📋 Tender Overview
Project ID: P171034
Region: Africa
Commitment Amount: Us$ 200.00 million
Total Project Cost: Us$ 200.00 million
Proposed Development Objective(s) The Program Development Objective is increase access to affordable, high quality internet services for government, businesses and citizens, and to promote digital entrepreneurship and creation of digital jobs, under a Mobilizing Finance for Development approach.. Component 1 -- Digital Economy, enabling legal and regulatory environment -- seeks to strengthen the analog foundations of the digital economy, in particular policy-making, regulation and skills. The WBG has been supporting the Ministry of Finance with the reform of the telecommunication sector, in particular the passage of the new Communications Services Regulatoin Proclamation, the creation of an independent sector regulator, the partial privatization of the incumbent operator and the opening of the market to new operators. To implement these reforms, the Government has requested project preparation advance (PPA) that is being used to hire a transaction advisor to assist with the partial privatization of Ethio Telecom. The Government has also invited IFC to act as a transaction advisor for the award of two new full-service telecom licenses. Component 2 -- Digital Connectivity -- seeks to assist Ethiopia in extending affordable broadband internet access to all firms, citizens and government entities by 2030 and doubling broadband penetration by 2021. Leveraging the moves towards market opening should help with reducing the digital divide and extending broadband coverage, under a Mobilizing Finance for Development (MFD) approach. But private sector investment alone may not be sufficient to cover all of rural Ethiopia and some level of capital expenditure may be necessary. Government can act as an anchor tenant to stimulate investment in new infrastructure and rural coverage of mobile broadband.
