Feature: Zambia moves toward mobile age

John Banda, a freelance Zambian journalist, recently got a secondhand Nokia mobile phone from a friend of his.

"I have been looking for a handset for a long time. It's very hard to run around without a mobile phone," said a delighted Banda.

Zambia, one of the world's least developed countries, has been slowly but steadily moving toward the age of mobile phones, to the benefits of thousands of people like Banda.

According to the 2004 Economic Report published by the Ministry of Finance and National Planning, mobile phone users in Zambia increased by over 100 percent last year to 413,120 from the 191, 289 in 2003.

Zambia, with a population of 10 million, now has three mobile phone service operators, namely the state-owned Cell Z and privately owned Telecel and Celtel.

Celtel, the biggest of them, boasted of 270,000 subscribers as at the end of 2004. Telecel and Cell Z had 83,000 and 60,000 subscribers, respectively.

In a country where 70 percent of the population live under the poverty line, affordability of service is of utter importance.

To woo as many customers as possible, the companies are providing top-up cards ranging from two US dollars to 100 dollars, to meet the needs of different tiers of customers.

Competition has led to reduced prices as well as new products.

Telecel recently announced a 20 percent price cut for peak time talks, while Celtel has just launched its text message services providing instant news, economic intelligence and weather information.

Mobile networks used to concentrate along the railway line that runs the north-south length of the country from Livingstone, the tourist capital in the south to Kitwe, the copper industry center in the north.

But now all the operators are making hectic efforts to expand their networks.

Celtel, the market leader, already established networks in all the nine provinces.

Telecel, the first mobile company in Zambia when it began operation in 1996, has embarked on an expansion program to establish its presence in the whole country.

Marketing Manager Margaret Schiott said the company intends to extend its coverage to all districts so as to bring mobile phone services to the rural population.

The company currently provides services in Southern, Lusaka, Central, Copperbelt and Northern provinces.

The rapid increase of subscribers has led to network congestion resulting in failed calls and line cutting, with angry consumers calling on authorities to take actions.

Operators have pledged to expand their switch capacity. Norman Moyo, commercial director of Celtel, said his company will spend 50 million dollars this year to increase the capacity of its switch to one million lines.

The Communications Authority of Zambia has also directed mobile operators to connect directly from one network to the other instead of going through the switch of the state-owned Zambia Telecommunications Company, the only operator of fixed lines. It is also considering opening the GSM1800 band, in addition to the 900 band currently in use.

Despite the rapid growth over recent years, the penetration of mobile phones is still quite low in Zambia.

Every 100 Zambians now own only 4 mobile phones, compared to over 90 in developed countries, or 25 in China and other developing countries.

"The number of people with access to mobile phones is still insignificant and our task is to address the issue of how to bring mobile phone services to as many people as possible. The investment potential in this sector is huge," said Shuller Habenzu, managing director of the Communications Authority of Zambia.

Source: Xinhua