The most important result of these additional estimations<sup>17</sup> is that as found above, _ICT adoption increases the probability to introduce both types of innovation in the pooled regressions._ So on average, ICT acts as an enabler of innovation. Again, when looking at the productivity equation the coefficients on product and process innovation remain with no statistically significance in the pooled regressions with the exception for new to international market innovation where the product innovation coefficient is positive and statistically significant.<sup>18</sup> A final robustness test that we produce is to estimate alternative specifications of the productivity equation based using as dependent variable, value added per worker, which is a better measure of productivity. The problem in doing this is that we lose more than half the number of observations and almost the entire services sector given the lack of information on inputs used. The results for this reduced sample, however, confirm the main findings of previous estimates, ICT is an important enabler of innovation, both product and process, but firm innovations does not appear to impact productivity when measured as value added per worker.

_In conclusion, the paper finds a very robust result, ICT appears to be an enabler of innovation, but the final impact on productivity depends of the degree of innovativeness of such innovation_ .

# **7. Conclusion**

In the last decade there has been a significant boom in the ICT sector in some countries in Africa. While the impact of some of these new “tech” ventures is potentially large, this effect is likely to be insignificant compared to the potential effect on employment and productivity growth from broad based ICT adoption by the African productive sector. The potential for ICT as a productivity enabler is large in those regions furthest away from the technological frontier such as Sub-Saharan Africa, which until now tended to have lower ICT adoption rates and underdeveloped ICT infrastructure.

This paper has analyzed empirically firm level ICT adoption in six African countries using freshly collected data from the Enterprise Surveys innovation modules. The data suggest that most African firms are still lagging behind ICT adoption rates as compared with firms in developed countries. However, when looking at specific countries in the sample, the data show a very heterogeneous picture; some countries, such as Kenya, show high ICT adoption rates and others, such as DRC and Tanzania, have low ICT adoption, which is in line with their income per capita level.

Given this ICT adoption heterogeneity, it is important to measure what impact this is having on firms’ innovation capabilities and productivity. ICT can act as an enabler for the introduction of new processes or new products, which in turn can have a positive impact on productivity. Thus, in the second part of the paper, we have measured empirically the impact of ICT on innovation outcomes and productivity.

Regarding ICT use, the findings of the paper suggest that larger, younger, more internationalized –foreign owned, importers, certified and with foreign technology license – firms, which are financially unconstrained and operate under higher degrees of competition, are more likely on average to use ICT. This suggests the

> 17 These estimates are available upon request.

> 18 As only few firms have introduced a new product or process to the international market in these six countries as a whole, it is not feasible to estimate at the country level.

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