High taxes blamed for low ICT use in Malawi
High taxes in the country are said to be contributing towards low penetration of Information Communication and Technology (ICT) in Malawi.
ICT Association of Malawi president Wisley Phiri said the sector is failing to grow because of numerous challenges that include high taxes.
“We have an issue of exorbitant taxes. Operators pass these high taxes on to the end users, which then results into high fees for ICT services. This has resulted into low ICT penetration,” said Phiri.
“Our ICT infrastructure is not good. Operators have to invest in the infrastructure as capital expenditure, making the cost of doing business expensive,” he said.
Phiri said Malawi as a country is also not doing well economically, hence not many people and business have enough resources to invest in ICT.
Phiri said Malawi does not also have enough IT professionals saying this also affecting the growth of the sector.
“Some skills available are not matching with the requirements on the ground. There seems to be a disconnection even between some university-trained IT professionals and industry. Companies end up re-training even graduates yet these should have been well drilled while they were in university,” he said.
Phiri also blamed lack of enforcement and implementation of Malawi’s ICT Policy for the challenges affecting the industry in Malawi.
