Leveraging the power of the digital economy to fast-track development in southern Africa

South Africa - 30 October 2017

Many of the technological advances that have gripped the world’s attention in recent years are nothing short of amazing - not only because of the novelty and convenience that they bring but because of the speed with which they are lapped up by a seemingly insatiable market. The massive growth in the mobile phone sector, for example, particularly in developing countries, signals the new imperative to be ‘connected’ at all times. Traditional economic systems are increasingly giving way to the ‘digital economy’, which can be described as the worldwide network of economic activities enabled by information and communication technologies (ICTs). Very little economic activity these days is even possible without some digital element or intervention, and so more and more people are saying that the digital economy is the economy.

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