E-commerce in Botswana

E-commerce

E-commerce market

E-commerce is still in a nascent stage in Botswana, mainly due to the lack of secure, sophisticated methods of online payment, scams and unfair business practices. According to an ICT survey by Statistics Botswana, half of the country's Internet users choose not to shop online due to the lack of trust. Nevertheless, the government of Botswana has taken steps to facilitate and regulate electronic transactions. In April 2014, it passed the Electronic Communications and Transactions Bill and developed a national e-commerce strategy in 2018 to promote the use of e-commerce solutions across all sectors of the economy. The government is also in talks with the Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba to facilitate its entry to the local market. The Pan-African online marketplace Jumia has already been active in Botswana for several years. The first Batswana e-commerce platform, Skymart, launched in 2012, boasts more than 120 sellers and is operational throughout southern Africa.

Social media

Botswana has a high rate of Internet access compared to the rest of Sub-Saharan Africa and nearly all of its Internet users have social media accounts (more than 99%, Hootsuite Survey 2018). The country also boasts the highest penetration rate of Facebook users in the region (30% penetration rate according to a Nielsen survey). Twitter is also becoming increasingly popular. Only 4% of the population are active Instagram users (Hootsuite). WhatsApp is the most popular messenger application as in the rest of Southern Africa.