ICT Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang’i said in Nairobi the shortage has forced some county governments to depend on private sector in order to deploy ICT systems.
“We are therefore fast tracking efforts to increase the number of highly skilled personnel in ICT sector,” Matiang’i said after signing a Memorandum of Understanding between Huawei Technologies and ICT Authority of Kenya.
Under the partnership, the technology firm will train over 160 graduate engineers in specialized fields of ICT over the next two years. The ICT ministry hopes to train 1,000 by the end of 2017.
Matiang’i said out of the country’s 50,000 university graduates produced yearly less that 10,000 are in ICT related courses. Kenya launched the National ICT Master plan in April.
“It will provide a national policy framework to increase broadband penetration as well as frequency spectrum management over the next five years,” he said.
Kenya has also set a target of creating over 180,000 direct jobs in the ICT sector by end of 2017. “It is a tall order but we are scratching our heads to find a way to deliver the result,” the CS said.
ICT Principal Secretary Joseph Tiampati said that the role of technology in national development cannot be overemphasized.
“In fact, ICT has been identified as one of the key drivers that will make Kenya achieves middle income status,” Tiampati said. According to the PS, Kenya will require high end ICT skills in order to take advantage of broadband technology.
The East African nation will use public private partnership to help support last mile connectivity of the national fiber network.
Kenya Education Network Executive Director Meoli Kashorda said that all universities need to be connected through broadband technology so as to improve university and industry linkages.
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Quelle/Source: Coastweek, 07.06.2014
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