Uganda Looks to Outsourcing to Creat Jobs

歌曲 Uganda Looks to Outsourcing to Creat Jobs
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专辑 VOA慢速英语:科技报道

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[00:00.10] From VOA Learning English,
[00:02.48] this is the Technology Report.
[00:06.43] For years, many western companies
[00:09.18] have sent important business services to India,
[00:12.95] where they can be done at lower cost.
[00:16.68] This is called outsourcing,
[00:19.72] and it has brought jobs to India.
[00:22.47] Other countries have seen the economic benefit of outsourcing
[00:26.70] and are seeking to copy the Indian model.
[00:30.91] For example, officials in Uganda
[00:33.96] have opened an outsourcing centre
[00:36.46] to train people in Internet technology.
[00:40.05] Their aim is to create jobs for Ugandans.
[00:44.47] 26-year-old Flavia Aliteesa studied information technology in school.
[00:52.62] Today, she is happy to have a job
[00:55.37] but does not perform high level IT work.
[00:59.57] She says, many of her former classmates
[01:02.07] have been unemployed for years.
[01:05.35] "First of all, I was given an opportunity to start working,
[01:08.01] otherwise I would have been seated back home doing nothing.
[01:11.05] At least it has given me a sense of independence,
[01:14.00] since I earn and I can do something on my own," said Aliteesa.
[01:17.25] Flavia Aliteesa works for a company called Techno Brain,
[01:23.21] it offers business process outsourcing,
[01:26.47] or BPO, to foreign companies.
[01:30.31] The Ugandan government hopes more companies like Techno Brain
[01:34.41] will begin operating in the country.
[01:37.21] Uganda supports its small but growing BPO industry
[01:43.11] by giving free office space and Internet service in Kampala.
[01:48.73] The government has trained hundreds of people
[01:51.73] in the skills that BPO companies need,
[01:54.79] and plans to train thousands more.
[01:58.62] Many people in Eastern Africa speak English,
[02:02.54] and the area is in the same time-zone as Europe.
[02:07.54] So countries there could be good places
[02:10.72] for call centers and data processing.
[02:14.08] And says Rogers Karebi,
[02:16.42] the head of the Uganda BPO Association,
[02:19.83] labor costs in other countries are growing.
[02:23.48] "Quite a number of firms in India,
[02:26.29] Asia and the Middle East have stepped up their prices,
[02:30.85] so the cost of outsourcing to the initially indigenous
[02:34.44] BPO destinations is on the rise.
[02:36.34] So, quite a number of firms in the demand markets
[02:40.33] are actually looking for alternative places to outsource to," said Karebi.
[02:44.74] But there are big differences between Uganda and India,
[02:49.59] one of the most important is the cost of Internet service.
[02:54.37] Most experts agreed that the cost of Internet service
[02:58.78] in East Africa would eventually be lowered,
[03:02.13] but even this might not be enough.
[03:05.03] Stephan Manning is an outsourcing expert
[03:09.33] at the University of Massachusetts.
[03:12.32] He says, East Africa might not have anything special to offer.
[03:17.08] "These services need to be distinct enough
[03:20.10] so that they don't enter price competition.
[03:23.07] And that's exactly the problem.
[03:25.47] In Kenya, if you provide English-speaking call center operations,
[03:29.89] then you do nothing different than the Filipinos or India,
[03:34.94] and there's no way you can compete on costs," said Manning.
[03:38.54] He says it might be better for African countries
[03:41.89] to offer their services to neighboring countries.
[03:45.46] That way, he says, they would not being competition with Asia.
[03:51.12] And that's the VOA Special English Technology Report.
[03:56.03] I'm June Simms.