Ghana To Build The “Biggest” Data Centre In Africa While Nigeria And South Africa Still Lead

The Ghanaian government has announced that it will build a data centre but what makes it news is because they said its going to be the biggest in Africa. In a BizTech Africa post, it was said that the 500 rack space will serve both private and public institutions alike. This is all part of the government’s agenda to promote technology use across Ghana. Such projects are usually carried out private institutions due to a number of reasons but notable among them is sustainability. For example, what happens when there’s a government that is not very interested in such a project which already hold sensitive data presumably? There is currently an uneven distribution of data centres on the African continent with Nigeria and South Africa accounting for nearly 60% of the total data centre space on the continent.

In Nigeria, MainOne, Galaxy and some telecom companies like MTN have all either built high capacity data centres or are in the process of constructing them. In any case, Africa is attracting enough capital to keep data within its shores.

Tech Companies like Apple and Facebook have all announced construction of new data centres that will be driven on renewable sources of energy. Power is a challenge in many African countries with many citizens depending on alternative sources like generators. In any case, if Ghana as a country can sustain this project for a long time, it would make a difference.