THE ICT LANDSCAPE IN KENYA

General Education :

It is estimated that about 16% of adults in Kenya are illiterate, 60% of these adults being women. It is believed that the level of illiteracy is actually much higher since estimations have been based on individual self-reporting of literacy status. (11)

Primary and Secondary Education

There are about 18,000 primary schools in Kenya . It is estimated that since the adoption of free and compulsory education in January 2003, 95% of children attend primary school but only50% attend secondary school. (12)

Higher Education

There are 29 training colleges, four polytechnics, six public and 12 private universities. However, Internet Lab (13), a Madrid-based international research group that monitors universities' academic and scientific research activities on the Internet, recently showed that Kenyan universities lag behind their counterparts in East Africa and the world. The survey also showed that African universities in general are behind in frontiers of knowledge and research internationally.

Of the 9,500 ranked universities globally, Kenya has the largest number in East Africa, with 18, while Uganda has 8 and Tanzania 4. South Africa leads in the continent with 22 out the best 50 universities. 9 out of the top 10 universities in Africa are South African. However, none of the African universities are among the best 300 in the world. The top institution, University of Cape Town , is in position 546 globally.

ICT Human Resource

Currently, there is no proper audit of the existing ICT human resource capacity. The Computer Society of Kenya estimates that there is a total of 5,500 ICT professionals in the country, with 300–500 graduates in computer science, electronics/electrical engineering and library scientists per year.