Tanzania is behind Kenya and Uganda in sourcing software development talent in Africa, according to a report by Tunga, a talent platform for software developers on the continent.
According to the report on the key insights in Africa’s software development sector, there are an estimated 690,000 professional software programmers in Africa.
Among East African Community (EAC) states, Kenya commands the highest number of software developers with the report indicating that the country has a total of 58,866 software developers while Uganda has 13,133 software developers and Tanzania has 8,065 software developers.
Rwanda also has 6,412 software developers according to the report.
“The top-17 countries, in terms of the absolute number of developers, represent more than 90 percent of the entire African IT talent pool,” the report said.
South Africa emerged as the country with the highest African software developers’ talent sourcing with 133,195, with Egypt taking second place (125,270) and Nigeria following with 114,536 software developers.
Other countries include Morocco (49,818), Tunisia (45,247), Ghana (20,551), Algeria (20,530), and Ethiopia (8,316).
Senegal (8,113), Cameroon (7,748), Mauritius (6,879), Zimbabwe (6,588), and Ivory Coast (5,165) are also on the list.
These figures, according to the talent platform, is a cross-referenced data from LinkedIn, Github, and a recent IFC report on the African internet economy.
However, the demand for African computer software developers skyrocketed in 2021 due to the global economic crisis, and of course, Covid-19 also played a role, a Google report reveals.
Findings by Google revealed that four out of every 10 African software developers now work for at least one company based outside of the continent, while five work for local start-ups.
It said: “African startups are responsible for hiring more than half of local developers, with foreign companies outside the continent hiring 38 percent of the remaining talent.
“This competition seems to have had a positive effect on salaries and other forms of compensation.”
According to the e-ConomyAfrica 2020 report, Africa’s IT market is expected to grow to $180 billion by 2025, or 5.2 percent of the country’s gross domestic product.
Source: Business Day Nigeria
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