On Thursday (May 4), Vesicash, a Nigerian escrow payment system, announced the launch of its new Merchant of Record (MoR) product, as well as its expansion into new African markets. The MoR product aims to simplify the process for companies to enter new markets, and the startup is utilizing it to facilitate its expansion.
"We are thrilled to launch our Merchant of Record technology in multiple African markets. Thus, expanding our reach to businesses in Ghana, Rwanda, Zambia, and Egypt," stated Vesicash co-founder, Tomisin Adeshiyan.
In Nigeria, the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) and the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) recently partnered to develop the digital economy. The partnership aims to develop the digital economy in Nigeria by increasing awareness and encouraging the youth to adopt emerging technologies. Under the agreement, training will be offered to youth corps members interested in advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence and robotics.
The QR code technology was democratized in the 2000s but, it recently gained popularity in the Covid-19 period that facilitated the boom of the contactless economy. By adopting the technology, Kenya joins the few African markets that have standardized QR code usage to facilitate payments.
Last Wednesday, the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) launched the "Kenya Quick Response (KE-QR) Code Standard 2023" aimed at improving digital payment services.
According to CBK governor, Dr. Patrick Njoroge, “the payment system will provide Kenyans with additional secure payment solution methods, increasing usability and consumer adoption of digital payment channels.”
The launch of the KE-QR Code Standard 2023 is one of the several initiatives taken by the CBK under its 2022-2025 National Payment Strategy to support the adoption of key standards and align Kenya's national payment system with global standards.
The effective implementation of the standard and the use of standardized QR Code payments will enable customers to make digital payments in a simple, fast, convenient, and secure manner using the QR code as opposed to the manual system used in the past. It will also promote financial inclusion by allowing institutions of different sizes and customer focus to
By effectively implementing the standard and utilizing standardized QR Code payments, customers can conveniently, quickly, securely, and easily make digital payments using the QR code instead of the manual payment system used in the past. Additionally, it will enhance financial inclusion by enabling institutions of various sizes and customer focus to expand the adoption of digital payments.
QR Code is a universal technology that can be scanned by specialized equipment and apps like the MPESA mobile app and banking apps similar to the ones offered by Equity Bank and the CBK. Thanks to the new standard, merchants can now have QR codes that contain their details as well as the unique identifiers of payment service providers. This technology also provides information about the transaction that has taken place.
Samira Njoya
Its founder, Doaa Abdel Hameed, was the head of operations for a food delivery firm. When her entrepreneurship drive was awakened, she decided to launch a solution in the sector she knows well.
Bonbell is a digital solution developed by an Egyptian start-up. It allows people to order and have food delivered wherever they want. The founding startup is based in Cairo but has partnerships with restaurants in most governorates in Egypt.
“We aim to help restaurants to offer an easier food ordering experience to their customers, either through food delivery, table reservations, takeout orders, or even special orders made by customers within their establishments,” said Doaa Abdel Hameed, co-founder, and chief business officer of Bonbell.
Users can access Bonbell’s services through its Android and iOS apps. Once registered, they can check the various restaurants listed on the platform and place orders if they want. “We strive to provide Egyptian users with a more enjoyable experience when it comes to meal ordering. We see a lot of potential and opportunity to do that by continuously developing the App based on users’ feedback. We will also expand our restaurant offerings across all of Egypt’s governorates,” Ms. Doaa Abdel explains.
Bonbell has raised $350,000 in funding to develop its technology and support its growth, among other things.
Bonbell wants to become a super app. For that purpose, it is integrating a growing number of services such as hotel booking or even services to sports clubs, universities, and companies. Ms. Doaa Abdel Hameed reveals that the solution started “dine-in and takeaway food ordering,” but, it believes that both food ordering and delivery “need more innovation and service enhancement.”
“...The food delivery business is somehow moving towards saturation and high competition, and it is not smart to go and dance with the wolves while we are still at this early-stage startup,” she indicates.
This year, Bonbell has been selected among the 13 startups to participate in the Top-up acceleration program organized by Orange Digital Center Egypt, Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH and Sprints (an accelerator that supports innovative tech startups). To accelerate its growth, it has raised $350,000.
Its Android app has been downloaded more than 10,000 times, according to Playstore’s data. In 2022, it was claiming over 22,000 clients and readying itself for the next stage of its growth. It then launched preparations for a $10 million funding round. Once completed, the proceeds are expected to help upgrade infrastructure and systems as well as fund expansion in the MENA region.
Adoni Conrad Quenum
He has over 12 years of experience in various fields such as humanitarian aid, finance, and entrepreneurship. With Naledi Services, he supports SMEs and start-ups in their digitization process.
Patrice Binwa Aganze (photo) is a Congolese entrepreneur who graduated from the University of Goma in 2011 with a degree in finance and financial management services. He also holds certificates of Professional Competence from Trust Merchant Bank and HavardX. He is renowned as the founder and CEO of tech company Naledi Services.
The company was founded in DR, in 2014. It develops custom web and mobile apps, and offers and maintains security systems, among other things, to help entrepreneurs in their management tasks.
"Naledi Services was created to provide solutions that improve the management of SMEs and startups. Our slogan says it best: “Think IT, Get IT”. We have noticed that many people start their businesses with the buzz around entrepreneurship, but the vast majority of Congolese SMEs do not have management tools adapted to their business," said Patrice Binwa Aganze on what prompted him to create the company, during an interview with TechCabal on May 2, 2023.
The digital solutions he provides SMEs and startups include Reflet, a store management software that offers the possibility to create loyalty programs to reward customers when they visit points of sale. There is also Akiba, a savings management software designed for microfinance institutions and establishments.
Naledi Services is also a communications agency that offers its clients advertising, media, print, marketing, press, and public relations management. It also manages professional and leisure events. To date, Naledi Services has 2,351 active users and has worked with over 375 SMEs and NGOs.
Its founder, Patrice Binwa Aganze, is a UN Capital Development Fund Business Development Support Expert since 2020. He entered the professional world, in 2009, by joining Radio Kivu One as a columnist. At the same time, he was working for APROFIME (Action pour la promotion de la fille-mère) as a senior accountant. He was also a customer service agent for Trust Merchant Bank from 2013 to 2014.
Melchior Koba
Nestcoin, a Nigerian company that makes modern finance borderless, recently announced the launch of "Onboard," a platform aimed at providing modern digital financial services that connect Africans to the global economy.
Among other things, the new platform will allow users to store and move digital assets directly to and from their bank accounts.
Last weekend, Congolese Minister of Posts and Telecommunications Leon Juste Ibombo (photo, right) granted an audience to Guinean Minister of Transport, Evita Oma Honorato (photo, left).
The two officials discussed future agreements to develop the ICT sector in their respective countries. The envisaged cooperation will focus on mobile money interoperability and the implementation of the Oyola training project.
In recent months, various accusations have been leveled against social media giants in Africa. This could take another turn with the birth of an African union of moderators.
On the sidelines of labor day, last May 1, more than one hundred and fifty employees of subcontractors of Meta, OpenAI, or ByteDance met in Nairobi, pledging to create the first African union of content moderators, several media outlets reported.
The new union aims to address issues that these workers regularly complain about, including poor working conditions, pay that is sometimes less than $2 an hour, and the impacts of content moderation on their mental health.
"There have never been more of us. Our cause is right, our way is just, and we shall prevail. I couldn’t be more proud of today’s decision to register the Content Moderators Union," said Daniel Motaung, a former content moderator who was fired after he decided to register a content moderators’ union.
The unionization efforts began three years ago after several contested terminations, including that of Daniel Motaung employed by Sama, the company responsible for Facebook content moderation in East and South Africa since 2019.
Another issue that led to the creation of the union is the low budget dedicated to “the rest of the world.” In 2021, a Wall Street Journal investigation found that Meta's Facebook was spending 87 percent of its disinformation resources in the United States and Western Europe at the time, leaving the rest of the world vulnerable to the dangers of misinformation.
By setting up the African Union of Moderators, the professionals who work or have worked for Facebook, TikTok, or ChatGPT hope to give workers more bargaining power, which can translate into higher wages, better working conditions, and more benefits.
Samira Njoya
She is a computer scientist with a passion for digital transformation, and her contribution to the Ugandan ICT sector was recently celebrated with a national medal.
Aminah Zawedde (photo) is currently the Permanent Secretary of Uganda's Ministry of Information and Communication Technology and National Guidance. She is a graduate of Makerere University, where she earned a bachelor's degree in statistics in 2001 and a master's degree in information systems in 2005. She also holds a graduate degree in education technology from the University of Cape Town (2014) and a Ph.D. in software engineering from Eindhoven University of Technology (2016).
Since 2021, she has been assisting the Ministry of ICT in leading, coordinating, and supporting the formulation of policies, laws, regulations, and strategies to develop the national ICT sector. Her career began in 2001 as the Data Officer for the Uganda Electoral Commission, followed by an internship in the IT department of the Uganda Revenue Authority in 2005. In 2006, she joined the Infectious Diseases Institute-Mulago Hospital as an IT consultant. From 2008 to 2016 and then from 2016 to 2021, respectively, she was an assistant lecturer and teacher-researcher at Makerere University.
Aminah Zawedde's outstanding work in promoting and advancing the use of ICT in Uganda was recognized on May 1, 2023, when the Ugandan government awarded her a national medal, along with Vivian Ddambya. She is also a member of the Board of Directors of the National Information Technology Authority-Uganda (NITA-U) and serves as the Non-Executive Director of DFCU Limited, one of Uganda's strongest financial institutions.
Melchior Koba
The PAYAIG (Pan-African Youth Ambassador for Internet Governance) initiative developed by Cyber Czar and supported by the British government announced, Tuesday (May 2), the opening of applications for its Internet governance program in Africa.
Applicants must be between 18 and 30 years old, reside in any African country, be able to communicate effectively in one of five languages: English, Arabic, French, Portuguese, or Swahili, and be motivated by Internet governance. The deadline for applications is May 19.
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Nigerian fintech company Storspay announced on Monday (May 1st), the successful completion of a $320,000 funding round. The deal allows the startup to join the New York-based accelerator Techstars for a 13-week fundraising and mentoring program. The funds raised will allow the fintech to develop its technology and improve the financial well-being of entrepreneurs through its decentralized Internet lending infrastructure.
Since 2020, the U.S.-based international organization has been providing additional capital to associations working for digital inclusion in three countries around the world. For this edition, six countries are concerned, including Ghana and Senegal.
The Internet Society Foundation, an organization that promotes the development of the Internet worldwide, announced on April 30, the opening of applications for the 2023 edition of its Strengthening Communities, Improving Lives, and Livelihoods (SCILLS) program.
The organization will award up to $250,000 in grants for projects that leverage the Internet to promote economic inclusion and boost education opportunities. In Africa, two countries are eligible, namely Ghana and Senegal.
"Internet access has increased significantly in Indonesia, however, access to Internet knowledge and skills remain out of reach for some. This new round of SCILLS program grants will support organizations that connect underserved communities with the critical digital skills needed to unlock economic growth and educational opportunities," said Sarah Armstrong, executive director of the Internet Society Foundation.
Interested parties are invited to apply with complete applications by May 31st.
Let’s note that at the of end 2022, the Internet penetration rate was 99.03%, up from 94.82% the previous year, according to a report by the Senegalese Telecommunications and Postal Regulatory Authority (ARTP).
Samira Njoya
In Africa, the lack of financial resources is not the only factor that affects access to education. The social environment can sometimes also be an obstacle. In those conditions, the well-directed use of ICT tools can address the issue.
ICT tools can be beneficial in many ways for children’s education, according to the World Bank. The international institution makes this assumption based on the experiment it facilitated, between 2018 and 2020, in the States of Kano and Jigawa, in Northwest Nigeria. The experiment involved 9393 rural households whose children aged 6 to 9 and their parents were subjected to two digital learning approaches. The approaches led to a 42% drop in the nonenrolment rate.
The baseline sample selected by the World Bank included 2,335 households in 32 communities that received only aspirational videos for parents to change their mindset and wish for better for their children. Also, 2,345 households in 32 communities received aspirational videos, and 40% of them also received a smartphone with educational content. 4,713 households in 64 communities served as a control group.
The results, documented in the “Improving Enrollment and Learning through Videos and Mobiles Experimental Evidence from Northern Nigeria” policy research paper demonstrate that aspirational videos alone reduced girls' aspirations to marry at the ages of 15 to 18. The videos had the greatest impact on the girls' parents. In households that received the aspirational videos and the smartphone, children's literacy and numeracy skills improved by 0.46 points and 0.63 points, respectively, compared to the control group.
According to the World Bank, no evidence of heterogeneous effects by gender was found overall, "highlighting the potential of edtech to also effectively reach girls in conservative settings, where girls' seclusion or a strong bias towards boys’ education may prevent girls from accessing formal schooling."
"Our heterogeneous analysis by gender shows that the interventions worked for both girls and boys and that the magnitude of treatment effects across gender were generally similar for the main outcomes (school enrollment, and literacy/numeracy skills),” the research paper informs.
Social pressure, a barrier to education
The research reveals that since smartphones are often used by multiple household members in low-resource settings, the resources provided for the experiment improved the literacy and numeracy skills of older, non-targeted siblings, reduced early parenthood among adolescents living in targeted households, and reduced early labor market entry.
For the World Bank, this is bonanza. In its 2019 Reading and Access Research Activity report, the institution revealed that northern Nigeria was significantly behind the national average in terms of education. Less than 3 percent of second graders in public elementary schools could read Hausa text with 80 percent or better comprehension. In the northwest, only 29 percent of women aged 15-49 and 59 percent of men were literate. Only 40 percent of 30-34-year-olds were educated in the northeast and northwest zones, compared to 90 percent in the southeast and southwest regions of the country.
The study believes the situation in the northwest is due to the strong adherence of the population to traditional norms. The formal legal institution of Sharia law, which applies in most northern states and covers social, civil, and criminal matters, has reinforced social norms that encourage early marriage among adolescents and thus early pregnancy. All of this represents additional barriers to education. The emergence of the militant terrorist group Boko Haram, which translates to: "Western education is forbidden," has created an additional barrier to school enrollment and attendance in the north of the country.
According to the World Values Survey 2017-2021 cited by the World Bank, 42 percent of respondents in Nigeria believe that college is more important for a boy than a girl and 41 percent believe that preschoolers suffer when mothers are employed. These norms contrast with those observed in other countries such as Kenya, where the proportions of the population holding these views are 18% and 23% respectively.
Africa has a well-documented agricultural potential. Yet, its farmers struggle in various aspects of their work. This can change with the introduction of technology in the sector.
TroTro Tractor is a digital solution developed by a Ghanaian startup. The platform allows farmers and agricultural entrepreneurs to rent agricultural equipment such as tractors, seeders, combine harvesters, and sprayers. It was developed by an eponymous startup launched, in 2016, by Adam Muhammed Muhideen and Kamal Yakub to enable easy access to modern, high-quality agricultural machinery that can help Ghanaian farmers improve productivity and maximize yields.
Through its Android app, farmers and entrepreneurs can create accounts to access the machines available. The machines can be sorted by rental rates, geographical location, and most importantly type of machine. TroTro Tractor also has a USSD code that allows farmers with no access to the internet or living in remote areas to access its services.
The startup also offers training on how to use agricultural machines, technical assistance, and maintenance services. With its maintenance reminders and management reports, it also helps farmers plan and manage their farming operations more efficiently.
According to play store’s stats, the app has been downloaded just over 100 times. This, however, is not considered a good indication of the popularity enjoyed by the solution since most African rural areas lack internet connection and the USSD code may be the most used option.
Adoni Conrad Quenum