, founded in 2009 by Dare Okoudjou (photo) and based in Johannesburg, South Africa, announced on Wednesday, November 1 its name change to Onafriq. The change comes as the firm embarks on its North American expansion after several acquisitions.
"As we embark on this next phase of our journey, we wanted a name that reflects our aspiration of wiring up the whole continent into one network of networks with pathways from and to every African and every African business," explains Dare Okoudjou.
Last Wednesday, October 25, Pascal Nyamulinda, Director General of the National Agency for the Identification of Persons (ANIP), officially launched anip.bj, the agency’s official mobile application.
The application aims to facilitate the acquisition of administrative documents, help users check the authenticity of those documents, and submit claims and complaints. For the time being, it is only available for Android devices.
On Wednesday, October 25, the Guinean Ministry of Technical Education, Vocational Training and Employment announced the signing of a memorandum of understanding with the Chinese technology firm Huawei. The aim is to build smart classrooms at the Kindia Vocational Center and Camara Laye in Conakry.
On Wednesday, October 18, Benin’s Ministry of Digital Affairs and Digitizationannounced the 2023 edition of itsyearlyevent SENUM (Digital Week) wouldbeheldfromNovember 6 to 10 at the Congress Center of Cotonou. This year, the eventwillbeheldaround the theme “Emerging technologies to accelerate the digital transformation of States.”
The Mauritian government recently announced that new mobile identification measures would become enforceable on October 31, 2023.
According to authorities, from the aforementioned date, all current cell phone subscribers will have to re-register their SIM or Esim cards. The main aim is to ensure that every SIM card in use is registered in the name of the individual using it, thereby strengthening subscriber protection against identity theft, various forms of fraud, and malicious practices.
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On the sidelines of the Regional Cybersecurity Week Abu Dhabi, October 8 to 13, Chad's Minister of Telecommunications and Digital Economy, Mahamat Allahou Taher, and the head of the UAE government's Cybersecurity Council, Mohamed Hamad Al Kuwaiti, signed a memorandum of understanding.
Under the terms of the agreement, the two countries will collaborate in the fields of cybersecurity, the fight against cybercrime, and international cooperation in cyber matters, among other things.
In Ethiopia, the National Identification Program Office, the Refugees and Returnees Service (RRS), and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) signed a memorandum of understanding last Friday, October 6.
The agreement aims to provide a national digital ID to some 90,000 refugees and returnees in the country over the next three years. The aim is to enable access to government services and benefits for the refugees and returnees.
On Monday, October 2, Tanzanian authorities inaugurated the Center for Competence in Digital Education (C-CoDE), the fruit of collaboration between Morocco's Mohamed VI Polytechnic University (UM6P) and Switzerland's Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL).
The center, hosted by the Nelson Mandela African Science and Technology Institution (NM-AIST), was built thanks to an endowment of over $100,000 from the United States. Among other things, the center will support the digital transformation of training and education practices in Tanzania and the East African Community (EAC).
Ham Serunjogi (photo), co-founder of Nigerian unicorn Chipper Cash, was appointed on Tuesday, September 26 to the U.S. Council for African Diaspora Engagement. He will serve in the twelve-member council along with 11 other African Americans, until 2025.