Google has rolled out a program that will see 10 Million young people in Africa acquire digital skills. Dubbed, Digital Skills for Africa (DSA), the program has so far reached 25 African countries.Africa has a population of between I billion to 1.2 Billion people. Out of these, about 60 per cent are under the age of 20.
In Kenya, over 26 Million people are using the internet. The number of those owning mobile phones and are subscribed to various telecommunication service providers is ever increasing with Safaricom taking the lion’s share. As at January 2017, Safaricom had recorded a whopping 25.94 Million subscribers according to a report published in the Daily nation of January 20th 2017. Airtel had a total of 6.76 Million subscribers, Telkom subscribers had dropped to 2.9 Million up from 5.2 Million and lastly Equity bank owned Equitel came forth at 2.28 Million subscribers.
Internet is revolutionizing the world. The number of internet users can only go up in the coming years. It is therefore important to acquire digital skills as you brace yourself for this change that is already catching up with us.
Self-employment
It is a known fact that one of the diseases ailing Kenya and Africa at large is the huge number of unemployed youths. Old models of doing work are being replaced by machines. The digitization of both private sector and government operations has led to loss of jobs as one machine can do what a hundred people used to do. This has lowered the cost of production and hence raised the profits of companies/corporations. But the internet has also made it easy for unemployed people to get into self-employment. You can do business online. You can start a blog. You can develop websites as a business. You will need to acquire digital skills to enable navigate and get the most out of the internet. You need to acquire digital skills to enable you run an online business effectively.
Jobs
There are thousands of jobs available online. All you need is to equip yourself with digital skills. You can become a website developer. You can become a search engine marketing (SEM) expert. You can work as a social media expert, a software engineer, a web data analysts etc. You can also work as a digital skills trainer. The world is heading towards complex digital operations and the earlier you join the bandwagon the better for you. A popular phrase used by Comedians Mchungaji and Mtumishi puts it aptly,” Tumetoka analog tunaenda digital.” I cannot agree more.
Community transformation
Another reason why you need to acquire digital skills is that it will help you to transform your community. After getting digital skills, it is you who will help the old people who cannot catch up with the rate at which operations are being digitized. It is you who will help the rest of the community to get online and benefit for the vast opportunities that the internet offers. By assisting people to become digitally smarter, you will have transformed not only the community you live in but also the entire World.
The Internet has enabled people in third world Countries to have the same opportunity as people in the first world countries. They can get the same information from the internet. This means that the internet has empowered the vulnerable people in the society. They can, by a click of a mouse, be able to browse opportunities available for them. They can do research online and acquire entrepreneurship ideas. They can interact and share information/ideas with other people from other countries and continents.
The writer is a certified Google digital skills trainer