Browsing: Africa

Amazon Web Services (AWS), the world’s most comprehensive and broadly adopted cloud platform has been helping EdTechs around the world including Africa; to innovate faster technology solutions that support students and educators every day, lowering costs and offering over 200 fully-featured services from data globally.  

Some EdTech initiatives in Africa include; Kenya’s Elimu, which is a leading digital educational provider in East Africa; with fun and engaging literacy apps that have garnered numerous positive reviews, due to fast improvements in reading fluency as opposed to the control group. They have been encouraging students to improve their skills both at home and school, combining engaging content as well as proven pedagogies.  

Another Kenyan EdTech company gaining traction is Zoezi Education, with a vision to empower the learning community in Kenya, through its flagship products ‘Zoezi Revision and Zoezi Darasani’. The renowned platform offers interactive and auto marked revision questions, for the new CBC curriculum and KCPE past and model papers; reviewed by qualified and experienced teaching personnel across the country. Furthermore, it avails Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) quizzes, composed to meet the CASEL standards.  

US-Ghana Trade Relations: Symbiotic or exploitative? www.theexchange.africa

Many exports from Ghana to the US benefit from duty-free tariff preferences under the American Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) and the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) programme. Exports from Ghana to the US that have enjoyed AGOA preferences include yams, apparel and cocoa (beans, powder or paste).

Ghana has exported US$131 million worth of yams to the US since 2012, avoiding a standard import duty of 6.4 per cent under AGOA. Cocoa exported to the US has amounted to US$2.5 billion over the last two decades.

Miss Rosa Whitaker, the President and the CEO of the Whitaker Group (TWG), is significant to the success of AGOA in Africa, facilitating the export of over 9,000 agricultural and manufactured goods to the United States.

Whitaker advocates for African countries to research what the US market is demanding and be alert to new opportunities. She pointed out the success of Ghana’s cocoa in the United States, saying that the processed cocoa powder manufactured at the US$100 million Cargill plant is now being offered to global food manufacturers under a made-in-Ghana label.

Intelligent packaging: Africa adopting blockchain and AI technology to end the plastic waste menace. www.theexchange.africa

According to the Future Market Insights report, around 9.2 billion tonnes of plastic have been manufactured globally, out of which only 9 per cent is recycled!

The technology helps to protect manufacturers and consumers against food and drug counterfeits. 

 With the plastic waste menace causing unprecedented damage globally, there has been an ongoing movement to discover and use alternative packaging materials, such as paper, glass, and metals.

The dilemma facing the world right now is that even the processes of creating plastic-free solutions often release more significant carbon emissions than conventional plastics.

Central African Republic is the first African country to legalize bitcoin. www.theexchange.africa

The legal tender title of bitcoin in the country implies the acceptance of cryptocurrencies as a legal means of payment in any transaction through specific rules and regulations. This means that no vendor, trader or organisation can deny service payment through bitcoin as illegal.

This move comes after several countries in the continent have restricted trading in bitcoin, and most of them are lukewarm about the market.

The legalisation of bitcoin in the first African country will transform the country’s infrastructure and facilitate the blockchain technology and web3 applications to thrive. With legalising cryptocurrencies, the Central African Republic is moving towards a new path of technological development and economic performance. This dynamic field is popular among investors worldwide and ever-present as full-fledged assets in the portfolios of the world’s largest financial players such as Microsoft, Meta and Amazon.