eBusiness Weekly
Aurra Kawanzaruwa
The Government of Zimbabwe has introduced a new Ministry of Cyber Security, Threat Detection and Mitigation and the internet is on fire. Despite clarifications issued on the role of this ministry, there is still an unhealthy dose of uncertainty around it.
Nevertheless, these new developments are symptomatic of the current state of the global shift; welcome to the Fourth Industrial Revolution (FIR).
The Third Industrial Revolution, which has been occurring since the middle of the last century and has been popularly referred to as the “digital era”, was characterised by the use of electronics and information technology to automate production.
According to the World Economic Forum, the FIR builds on this and is seeing the evolution of technology that affects how we live, work and relate to one another.
Now in some parts of Africa this may seem like a farfetched concept; self-driven cars, artificial intelligence and The Internet of Things have become the poster child of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.
However, the evidence of these times go beyond robots and flying cars. Its evidence is found in the way we experience the world through our smart devices, e-business models, customer experiences and virtual social interactions (social media).
Business as we have come to know it is being disrupted on a daily basis, with digital innovations affecting existing industry value chains. When looking at supply, access to digital platforms for research, distribution, marketing, sales and customer engagement has given adaptive, innovative competitors a window to out-perform long standing corporate entities, based on speed, quality or price of product.
On the demand side, consumer power has dramatically risen with access to digital platforms changing the patterns of consumer behaviour.
Growing transparency of a business is on the incline as the internet makes it easier to access information on its operations.
And perhaps the most exciting of these developments is the ability for a consumer to express their opinions and criticisms directly to their suppliers.
This last point in particular is a two-edged sword; while it gives access to the consumer and their needs that most suppliers have never had in the past, it can also be extremely difficult to manage consumer opinions and interpretations versus facts on the ground.
The Fourth Industrial Revolution offers Zimbabwe and Africa as a whole an opportunity to cultivate digital skills that secures the continent’s position as innovation leaders in this new era.
“The Future of Jobs and skills in Africa” report suggests that, in order to prepare for the future of work, the region (Africa) must expand its high-skilled talent pool by developing future-ready curricula, with a large portion of that focusing on STEM education — interdisciplinary approach to learning where rigorous academic concepts are coupled with real-world.
It also forces longer standing companies to re-evaluate the way they do business, taking into consideration the changing environment as well as finding originative ways to engage the new “independent” consumer, who has been given a very big microphone to publicise their thoughts in the form of digital media platforms.
Issues of cyber security do affect the development of the economic sector which has begun to find more and more development opportunities in the ever evolving cyber space.
Moving forward, Zimbabwe is at a turning point where a growing population of its citizens have also become “Global” citizens, creating borderless communities and finding innovative digital ways to develop and commercialize their intellectual property and knowledge-based skills.
Minister Patrick Chinamasa’s new Ministry is in a position to protect not only the State from abusers of various digital platforms, but to also protect its citizens from cyber threats to the digital economic sector.
Businesses at all stages of development could benefit immensely from structures that see the support and development of new solutions around cyber security and the Ministry of Cyber Security,
Threat Detection and Mitigation can be utilized to advocate for such protection. With so much speculation around what exactly the day to day operations of the Ministry would be, Chinamasa may very likely be in a position to shape Zimbabwe’s global entry and footing into the Fourth Industrial Revolution.
