The impact of Electronic Commerce on Higher Education in Yemen

Abstract
Education plays a major role in the development of a country. Education translates an
individual’s talents into useful skills that will enable the individual to become a
responsible member of a respectable society. Expanding the higher education
opportunities in a major part of the society has so far become a social necessity. Lately,
the concept of e-commerce in the curricula, and the social dimension (social
inclusiveness) are the centre of important policies on the national and international level.
It has been affirmed that the social dimension of higher education primarily consists of
offering the members of a society the opportunity to participate in higher education.
The combination of human intelligence and the high speed of computers have enabled the
effectiveness of commercial activities. All the processes of negotiation, signing of
contracts, ordering and accepting products are done by computers which are connected to
the network.

Key Words: E-Commerce, Information and Communication Technologies (ICT),

Yemeni higher education system.

Introduction
E-Commerce is exchange of goods and services by means of the Internet or other
computer networks. E-Commerce follows the same basic principles as traditional
commerce, that is buyer and seller come together to exchange goods for money but rather
than conducting business in the traditional way in stores and other buildings or through
mail order catalogs and telephone operators in e-commerce buyers and sellers transact
business over networked computers1.
Universities play a key role in the future of Yemen and in the orientation of the economy
and society towards knowledge. Particularly, higher education institutions need to open
flexible programmes, and find more ways to increase the number of the students in need
thereby raising their total number of the students. The flexibility of higher education is
also extended by the development of new technologies such as e-learning and e-
commerce.
Computer networks and digital technology are widely used in e-commerce.
Administration of such streams has become easier and convenient through e-commerce.
Planning, preparation, implementation and monitoring of government programs, projects,
and activities can be conducted using e-commerce with remarkable ease. In various ways
e-commerce offers assistance to the public in general as well as to students and teachers
offering services which were not available for them before. This paper elucidates how
the impact of electronic commerce on study programmes in the modernization of higher
education in Yemen can be addressed using e-commerce.

E-commerce in Yemen
The business sector has been much more advanced in the use of information technology
and e-commerce to transact business than the government has accomplished. One of the
examples is the introduction of ATMs as an innovation of e-business in Yemen. A
leading bank in Yemen introduced an ATM network in 2004, which caters to the entire
customers in the city of Sana’a. It incorporated direct salary deposits to the bank account
and ATM cards were provided to all customers to access their salaries via the ATM
network. Electronic transfer of funds was another service provided by the bank2.
In 2006, another government bank decided to provide the same services to government
employee salaries. This was a revolution in Yemen banking industry and the EFT culture.
The penetration was adamant that the total number of ATM cards reached over a million
by 2010.

Started of E-commerce in Yemen

The first international electronic transaction via international networks took place in
2005. This mode of transaction remained slow until 2011 after the introduction of ATMs.
Internet merchant accounts were hitherto unheard of. This was as result of the fact that
the local infrastructure for banking transactions was still facing several issues such as
network problems, capacity building, and inadequate interbank connectivity, lack of
regulatory body to settle disputes, the increasing security concerns, political instability,
economic hardships, and others3.
With the support of the World Bank, the Central Bank of Yemen (CBY) sanctioned
grants in 2014, to implement an advanced EFT system to include the credit bureau, real-
time gross settlement (RTGS), and a modern core banking system to electronic interbank
transaction system. This is intended to improve the local payment systems. The grant
aims at bettering the information technology in the financial system. Central Bank of
Yemen may benefit from the experience through replicating what Oman has done in
modernizing its payment systems.

Net banking in Yemen

Internet banking was established by individual banks but the services offered limited
browsing one’s balance and transaction history; though banks have been struggling to
make the services fully functional and dependable. Some banks provided electronic bill
payment systems via SMS or through ATM cards. Banks had to tackle internet fraud
which was a recurring risk4.

Higher Education and E-commerce5

The technology for e-commerce does not need to be hugely powerful, complex or
expensive, especially on an HE site are not going to be enormous, especially at first.
Online Conference Booking systems have successfully used a variety of systems, ranging
from Mac-based Filemaker Pro databases to a more robust solution using PHP on a
secure Unix server. It’s unlikely that much online trading could be achieved without
using at least one database (to record the transaction details), and in reality most of the
content of an e-commerce site will probably be database-driven. CGI scripts, PHP,
Active Server Pages are commonly used methods of linking databases to HTML pages,
and this needs to be done by someone with a thorough understanding of the chosen
technique.

Typically an HE e-commerce site will involve personnel from many departments,

possibly ranging to Finance and the Computer services. It is vital that all those involved
fully understand how the system works and that there is effective communication
between them. Real team work will make the venture a success.
Perhaps above all, you need to advertise the existence of your e-commerce offering, so a
marketing strategy is vital. Simple things like making sure the URL appears on printed
material, and that there are plentiful links from the ‘main’ website must not be
overlooked. A direct e-mail campaign may the most effective way of building potential
customers. Probably as much effort needs to be put into marketing as goes into all other
aspects of building and running an e-commerce web site.

Training
Bringing together training that covered basic business analysis, stock control, marketing
etc. in conjunction with relevant IT skills would enable more institutions to benefit from
e-commerce. Online course support and documentation would perhaps be the most
appropriate means of delivery.

Findings
The problems in online payment was another hurdle that the customers had to overcome.
Some banks blocked internet transactions insisting that the customers should sign
documents so that the banks could evade responsibility. Complaints from the customers
were that their disputes were not resolved and in some cases the banks were not even
ready to offer any protection.
International credit card processing companies came forward to offer their services in
Yemen. Thus an alternate payment system for trade was introduced in Yemen but the
charges were so high that customers were reluctant to accept these services. Some
companies like PayPal allowed Yemen customers to pay through money only while
others offered the traders to get their accounts, but this also was highly expensive.
By providing subsidies on computer and IT infrastructure, the government of Yemen can
promote the realization of e-commerce concept. The shortage of infrastructure for the
implementation of electronic commerce in Yemen is an important area the government
has to look into.

Conclusion
In the short term probably not very great, but institutions who don’t start now may well
find it harder later. There is a steep learning curve for both the person tasked with
developing an online payment system and the institution of which they are part. One of
the challenges facing web site managers has been bringing together disparate people and
parts of a college or university to convey a useful and attractive image on the web. With
e-commerce it seems we may have to repeat the process of forging key alliances,
choosing the right technology and devising a business plan, but with the even more
‘mission critical’ objective of making money. Already e-commerce has revolutionized
banking, travelling, and book selling. Other financial services, recorded music and food
shopping seem likely to be next in line. It’s happening in Higher Education among those
institutions who see it as essential to their future prospects.

References
1. World Trade Organization. (2013) A Workshop at the WTO highlighting on E-

commerce in developing countries, Opportunities and challenges for small and

medium-sized enterprises, Available at

https://www.wto.org/english/res_e/booksp_e/ecom_brochure_e.pdf

2. Republic of Yemen, E-commerce in Yemen: Problems and Prospects Update,

Retrieved from http://www.internetsociety.org/sites/default/files/Appendix

%201_E-Commerce%20Reserch%20Document.pdf

3. Executive Summary (2014) U.S Department of State, Department of State: 2014

Investment Climate Statement, Retrieved from

https://www.state.gov/documents/organization/229320.pdf.

4. Kamal, Alsobaihi. (2016). “E-governance in higher education in Yemen:

Opportunities and Challenges”, 10th ISDSI international conference, Nashik,

India.

5. Andrew, Aird. (2001). “E-commerce in higher education: can we afford to do

nothing” available on http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue26/e-commerce.