ACIST 2020



Continuous innovations in information and communications technologies (ICTs) across the world are increasing the pace of the creation and dissemination of digital information in Africa. Alongside this is the increasing adoption of smart ICTs that are capable of adaptations to the environment and modifications of behaviours and entire societies. Smartness also includes capabilities for sensing and learning from the environment to complement human efforts.

The 2020 (6th) proceedings of ACIST focuses on how African societies are leveraging and can leverage the smart capabilities in digital technologies to address organizational and societal challenges. Technology-enabled solutions offer solutions to many of these challenges. Technology-based solutions facilitate solutions in areas such as:

  • Resource exploitation and allocation
  • Citizen engagement
  • Infrastructure enhancement
  • Public and private decision making
  • Human capabilities extension
  • Business innovation
  • Social services delivery

Against this backdrop, ACIST 2020 seeks to discuss the role of information systems and technology (IST) research and education in the relationship between digital technologies and a smart Africa. We invite you to participate in ACIST 2020 through this call for completed papers, research-in-progress papers or posters, position papers, panel discussion topics, and exhibition posters on topics that include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • Digital Innovation
  • Blockchain technologies
  • Internet of Things (IoT)
  • Smart Technologies and Development
  • Sustainable (Green) ICTs
  • ICT and Organisational Structuring
  • Smart Devices and Mobile Ecosystems
  • Internet and IS Development
  • Smart Networks and Collaborations
  • Information Systems Management
  • Digital Society, Knowledge and Identity
  • ICT Curriculum and Education
  • Philosophy & Methods in IS Research
  • ICT and Social Inclusion/Exclusion
  • Digital Platforms and Smartness
  • Ubiquitous Computing
  • Big Data and Business Intelligence
  • Cloud and Smart Computing
  • Smart Cities & Wireless Communications
  • Smart Government and Smart Business
  • Smart Collaborations & Crowdsourcing
  • ICT in the Oil and Gas Industry
  • Information and Computer Security
  • Decision Support Systems
  • Human Behaviour and ICT
  • ICT-Enabled Services

As we prepare for the conference in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, it is hoped that IST researchers in Africa and elsewhere will think creatively, broadly, and provocatively about Digital Technologies for A Smart Africa from many different theoretical, philosophical, policy and practical perspectives.

Conference venue: the ACIST’2020 conference is hosted virtually via Microsoft Teams.

**Note: The times below are Ethiopian Time**

Schedule

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2020
Thursday, July 2nd
11:30 AM (EAT)
12:00 AM (EST)

Welcome

Lemma Lessa, Addis Ababa University

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

11:30 AM - 12:00 PM

12:00 PM (EAT)
5:00 AM (EST)

Factors Affecting Mobile Payment Adoption By Merchants In Ethiopia

Firehiwot Abebe, Addis Ababa University
Lemma Lessa, Addis Ababa University

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

12:00 PM - 12:30 PM

Nowadays the world witnessed a rapid growth in mobile commerce and widespread use of mobile devices. The growth of mobile commerce depends on widely accepted mobile payment systems. However, this trend is not well experienced in developing countries like Ethiopia. Even though merchants somehow benefited from the rapid growth in electronics commerce and use of mobile devices in ecommerce, they still hesitate to effectively employ in their day to day transactions. Little research has been conducted to examine and explain the merchants' views on the new payment technology. In this paper, we explore the factors that affect merchants’ adoption of mobile payment in Ethiopia. The result suggests that relative advantage, ease of use, usefulness, attitude, trust, risk/security and cost are factors that affect mobile payment adoption positively and significantly. Whereas compatibility is found not significant for merchants adoption of mobile payment systems in Ethiopian context. Based on the findings, the study proposes a conceptual model for mobile payment adoption to guide practice and future research in this emerging area.

12:30 PM (EAT)
5:30 AM (EST)

IT Governance for Balancing Evolveability and Standardization in Health Information System Implementation in Ethiopian Context

Birkinesh Lagebo, Updated - AIS
Birkinesh Lagebo, Addis Ababa University
Mark Gaynor Prof., Saint Louis University - Main Campus
Temtim Assefa dr, Addis Ababa University

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

12:30 PM - 1:00 PM

Failing to balance standardization and evolveability in IS design and implementation process results sustainability failure which is common in developing country. IS research provides various IS design solution including layered modular architecture to address both evolveability and standardization simultaneously. However, this design solution requires appropriate IT governance mechanisms which lacks both theoretical and empirical explanation in IS research. The core of this research is understanding IT governance mechanism design that can balance standardization and evolveability in the course of IS design and implementation. The research uses the case of District Health Information System-2 (DHIS-2), layered modular architecture, design and implementation in public health care context of Ethiopia. The major research question guiding this study is how IT governance mechanism design and its interplay with IS architecture design shape DHIS-2 design and implementation process towards standardization and/or evolveability? The research strategy adopted in this case will be based on an interpretive case study approach.

1:00 PM (EAT)
6:00 AM (EST)

Efficient Data Mining Algorithm Network Intrusion Detection System for Masked Feature Intrusions

Kassahun Admkie
Kassahun Admkie Tekle

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

1:00 PM - 1:30 PM

Most researches have been conducted to develop models, algorithms and systems to detect intrusions. However, they are not plausible as intruders began to attack systems by masking their features. While researches continued to various techniques to overcome these challenges, little attention was given to use data mining techniques, for development of intrusion detection. Recently there has been much interest in applying data mining to computer network intrusion detection, specifically as intruders began to cheat by masking some detection features to attack systems. This work is an attempt to propose a model that works based on semi-supervised collective classification algorithm. For this study, data mining algorithms were first selected based on efficiency and accessibility criteria. An experiment was conducted using real .arff dataset to develop the model. The result shows that meta.Filtered Collective Classifier is appropriate to detect intrusions with hidden features, which scored the best classification accuracy of 96.2%.

1:30 PM (EAT)
6:30 AM (EST)

Information Technology Disaster Recovery Plan (ITDRP) Framework For Banks in Ethiopia

Nigussie Tariku, Addis Ababa University
Lemma Lessa, Addis Ababa University

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

1:30 PM - 2:00 PM

IT services and solutions in the banking sector should be protected to keep the business continuity in a disastrous scenario. This study aims to develop an Information Technology Disaster Recovery Plan (IT DRP) framework in the case of Ethiopian Banks. Qualitative case study method is employed to investigate current best practices and challenges in Ethiopian banks. The findings indicated that Banks do not have IT DRP in place. Lack of framework, lack of focused group, lack of experiences, and lack of standardization are some of the challenges identified. Accordingly, the IT DRP framework is proposed for Banks of Ethiopia. The framework is confirmed and validated by the subject experts. The framework can serve banks as a quality tool to evaluate existing IT DRP or develop new ones based on their business needs. Recommendations are also forwarded and related topics are suggested for future research to extend this work.

2:00 PM (EAT)
7:00 AM (EST)

Learnings from a Cloud Migration Project at a South African Retailer

Nonqaba Jaka, University of the Western Cape
Carolien van den Berg Dr., University of the Western Cape

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

2:00 PM - 2:30 PM

All industries are aware of the potential benefits of cloud computing, however, the migration to cloud has not been widely adopted by South African retailers. The purpose of this paper is to explore the motivations behind organisations deciding to migrate to cloud and the factors that may impact a successful cloud migration project. The paper discusses a case study that analysed the key drivers and the impact of cloud migration within a retail environment. The empirical findings suggest that skills and competencies largely impact every aspect of cloud migration, from decision making to execution and support. Furthermore, that migrating to cloud will differ based on organisational need and the type of cloud service being adopted. In addition, the findings outlines that best practise may advance as more organisations migrate to cloud environments.

2:30 PM (EAT)
7:30 AM (EST)

Adoption and Challenges of Mobile Banking Systems in Ethiopia: The Case of Cooperative Bank of Oromiya

Ebisa Beyene

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

2:30 PM - 3:00 PM

The incorporation of information system into organizations for the purpose of getting competitive advantage, easing workload, providing intangible (soft) work place and coping up with technological advancement has become an indispensable for organizations. Due to these many companies (like banks) are getting advantages of information communication technology implementation like Mobile Banking (M-banking), Internet banking, Automatic Teller Machine, etc. Accordingly Ethiopian commercial banks have implemented Mbanking system into their service system. This research examine adoption of M-banking system in Ethiopia focusing on Cooperative bank of Oromiya with respect to the challenges which can influence the bank from taking advantage and expected benefits of M-banking system derived by adopting the system. The result of the research indicated that, drivers of M-banking are relative advantage, perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness while challenges are perceived risks, trust reliability and lack of ICT infrastructure.

3:00 PM (EAT)
12:00 AM (EST)

Artificial Intelligence Towards Future Industrial Opportunities and Challenges

Gizealew Dagnaw

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

3:00 PM - 3:15 PM

The industry 4.0 will bring reflective changes to our society, including an important digital shift in the manufacturing sector. At present, several manufacturing firms are trying to adopt the practices of industry 4.0 throughout their supply chain. The Fourth Industrial Revolution and the artificial intelligence at its core are fundamentally changing the way we live, work and interact as citizens. The complexity of this transformation may look overwhelming and to many threatening. Recently, the dramatic growth of new generation information technologies has prompted several countries to seek new strategies for industrial revolution. The globalization and the competitiveness are forcing companies to rethink and to innovate their production processes following the so-called Industry 4.0 paradigm. It represents the integration of tools already used in the past (big data, cloud, robot, 3D printing, simulation, etc.) that are now connected into a global network by transmitting digital data. Digitization and intelligentization of manufacturing process is the need for today’s industry. The manufacturing industries are currently changing from mass production to customized production. The rapid advancements in manufacturing technologies and applications in the industries help in increasing productivity. The term Industry 4.0 stands for the fourth industrial revolution which is defined as a new level of organization and control over the entire value chain of the life cycle of products; it is geared towards increasingly individualized customer requirements. Industry 4.0 is still visionary but a realistic concept which includes Internet of Things, Industrial Internet, Smart Manufacturing and Cloud based Manufacturing. Industry 4.0 concerns the strict integration of human in the manufacturing process so as to have continuous improvement and focus on value adding activities and avoiding wastes. The objective of this work is to provide an overview of Industry 4.0 and understanding of the pillars of Industry 4.0 with its applications and identifying the challenges and issues occurring with implementation the Industry 4.0 and to study the new trends and streams related to Industry 4.0 with artificial intelligence by using flexible intelligent approach. Based on intelligent and flexible AI methods and the complex safety relations in the process industry, we identify and discuss several technical challenges associated with process safety: knowledge acquisition with scarce labels for process safety; knowledge-based reasoning for process safety; accurate fusion of heterogeneous data from various sources; and effective learning for dynamic risk assessment and aided decision-making.

3:15 PM (EAT)
12:00 AM (EST)

Business - IT Strategic Alignment Improvement Framework: A Case Study on an Ethiopian Bank

Menelik Belete
Yonas Hagos

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

3:15 PM - 3:30 PM

In recent years, the bank sector is heavily relies on IT and has been investing a lot to easily reach their customer and gain the competitive advantages. Unfortunately, due to alignment gap between the business and IT strategy, they were not able to maximize their IT return value. The purpose of this study is finding internal and external challenges that hinders business and IT strategy alignment in the context of an Ethiopian Bank, A. The study conducted as a qualitative case study. The main finding shows that vendor dependency, lack of proper system evaluation, lack of clear national regulation, external changes, lack of expertize on new technology, lack of clear strategy, lack of strategy implementation experience, customer perception on new technology and lack of clear policy and procedures are key internal and external Business-IT alignment hindering factors. Based on the finding, a solution framework has been developed and presented.

3:30 PM (EAT)
12:00 AM (EST)

Investigating the Current Information System Use for Improving Organizational Tasks in AAU Using Grounded Theory

Gebremedhin Gebreyohans, Updated - AIS
Abdurahman Ali

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

3:30 PM - 3:45 PM

Information System (IS) is the interaction between people and organization using a certain type of system. Therefore, in this current study the people are the staffs, the organization is Addis Ababa University and the system is the different applications and tools used to ease tasks. Most universities in developing countries, including AAU, staffs are lacking the basic know how and skills on how to use the IS and to create conducive setting to perform organizational tasks easily and quickly. As it is observed from different perspectives staffs of Addis Ababa University are performing their daily tasks with the traditional way of activities, as well as how they are cop up with the new system is also questionable.

Therefore, there is a need to conduct a research on the issues directly influence on how the staffs behave and use those systems continuously to ensure improvement of organizational tasks performance and create customer acceptance and organizational productivity. With this arguments, the main objective of this paper is to develop a ground theory to investigate the practice of ISs and Applications (tools) use for organizational task effectiveness in Addis Ababa University (AAU). From this the specific objectives are:

  • To identify factors that encourage staff to use IS
  • To identify effective organizational tasks in AAU
  • To understand staffs use of information system

The method used for this study is grounded theory. The reason for choosing this method is, grounding theory is an interesting research methodology to develop a theory or model from the scratch i.e. plentiful of data and can show how things/scenarios are related and interacted with each other well (Boadu and Sorour (2015). More importantly, the explanations ultimately come from the participants being studied. The study captured data from Addis Ababa University and staffs were selected randomly from School of information sciences in Addis Ababa University and the data was collected digitally by interview and then changed in to written format.

The result of the study is expected to contribute to add value for Addis Ababa University (AAU) quality improvement of tasks in educational sector from the initial stage (i.e. awareness to use) up to the final stage (i.e. improving organizational task) essential attributes has been included. Finally, the research has recommended as future study that, the model can be tested and can be a starting platform for further work of future study using quantitative methods.

3:45 PM (EAT)
12:00 AM (EST)

Systematic Literature Review of Soft System Method Use in Information Systems Field

Abdurehman Ali, Updated - AIS
Shimelis shiferaw Deneke, Jimma university

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

3:45 PM - 4:00 PM

Information system (IS) papers are published in different Journals and conferences using various methods focusing on different problems. IS is an interdisciplinary field and contains information related to technology, human and organizational issues. Problems related to this are most of the time messy and confused ones and these needs soft system methodology (SSM) uses because this methodology basically emphases on activities inside the organization and allows a participation of heterogeneous groups like IS discipline do. Therefore, the study focuses on how SSM uses in IS field.

SSM help to construct complex structural and governmental conditions and delivers a possible change. It uses extensive interviews to recognize the problem situations using “rich picture” and creating a “root definition” by ‘CATWOE’ (Customers, Actors, Transformation process, World view, Owner, Environmental constraint) principles. These are inputs to create a conceptual model and leads to desirable change and for implementing actions on the ground. The general objective of the study is to analyze SSM use in IS field using a systematic literature review method.

The specific objectives are:

  • To identify soft system method use in IS field
  • To identify the use of systematic literature review method in IS
  • To review literatures concerning SSM use
  • To understand conceptual model constructions

The search process in this study includes publications from international IS journals and also specific SSM related journals and conference papers. For the searching process, the inclusion words are soft system method or (its use) and information or (IS) or (organization).

The systematic literature review method finally produced four main SSM uses in IS field. These are organizational systems, education, e-service and security functionalities. Generally, one should use SSM for innovative purpose since it mostly related with new technology and product development and to change the working habit of the organization. SSM helps to define the unstructured difficult conditions and focuses on complicated managerial activities, investigating unorganized problems extensively. The benefits of applying SSM allows to make it easy for organizational set up and structure of problem conditions of complex institutions and can be used in a very difficult security problems. So combining other methodologies with SSM will create a meaningful result for solving complicated problems and the diverse view of customers’ complaints in a more innovative and systematic way used to restructure organizations.

4:00 PM (EAT)
12:00 AM (EST)

A Comprehensive Study for Modern Models: Linking Requirements with Software Architectures

sisay yemata

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

4:00 PM - 4:15 PM

Several models recently have been addressed in software engineering for requirements transformation. However, such transformation models have encountered many problems due to the nature of requirements. In the classical transformation modeling, some requirements are discovered to be missing or erroneous at later stages, in addition to major assumptions that may affect the quality of the software. This has created a crucial need for new approaches to requirements transformation. In this paper, a comprehensive study is presented in the main modern models of linking requirements to software architectures. An extensive evaluation is conducted to investigate the capabilities of such modern models to overcome those limitations when transforming requirements, validating their consideration of bringing quality for the software development process. Key research gaps and open issues are discussed, highlighting the possible future directions that can be considered in this field.

4:15 PM (EAT)
12:00 AM (EST)

Usability and Accessibility Model for E-Government Websites in Ethiopia

Yoseph Zeleke

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

4:15 PM - 4:30 PM

The development of websites and portals are main components of the e-Government strategy implementations for the last nine years in Ethiopia. However, services optimizations with usability and accessibility are key issues of Ethiopia e-Government services development.

Therefore, the ultimate goal of this study is creation of usable, accessible and sustainable Ethiopian eGovernment websites with four stage of research analysis, through proposed model. The investigations results are used to provide a clear picture of what needs to be improves from management and user point of views and also from other stakeholders of e-Government services. This study applies mixed methods of data collection and analysis, that integrating quantitative and qualitative data, using questionnaires’ and interviews to identify the key usability and accessibility issues of Ethiopia e-Government websites services. The data collection and analysis are primarily from management and users’ point of views are analyzed and discussed and also interpretations of the data are presented using factor analysis and other analytical techniques. Afterward, expert based e-Government website evaluations are presented and discussed using heuristics evaluation principles’. Finally, automatics accessibility evaluation based on WCAG 2.1 guidelines using online WAVE Accessibility Tool assessment results are analyzed, presented and discussed.

4:30 PM (EAT)
12:00 AM (EST)

User Interface Design for Mobile Financial Services: Users Perspective

Belachew U. Regane

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

4:30 PM - 4:45 PM

Users belonging to different countries have different exposure and perception to trust the technology to adopt it. Users’ trust and adoption rates are challenging issues in mobile financial services. Thus, the purpose of the research is how to design a trustful user interface. Market research is conducted to collect data. Using the data, personas and use cases developed. The result of personas and use cases used to develop prototypes. Prototype A and B designed differently to give choice to users to investigate users' trust. Prototype A is designed to make it easy to use and clear workflow. Whereas prototype B is designed to make it navigate more in detail vertically to accomplish tasks. Finally, users asked to choose one of the prototypes as their best preference. The easiness to use, clear workflow and attractiveness make prototype A be preferred and better trusted.

4:45 PM (EAT)
12:00 AM (EST)

Predicting Factors Contributing to Road Traffic Accident and Implying Driver’s Driving Behavior in Addis Ababa City,

shimelis Shiferaw Deneke Mr., Updated - AIS
SHIMELIS SHIFERAW DENEKE MR, AIS
Abdurahman Ali endalkachew Mr, AIS
Shimelis shiferaw Deneke, Jimma university
Abdurehman Ali, Addis Ababa University

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

4:45 PM - 5:00 PM

This study tries to uncover which factor could be associated with Addis Ababa City rode traffic accident and implicate drivers driving behaviors based on the data collected from post-accident. Which is the capital city of Ethiopia. The main objective of this research is Appling data mining technique to explore on factors that could associated with drivers related factors with road traffic accident to provide an insight way to reduce road traffic accident. The data was collected from road traffic accident from the real-world data collected at accident time in Addis Ababa City/Ethiopia. Totally 4285 datasets with 20 attributes were used. Which includes relevant attributes contains information about road, driver, vehicles and accident and other related variables. Finally, in the result implies novel association rules were identified, especially the male drivers’ behaviors has indicated associated with speed driving behaviors and this implies need further investigated with behavioral science approach for more specific result.

5:00 PM (EAT)
12:00 AM (EST)

Closing Session

Solomon Negash, Kennesaw State University

Virtual - Microsoft Teams Meeting

5:00 PM