Digital Literacy, Official Development Assistance and Social Inclusion in Africa

Oseghale Ihayere, Evans Osabuohien and Oluwatoyin Matthew

Abstract:

The attainment of social inclusion is the goal of every economy and a template for the right ways to achieve digital literacy and enhanced official development assistance in to the telecommunications sector. Social inclusion in Africa has been established to be relatively low and furthermore, the ICT and official development assistance on social inclusion literature has not sufficiently been explored in the African context. Thus, this study empirically fills that gap in Africa utilising data within the period 1996 – 2019 via the System General method of moments (S-GMM). The broad objective was to examine the impact of ICT and official development assistance on social inclusion in Africa. The findings of the study revealed that the indicators of official development assistance have negative sign for the total vulnerable employment. However, in terms of significance, it is only Net ODA received per capita that is significant at 1%. Second, most indicators of official development assistance have negative sign for the male vulnerable employment. Nevertheless, in terms of significance, Net ODA received per capita, Net ODA and official aid received, and Net ODA received are significant at 10%. The findings for male, female and total employment on all measures of institutional quality, with the exception of political stability and the absence of violence, have a negative sign when applied to the total vulnerable employment. In addition, ICT has a negative sign for the total vulnerable employment However, when it comes to statistical significance, all indicators are significant at 10%. Second, when applied to male vulnerable employment, all indicators of institutional quality, with the exception of political stability and the absence of violence, have a negative sign. The study expects the results to help in suggesting the need for the acceleration of ICT development and efficient delivery of ODA in African economies, given the universal communal mission of social inclusion which entails curbed vulnerable employment.