At a recent summit in Nigeria the importance of ICT in the country was discussed by Konga CEO Sim Shagaya, who noted that the company had been able to give graduates job experience and stimulate entrepreneurship via the Konga Marketplace.
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Shagaya noted that Konga had been able to bring a significant part of its technology development to Nigeria by hiring engineering graduates from Nigerian Universities like UniIfe, Futo, and so on. Through this initiative, recent graduates gain exposure to relevant technologies that help them build long-lasting technologies for Nigeria.
Konga has been making some noise around encouraging employment and entrepreneurship in recent months. Last month the ecommerce player announced the Konga Marketplace, which aims to help Nigerians become entrepreneurs and give existing Nigerian entrepreneurs the opportunity to reach a bigger and wider audience by using the web. The Marketplace essentially gives Nigerian merchants access to a much larger audience online at no commission.
The growing influence of the country’s rising technology industry is shown in the popularity of its ecommerce stores. Ecommerce stores such as Jumia, Kaymu and Konga have been extremely competitive recently after record numbers were reached during the 2013 Christmas season.
However, Mckinsey & Company director Leke Acha noted that the Nigerian internet sector contributed just about 0.8% to the country’s GDP, which is less than the continent’s average of 1.1% and less than half of the world’s emerging market average.
Mckinsey pointed out that Senegal and Kenya, though not the continent’s largest economies, had Africa’s highest internet contribution to GDP, and governments in both countries had made concerted efforts to stimulate internet demand.
Regardless of this, Konga is optimistic about the role of ecommerce in Nigeria and provides the tools, awareness and security for entrepreneurs and businesses across the country who want to reap the benefits of having a business online.
