The Impact of electronic commerce on business in Kenya

Abstract

The project aimed at studying the effects that electronic commerce has had or is having on the different sectors of the Kenyan economy. This would help understand the situation relating to Electronic Commerce and be able to make a comparative analysis between Kenya and the rest of the world. While in other countries, statistics exist that help businesses understand the potential of e-commerce, none exist in Kenya. For example, Forrester Research, an independent research firm in the USA estimates that by the year 2004, electronic commerce will amount to US$6.9 trillion - this is about 8.5% of global sales of goods and services. No one knows how much of this shall be contributed by business in Kenya. It is important to know this so that corrective measures can be put in place, be it by the public or private sector. In Kenya, there is very little electronic trading that is taking place. In fact many people do not even know anything about it. Those who know about it have been hindered from implementing it due to reasons, which they say, are beyond their control, among them being: - lack of security on the Internet, use of international credit cards, high costs of infrastructure, lack of knowledge and inexistence of raws governing trading on the Internet. This project goes step by step through these various issues, addressing those that are of concern in today's implementation of electronic commerce and tries to educate to allay unnecessary fears that people may have. Data was collected-through the use of questionnaires, e-mail and telephone calls. Contacts were drawn from the Kenya Telephone Directories. The collected data was analyzed and conclusions drawn thereof. From the study results, only 3.125% of the companies surveyed used the Internet for online sales and purchases. Given that all the organizations and institutions surveyed are in Nairobi, which is the capital city of Kenya, this is a good representation of the state of affairs in Kenya.