The report from UK-based price comparison website — cable.co.uk - has shown that Somalia comes as the 7th country in the world and the first in Africa, where the mobile data cost of 1GB is $0.50, according to data collected from 238 nations worldwide by Cable in its "Worldwide mobile data pricing”.

Report shows that Somalia telecom companies offer the cheapest mobile data subscription rates in Africa and one of the top ten in the world, making a huge progress in the space of 12 months as the country was 134th worldwide and 37th on the continent.

Mr Hassan said that this was one of the latest in a range of positive indicators, which highlight that Somalia's ICT environment was steadily improving and this will support the contribution of digital economy to our GDP as the number of internet-based services would increase.

"This year’s finding by Cable is above all a testament to the hard work and innovation of our telecom businesses and workers. It also shows that the sacrifices of so many people are yielding tangible results in terms of international competitiveness,” noted the minister.

The improvement affirmed the government’s efforts made in the last three years to regulate and promote competition in the market. Currently Somalia has ICT Law and Policy in place, and plans are in their final stages to put in place licensing, spectrum, numbering and interconnection regimes.

(Source: MPTT)