The East Africa Community governments are using technology to promote e-commerce and take services closer to citizens.

Kenya has allocated Ksh2.5 billion ($25.7 million) towards increasing the one-stop shop Huduma Centres and Ksh1.9 billion ($19.5 million) for the continued rollout of Integrated Financial Management Information Systems.

Rwanda and Kenya will promote e-learning through providing ICT learning devices to schools. Rwanda will continue with its One-Laptop-a-Child project while Kenya will be making a second attempt to provide laptops to primary school children.

The government has allocated Ksh17.58 billion ($181 million) towards this initiative covering ICT learning devices, digital content, building capacity for teachers and the building of computer labs.

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Tanzania is also planning to have more learning equipment in place with the aim of promoting technology. The country is planning to take more e-services available to its citizens through Internet and mobile penetration.

“Key challenges that the government needs to overcome for successful implementation are access to electricity and Internet connectivity in remote areas and safety of the devices,” says a report by PwC on budget analysis.

Over 400,000 Kenyans have registered on the e-Citizen Payment platform with over 8,000 transactions and with revenue collection averaging about Ksh10 million ($103,000) daily, the government further aims to digitise at least 100 inbound payment service transactions by end of 2015.

In Uganda, the National Information Technology Authority is currently consolidating the hardware and software licences to accelerate delivery of government services.

It is also connecting public universities to the national backbone infrastructure to enable access to high speed Internet connectivity and facilitate e-learning and technological research at a lower cost.