Editor, RE: “Why Jumia Rwanda closed its e-commerce platform” (The New Times, January 17). Such is the way of life... Businesses face challenges all the time and some survive, some close down. I am glad Jumia has chosen to be agile and respond to the market instead of completely giving up. E-commerce is the next step in Rwanda’s ICT journey. The country has the requisite infrastructure in place, including telecom networks, internet companies and specifically broadband (4G LTE) and a healthy internet service provider market, a national data center, the national cyber security infrastructure, a fiber optic network that connects 30 districts and 11 border points, and broadband internet capacity within the country. The country now needs to move forward to fully utilizing the investments and realizing its value through services including e-government services, e-citizen services and e-commerce among others. Currently, Rwanda internet penetration rate is about 30% equivalent to 1 million Rwandans with access to the internet. The key pieces seem to be in place, yet the progress of e-commerce in the country is very slow. This requires government intervention to push for an uptake of ICT within the local population. The government could have an inkling of this great need to see its massive investments in ICT being utilized. The barriers to e-commerce however include: 1. The cost of internet and broadband. Although prices have fallen 4G still remains out of reach for many people. 2. Lack of a good addressing system. Although the City of Kigali addressed it, but it needs to be rolled across the country. 3. The National Post Office a while back released an e-commerce strategy for its services, but time will tell how effectively it can be implemented. 4. Lack of trust and fear of online fraud within the population. 5. Low literacy rates in Rwanda and especially ICT literacy. It’s high time to consider that vast numbers of Rwandans are comfortable with Kinyarwanda yet all the e-commerce websites listed above do not have a Kinyarwanda version. 6. Open markets. African reality is that everyone is literally doing the same businesses at every corner and it’s a stiff competition. How can an e-commerce compete with your local/neighborhood ‘boutique’ as popularly known that stocks the very similar products sold online? Ultimately a good e-commerce strategy needs to be implemented to sort out barriers to e-commerce. MG
