The Kenyan government has made tax cuts to aid telecommunication.

The Kenyan government has announced several initiatives in order to boost mobile phone sales and broadband availability, according to the BBC.

The 16% VAT on new mobile phone handsets has been cut in order to make them more affordable as a communication method. According to Kenyan newspaper the Daily Nation, 17.5 million people own a mobile handset in the country, compared to just 200,000 people in 2000.

Kenya’s Finance Minister, Uhuru Kenyatta, told Kenyan newspaper the Daily Nation: “Mobile telephones have become essential aspects of our daily communication and transaction system and I do hope the dealers in these products will pass the benefit to ordinary wananchi (people) by lowering prices.”

The 10% tax on airtime vouchers will continue however, so the price of calls will remain unchanged. 

Mr Kenyatta is also going to allow internet providers to offset the cost of purchasing new fibre optic bandwidth for 20 years.

Kenyans rely on slow, expensive and unreliable satellite internet connections, and will not benefit from high-speed broadband access until all three of The East African Marine Systems (TEAMS) cables are in places.

The project to connect the cables from Mombasa port to Fujairah in the United Arab Emirates is a joint venture between the Kenyan government, Emirates Telecommunication Technology and a consortium of local investors.