Coronavirus: MTN Ghana’s CEO explains why it is hard to reduce cost of data

Coronavirus: MTN Ghana’s CEO explains why it is hard to reduce cost of data

Ghanaians who were hoping that telecommunications giant, MTN Ghana will reduce the cost of data on the back of coronavirus pandemic should rethink again.

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The Chief Executive Officer of MTN Ghana has categorically stated that the mobile network operator does not have plans to reduce data prices.

According to him, any move to reduce cost of data, will lead to increase in traffic, which will affect the speed of internet.

Once you lower prices, invariably the 150 percent growth in capacity will become 300 percent growth in capacity. If we can’t even accommodate 150 percent increase in traffic; then creating a situation where we have to accommodate 300 percent increase in traffic will be a challenge,” he said in an interview on Citi FM on Monday, March 23, 2020.

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As Ghana and the world struggle to contain the spread of the COVID-19, governments around the world and the WHO have urged that people stay safe and avoid the spread of the disease.

This has led to several organizations in Ghana instructing that their staff work from home, with schools also closed for four weeks.

This means data usage will go up, hence they have been calls for a reduction in the price of date from the telcos.

But CEO of Ghana’s biggest network, MTN opined that the overall economic impact for consumers if data cost is reduced will be negative.

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We have to be very careful. The economic impact is significantly larger than a reduction in price of data”.

Providing some information on recent increase in internet usage due to COVID-19, Mr. Adadevoh stated that there has been an upsurge in the use of social media and movie streaming sites.

YEN.com.gh earlier reported that some Ghanaian companies have ventured into the manufacturing of hand sanitizers at a cheaper cost to meet the demand for the product on the back of the increase in the cases of the coronavirus in the country and the world.

Due to the high demand for hand sanitizers by Ghanaians to help combat the novel COVID-19, some suppliers of the product increased the price of hand sanitizer by 200% others by 1000%.

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Source: YEN.com.gh

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