Introduction - The Republic of Mozambique
The Republic of Mozambique is located in Southern Africa, bordered by Malawi, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe. The Mozambique Channel is to the east. Mozambique has an area of 799,380 km² and eleven provinces: Cabo Delgado, Niassa, Nampula, Tete, Zambézia, Manica, Sofala, Inhambane, Gaza, Maputo Provínce and Maputo-Cidade. The population is estimated at 28.9 million inhabitants (August 2017 National Population Census ) with a literacy rate of 58.8%. Fifty-two percent of the population is aged between 15 and 64 (median 17 years). The capital city is Maputo with a population of 1.102 million (2018 CIA World Factbook). Portuguese is the official language and there are several indigenous languages as national languages. English is widely used in business and government.
Despite fiscal reforms (including the introduction of a value-added tax and reform of the customs service), Mozambique remains dependent upon foreign assistance for more than half of its annual budget, and the majority of the population remains below the poverty line.
Subsistence agriculture continues to employ the vast majority of the country's work force and smallholder agricultural productivity and productivity growth is weak. Heavy reliance on aluminium, which accounts for about one-third of exports, subjects the economy to volatile international prices. Estimated GPD growth in 2014 was 7%, with agriculture representing 29%, industry 21% and services 50% (CIA World Factbook).
Mozambique reformed its telecommunications landscape in 1992. There is one fixed line operator - Telecomunicações de Moçambique (TDM) and three mobile operators providing services - mCel, the incumbent mobile subsidiary of TDM, Vodacom Mozambique (2003) and Movitel (2012). The merger between TDM and mCel will be completed during December 2018. This consolidation has been planned since 2016 as part of the restructuring of public sector business ongoing by the Government.
While the mobile sub-sector experienced growth rates with the introduction of competition, growth has slowed due to ineffective cost structures and insufficient infrastructure. In terms of Communications there were 83,708 fixed phone lines in use; 13.58 million mobile phone subscribers and Internet penetration is 5,39 million users in October 2017 (INCM, Mozambique). During 2013 the Government initiated a revision of the 2004 Telecommunications Act to support the development of infrastructure and greater competition.
There are 4 public universities, 14 public Higher Education Institutions, 11 private Universities and 20 private Higher Education Institutions. Twenty-two institutions are dedicated to research activities, 15 of which are government institutions and 7 private.
In terms of ICT infrastructure, there are two submarine fibre optic cables - Seacom (2009) and EASSY (2010). The national broadband backbone provides an optical fibre connection to all 11 provincial capitals. There is an Internet Exchange Point in Maputo. Purchase of international capacity is facilitated for eGovernment users through the GovNet projects and for Universities through MoRENet.
The Mozambique Research and Education Network (MoRENet) was set up in 2005 by the Ministry of Science and Technology as part of the ICT Policy Implementation Strategy as a national data network to interconnect academic and research institutions. MoRENet is a member of the Ubuntunet Alliance and a partner in the Africa Connect project which is supporting improved connectivity for research and education within Sub-Saharan Africa by the provision of research networking infrastructure within the region and organising a direct interconnection to GÉANT.
ICT Background
In 1998, the Government of Mozambique established an Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Policy Commission, chaired by the Prime Minister, whose primary mandate was to draw up a national ICT Policy. Following a two-year nationwide debate involving all stakeholders (public and private sectors, civil society, academic and research institutions, donor agencies, etc), the national ICT Policy was approved by the Council of Ministers in December 2000. In June 2002, an ICT Policy Implementation Strategy was adopted, which provided concrete benchmarks and targets to be achieved and indicators to assess progress. Human capacity, infrastructure, legal and regulatory framework, e-Government, content, applications and business development were selected as key areas of intervention to ensure that ICT was an enabler and cross cutting issue in all sectors and development programmes.
e-Government is a key element in the ICT Policy Implementation Strategy to support the Public Sector Reform Strategy of improving public sector performance, efficiency and cost-effectiveness through the use of ICTs.
As part of the implementation of the ICT Policy Implementation Strategy and mobilization of resources, many ICT projects were launched in the public sector including the Electronic Government Network Project, SchoolNet Project, eSISTAFE (State Financial Administration System), the Land Information Management System, SISCAL (System for Licensing and Registration of Enterprises), Criminal Registry System, Civil Registration System, Civil Identification Registry System, Emigration Registry System, Driving License Registry System. The private sector has also been very innovative in providing many eCommerce and eBusiness applications to citizens and the public sector.
The Electronic Government Network Project (GovNet) was launched to provide the Government with a high-capacity electronic communication infrastructure that is reliable and safe for 'rapid, efficient and effective transportation of information'. This infrastructure is designed to support the implementation of information systems and the installation of all applications that will enable Government-to-Government (G2G), Government-to-Business (G2B), and Government-to-Citizens (G2C) operations. The Electronic Transaction Law was approved in 2017.
From 2015 the ICT Policy, ICT Policy Implementation and the eGovernment Strategy documents were revised, resulting in new three documents, namely Information Society Policy, Information Society Strategic Plan and Information Society Operational Plan, which were submitted for approval by the Government.
In 2017, following the approval of the Electronic Transactions Law (Law No. 3/2017), which establishes the principles, general rules and legal regime for electronic transactions, electronic commerce and electronic government, the Information and Communication Techology National Institute (INTIC) became the regulator of ICTs in Mozambique. The National Institute for Electronic Government (INAGE) was established as a new entity to implement Electronic Government Services in Mozambique.
