Kenya allocates $125.3M toward ICT sector

The Kenyan government has allocated $125.3 million to support several information and communication technology (ICT) initiatives for the 2024/2025 financial year.

The budget was announced by the country's National Treasury Minister Njuguna Ndung'u in Parliament late last week.

The funds will be allocated to several government projects within the ICT Ministry.

The funding allocations include: $8.5 million for government-shared services, $5.4 million for the digital superhighway initiative, and $1.7 million for constructing the Kenya Advanced Institute of Science and Technology at Konza Technopolis.

Ndung'u highlighted that to fast-track the development of the Konza Technopolis City, the Kenyan government also allocated $11.5 million for the Horizontal Infrastructure Phase I, as well as $40 million for Konza Data Centre and Smart City Facilities.

The funds will be allocated to several government projects within the Kenyan ICT Ministry. (Source: wirestock on Freepik)

To help Kenya's Digital Economy Acceleration Project, a further $21.6 million has been allocated.

For the upcoming year, the Kenyan government's digital loans initiative, the Hustler Fund was also allocated $38.4 million.

Kenya investing in ICT goals

Kenya's recent budget allocations are helping to advance its ICT goals and further establish the East African country as Africa's technological hub.

In April, the government announced that its ambition to roll out 100,000 kilometers of optical fiber to underserved areas, initially expected to take five years, could now be realized in the next two years.

Earlier this year, in February, tech company Oracle announced plans to establish a public cloud region in Kenya's capital city of Nairobi.

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And in August 2023, President Ruto went on a US-Kenya business roadshow in San Francisco, California, and met with several Silicon Valley tech CEOs to pitch Kenya's "Silicon Savannah" as a prime investment destination for US-based tech companies.

Continuing its efforts to make the country a major tech hub, in November 2023, the country opened a local device assembly factory with capacity to produce up to 3 million mobile phone units annually.

*Top image is of National Treasury Minister, Njuguna Ndung'u in Parliament. (Source: Kenya's National Treasury & Economic Planning)

— Matshepo Sehloho, Associate Editor, Connecting Africa