6.1 Financing
06
Implementation
Achieving the vision of the National ICT Master Plan will require the
mobilization of significant financial and human resources. Funding of
the flagship projects in this Master Plan will come from the National
and County Governments, development partners and other public or
private institutions through Private Public Partnerships (PPPs) and
collaborations.
In 2011, ICT spending was US$860 million. Government of Kenya
spent 0.3% on IT as a percentage of overall spending. This will need
to increase and be reallocated based on planned priorities. Most Government ICT spending is on hardware at 65% compared to global
benchmark of 18%. IT spending on staff is significantly lower at 18%
as opposed to 38% for global benchmark.
As shown in Table 1, Kenya spent 9.3% of its ICT spending on computer software and services in 2009, a further confirmation that a significant amount goes into hardware. South Africa spent the highest
proportion of 22.4%. There is a need to benchmark this spending with
global standards.
Due to financial limitations in public and official development assistance, it is essential to develop innovative funding mechanisms to mobilize additional resources from other sources as outlined below.
Sources of Funding
The following are the envisioned sources of funding for the ICT Master
Plan:
1.
Government: The Government shall fund the foundational pillars through a re-focused expenditure planning model. This shall be
facilitated through the Government budget and allocations such as:
a.
Increase Government spending on ICT from 0.3% to 5% of National and County Government budgets from 2015/2016, as
recommended in the National Broadband Strategy.
b.
Use of Universal Access Fund (which loops in 0.5% of turn-over
of ICT operators and service providers) from 2015/2016 to fund
broadband roll-out in under-served areas, as recommended in the
National Broadband Strategy.
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.................................................................................................................Towards
...............a...Digital
.............Kenya
............
‘Due to financial
limitations in
public and
official
development
assistance, it is
essential to
develop
innovative
funding
mechanisms to
mobilize
additional
resources from
other sources’
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Towards a Digital Kenya
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