MWC AFRICA, KIGALI: CEO of Smart Africa, Lacina Kone, (pictured) called for government initiatives to move away from conversations surrounding new socioeconomic opportunities in Africa, stating it’s time for action by committing to the continent’s digital development.

In a keynote session, Kone described the founding of Smart Africa in 2013 as a testimony to a commitment to transform the continent into a single digital market by putting “ICT at the centre of our socioeconomic growth”.

The CEO noted the move to accelerate Africa’s digital agenda should support bold innovations focusing on the group organisation’s founding values including entrepreneurship, sustainable development and e-governance, among others.

Koné belives the organisation’s goal to activate a fully digital economy in Africa by 2030 can be achieved through sustaining institutional coordination and improving national ICT strategies.

Today, the Smart Africa alliance has grown to include 35 African countries representing 1.1 billion of the African population. It claims to have established digital infrastructure that benefit and span across different sectors, ranging from the development of smart cities and villages, digital economy to cloud data centres.