Itana — Africa’s first digital “free zone”
Feb 6, 2024
I am the Lead Product Manager- Itana (the ideal online jurisdiction for internet-based companies out of Africa). My work has transcended from building products from 0 → 1 with a team of highly talented software engineers and designers to dealing with policymakers, lawyers, and politicians to develop the operational guidelines for the first virtual free zone in Nigeria(and Africa)-and going ahead to build it.
But first, what are free zones?
Free Zones in Nigeria
Free zones are designated areas in a country declared by the government as a region where economic activities are free of the usual corporate and economic compliance set out in regular jurisdictions. Nigeria has about 50+ free zones in its area of land, which is about 923,768 square meters. Every free zone is created primarily to boost the export of a particular industry. There is a free zone for oil and gas (Dangote free zone), a free zone for textiles (Kano free trade zone), and a free zone for FMCG export(Lagos Free zone). All free zones in Nigeria are regulated by the Nigerian Export Processing Zone Authority (NEPZA).
Origin of Itana?
Africa is the emerging technology hub giant of the world, with the largest youthful population.
More specifically, the digital economy in Nigeria is growing exponentially. As of January 2023, the internet penetration rate in Nigeria stood at 55.4% of the total population from 27.7% five years ago. Nigeria is also beaming with technical talents (which I am part of), building great software and technology businesses for the continent and the rest of the world.
All these growths are happening on the continent; however, the government policies to sustain them are not updated, simply put; the government is playing catch-up to the exponential growth of technology in the country.
Instead of complaining, the founders of Itana decided to set up a free zone for the digital economy to create a blank canvas for the policies and infrastructure that can sustain this growth and 10x it so that it becomes a trillion-dollar economy that will create prosperity for all. Thus, the good people of Itana are working with the government to develop the first free zone for the digital economy called — Itana Virtual Free Zone.
Why Virtual?
Free zones need an area of land to be declared as one. Technology businesses do not need land to operate, thus the term “virtual.” One of Itana’s most significant challenges is communicating to the public that a free zone can exist without a piece of land.
Itana’s Strategy
Itana is looking to invite service-based companies, both at home and abroad building for the world, to consider setting up an entity as a free zone enterprise in Itana. For this to happen, Itana is working on four goals at the moment:
Establishing the zone in collaboration with the government(the NEPZA precisely) and other private entities
DiFZiN, advocacy led by Itana, is working with the Federal government and other government agencies to formulate policies and regulations for businesses registered in a digital-free zone.
Facilitating the onboarding of businesses into the zone and providing them with the necessary resources for business activities (such as banking, hiring, and taxes). We aim to accomplish this through an application, and this is where most of my team’s involvement is.
Digitalizing NEPZA (Nigeria Export Processing Zones Authority) through an independent dev shop to enable zones(digital or not) to programmatically carry out the process described above (registering and managing free zones and its enterprises)
Nothing Itana is doing is entirely novel; free zones exist, but the present operations are tailored to manufacturing companies rather than service companies. However, the truth is that it is becoming increasingly cheaper for Nigeria to export more services than goods. Thus, the benefits for traditional free zone enterprises should also be available to service companies. Itana’s vision is to be the first free zone to prove this and create an ecosystem of technology/services companies to be stakeholders in this jurisdiction.
