Ghana ranked number 1 African country with fastest internet
Ghana has been ranked the country with the fastest internet in Africa by Speedtest Global Index for June 2021.
Ghana was ranked 79th in the world, with a speed of 53.28 Mbps for Fixed Broadband.
Ghana outperformed South Africa and Egypt and a host of other giants on the continent.
South Africa placed 85th in the world and 2nd in Africa, while Egypt was ranked 91st in the world and 3rd in Africa with speeds of 47.32 Mbps and 42.42 Mbps.
For Mobile internet connectivity speed, Ghana placed 132 globally and fell out of the range of the top 10 in Africa.
Within the same period for the previous year, the speed for Ghana’s Fixed Broad measured on average 30 Mbps and placed 73rd globally.
The Mobile connectivity was 7.7 Mbps with a global rank of 118th.
The ranking is based on the average of the download and upload speeds. Results are updated mid-month for the previous month.
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The global internet speed is measured by Speedtest Global Index, and it looks at the internet speed of about 180 countries.
With Ghana undertaking a massive digitization drive, a rise in internet connectivity speed should be a major boost to the government’s digitization agenda.
Govt To Connect 4m Rural Dwellers To Telephony Services
The subscriber base of telecommunication service providers is expected to increase further as the government targets connecting 4 million rural dwellers to voice and data telephony services.
The Minister for Communication and Digitalisation, Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, at the launch of the Ghana.gov platform in Accra on Wednesday, July 14, 2021, hinted that the government would do so by the end of 2023.
She said that the targeted persons are those in the remotest parts of the country who are either not connected to voice or data telephony services or do not receive adequate services.
According to the minister, the gesture forms part of the government’s digitalisation process and formalisation of the economy.
She said the government is making a “smart investment” in infrastructure to improve access to the latest technology to make available affordable and reliable broadband connectivity to Ghanaians.
“We are in the process of implementing a rural connectivity project to link the unserved and underserved areas of the country within the next two years. Some four million citizens will be connected to voice and data telephony services in the remotest parts of our country,” she said.
Mrs Owusu-Ekuful said that the government would transform the economy through broader adoption of digital technologies across the country, adding that, “we are determined to promote digital inclusion and leave no one behind.”