JOHANNESBURG - Africa's call center industry is set for major growth with South Africa and Egypt leading the charge thanks to cheap labor, good language skills and time zones that chime with Western Europe, research shows.
London-based market analysis firm Datamonitor said on Friday the number of call center agent positions in North Africa—which includes Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia—would triple by 2010 to around 23,000.
And in South Africa, which is favored by British companies for its cultural affinity with Europe, call center positions are expected to more than triple to 7,400 by 2010.
"Egypt continues to impress western investors with its mix of savvy and linguistically-talented agents," said call center analyst Peter Ryan.
"Spoken English (in South Africa) is among the best anywhere and the commercial acumen of agents is first-rate."
Agent positions are desks from which call center agents make or receive calls and are the main measure of growth in the outsourced call center industry.
African countries like South Africa and Egypt are trying to capitalize on low labor costs and improved stability to persuade western investors to build call centers—often a rich source of jobs—in their countries.
The world's poorest continent desperately needs foreign direct investment to power economic growth and help lift millions of people out of poverty.
Ryan said African countries were unlikely to challenge India for supremacy in the call-center market but those countries that had made improving IT and telecommunication a priority, like Botswana, Kenya, Senegal and Ghana, were ripe for growth.
South Africa works well with investors because it shares a time zone with Western Europe, and high levels of education and familiarity with European culture means it is often seen as a high-quality niche market.
But some investors are deterred by high telecom tariffs due to government tardiness on liberalizing the industry.
Egypt is popular because it is close to Europe and French-speaking Morocco and Tunisia have proved popular with French companies and increasingly Spanish companies.
