E-COMMERCE ADOPTION: A SURVEY OF UNIVERSITY BOTSWANA

STUDENTS

Abstract

There are an increasing number of organizations adopting e-commerce services in Botswana. Drivers of this trend are (i) the rapid expansion of Internet access and literacy across the developing world; (ii) ever increasing levels of globalization; and (iii) clearly articulated development goals with associated action plans as stated in Vision 2016. Previous studies have shown that education level plays an important role in consumers engaging in e-commerce. It is therefore of interest and importance to obtain an understanding of factors influencing e-commerce adoption amongst students at the University of Botswana. This paper reports on the findings of an exploratory study carried out at the University of Botswana. It aimed at ascertaining who participates in e-commerce amongst the students, identifying the factors that influence continued engagement in e-commerce and the factors that discourage the adoption of e-commerce. From these identified factors recommendations could be made for businesses investing and engaging in e-commerce. As an inf-ormation gathering tool the study employed a survey used and proven effective in a previous study conducted in a similar context (Nigeria). Snowball sampling was employed with a sample size of 120 students representing all six faculties. In the study the sampled population was limited to current students at the University of Botswana which implies that results may only provide a general perspective of e-commerce adoption by university students in Botswana. The response rate of the survey was 64.2%. Collected data were coded, captured and analyzed using statistical procedures. Simple frequency tables and cross tabulations were used for analysis. Studying tertiary level students, which are considered to be highly educated and are about to enter the consumer market, is a good way of measuring how effective IT education is in moulding them to become participating members of an information based society. The findings generally suggest that security, the preference of traditional commerce and lack of awareness of available e-commerce services are the main factors hindering adoption of e-commerce. They also show that to encourage continued use of e-commerce, these services should be convenient, visible and cost effective. Businesses are recommended to improve their security measures for their e-commerce services and to invest heavily in creating awareness through targeted marketing.

Key Words: E-commerce Adoption; Student Adoption; University Botswana; Survey Research.

Introduction

Electronic commerce which is commonly known as e-commerce is defined as the buying and

selling of products or services over networked electronic systems such as the Internet and

other computer networks (Sergiu, 2008).

In the past Botswana’s access to the Internet was through South African service providers and

email was the most commonly used applications of the Internet (Eyitayo and Molefe 2000).

However the Internet infrastructure has changed considerably in the past few years. Today

there are many Internet Service Providers, Internet cafés and organizations that provide

Internet services such as website creation and maintenance (Eyitayo and Molefe 2000).

In Botswana there is an increasing interest in the use of e-commerce to serve the local

population. A number of examples include:

First National Bank of Botswana has an online and telephone banking service.

Standard Chartered Bank has an online and telephone banking service.

The Savannah Guest House in Palapye allows the reservation of rooms and payments

online.

Botswana Craft, a vendor of basketry and tapestry art, accepts orders for items over

email and will soon introduce an Internet shopping cart

E-biz, an E-Commerce firm, is negotiating deals with utilities in Botswana to allow

customers to settle monthly bills with these corporations over the Internet while

Business Advertiser's, another E-Commerce firm that specializes in E-Commerce

already offers a range of services including commerce enablement, security, digital

certificates and secure transaction transport for business to business and business to

consumer transactions in Botswana.

The growth of the Internet has given businesses the opportunity to become competitors in the

global market rather than being limited to the local market. Businesses in other countries and

on other continents can now target Botswana as a market without having to set up branches

here. As part of the global economy Botswana’s businesses not only need to adopt e-

commerce but they also need to examine how their consumers within Botswana respond to it

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and ways of increasing its use so they can better position themselves to compete

internationally and reap its benefits.

Previous studies have shown that education level plays a role in the adoption of e-commerce

(Siyal, Chowdhry and Rajput 2006). This study found that consumers that were educated up

to tertiary level were the ones that were involved in e-commerce activities. Therefore

University of Botswana students should be in the forefront of adopting e-commerce as they

have been educated within an information oriented society.

One of Botswana government’s development goals (Vision 2016) concerning technology and

education has the aim of ensuring that all its citizens are IT literate by 2016:

“Botswana will be in the forefront of information technology with state of

the art computer and communications equipment, and will play a full part

in the coming information age. All people will have access to telephones,

national newspapers, radio and television services, and to computer

equipment.”

Part of being IT literate is being able to use e-commerce services. The results of the study

could reveal a gap between the desired level of IT literacy in the country and the actual level.

This would therefore have an impact on the country’s vision 2016 development goals.

Research will help address the issues involved that discourage or prevent students from

adopting these services. Knowing the issues that affect e-commerce adoption is important for

businesses in Botswana if they wish to harness the Internet’s potential to drive business

efficiency, improve the provision of services and integrate local economies with the global

economy (Seleka, Shemi and Uzoka 2007). If use is shown to be minimal then businesses and

organizations would need to take the necessary steps to increase adoption such as raising

awareness or improving security measures etc.

Therefore with this research paper the authors endeavor to present the patterns of e-

commerce adoption by University of Botswana students with the aim of making

recommendations of ways to increase e-commerce participation by students within Botswana.

An overview of research on e-commerce adoption will be presented. This will serve as a

background to substantiate the methodology that was follow. The research design will

therefore be briefly presented in the next section. This will be followed by a discussion of the

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main findings and finally a few recommendations and conclusions emanating from the

research.

Background

One of the factors that play a part in the adoption of e-commerce by a consumer is the

consumers IT literacy. It has been shown that consumers that are more experienced with the

Internet and have had substantial education in IT are more likely to become e-commerce

users, (Liaoa and Cheung, 2001). If users are not educated in IT their use of the Internet tends

to be limited to services such as communication (email), entertainment (social networking

websites, music downloads etc) and basic information searching (search engines), (Hinson

and Amidu 2006). In a study based in Saudi Arabia done by Sadiq, Khalid and Syed (2004),

it was found that the users experience with the computer and pattern of use correlated with

the tendency to use e-commerce services. They also found that consumers that already used

gadgets in the home that are considered advanced were more likely to adopt e-commerce

services. Sadiq et al (2004) also compiled a profile of e-commerce users from their

demographic information collected during their survey and found that most users were

students which shows that education plays a role in determining whether an individual is

more likely to adopt e-commerce services.

In the study done by Sadiq et al (2004), it was found that most users where males and this

was attributed to the fact that Saudi Arabia has a culture that gives more opportunities to

males and therefore they were more likely to be the ones that adopt the service. According to

a study done by Rodgers and Harris (2003), nearly every e-commerce study that is gender

based has found that more men than women use e-commerce services. They also cite other

studies that have found a similar trend indicating that male users are more focused on

transactional uses of the web (Tracy, 1998) and have been shown to be 2.4 times more likely

than women to shop online (Kwak, Fox, and Zinkhan, 2002). Rodgers and Harris (2003) also

stated that, using their Web Motivation Inventory, Rodgers and Sheldon (1999) found that

male students also reported better overall attitudes toward e-shopping than did female

students.

Since women are known to be the primary participants in traditional shopping they would be

expected to use e-commerce services more, but this is not the case (Rodgers and Harris

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2003). Rodgers and Harris (2003) attribute this to the difference in females’ perception of e-

commerce. They based their research on three factors; emotion, trust and convenience which

contribute to the consumers perception of e-commerce. In their results they have found that

females did not enjoy the online shopping experience; they had less trust in online security

than men do and they find it less convenient.

In studies conducted in developing countries, a contributing factor to the hindrance of e-

commerce adoption by consumers is the lack of an information infrastructure to support

Internet use (Sadiq et al, 2004). Consumers may not have a chance to use e-commerce

services simply because Internet access is restricted or expensive (Hinson and Amidu, 2006).

Consumers also get discouraged if response time is slow which is usually the case in

developing countries where the information infrastructure is not fully developed (Sadiq et al,

2004).

In most e-commerce adoption studies consumers concerns about security, trust,

authentication, fraud and risk of losing money are often mentioned among the major

obstacles to e-commerce use (Ahmed, Hussein, Minakhatun and Rafikul, 2007). There are

many threats to online transactions that include viruses, hackers, crackers and worms and

consumers are aware of such threats because they tend to be publicized a great deal by the

media (Ahmed et al, 2007). Consumers are concerned that sending their private information

over the Internet during transactions is risky especially with services such as online banking

(Liaoa and Cheung 2001). Consumers are also concerned with the integrity of products

bought over the Internet because it is different to establish the reliability of the vendor or the

quality of the product being sold. This is unlike traditional shopping where the consumer can

gauge the quality for themselves by touching or testing the product (Liaoa and Cheung 2001).

In a study done by Martins, Martins and Olivier (2001) consumers were asked about their

perceptions of e-commerce in relation to transactional security. They surveyed two groups of

consumers; people employed in the Human Resources departments of their companies and

those employed in the Information Technology departments of their companies. Martins et al

(2007) also asked the survey participants questions relating to their use of the Internet in

general and found that most use the Internet for email. Their study found that the Human

Resource employees were not conversant with security methods used online to protect e-

commerce transactions. However Martins et al (2007) found that even though the IT

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employees knew about the various measures used, they were still apprehensive to conduct

online transactions although it was to a lesser extent than the Human Resource employees.

In a study done in Botswana on Internet usage it was found that e-commerce was not cited as

a major reason for the use of the Internet (Massimo, Mburu and Mutua, 2002). The reason

given for this was that in most African countries there is the culture of doing business the

way you know best, which for Africa is the traditional method of going physically to a store

to purchase goods. Being that e-commerce is a relatively new development, the culture is

taking some time to adapt to the new method of conducting business (Massimo et al, 2002).

In addition to this, local businesses are still using their websites primarily for advertising their

goods and services rather than for e-commerce purposes (Massimo et al, 2002). This study

recommended that e-commerce services should be advertised more by providers and

companies that have them available. Massimo et al (2002) also recommended that students

should be exposed to such services through their school courses to improve usage and create

a business culture that will adopt the use of e-commerce to conduct business activities.

There is substantial literature on the issues affecting e-commerce adoption, especially those

that focus on security issues. Most studies however concentrate on the society as a whole and

are done in developed countries. Literature on e-commerce that is based in Africa tends to

concentrate on the adoption of e-commerce by businesses rather than consumers. There is

some literature on e-commerce adoption by consumers in developing countries but most of it

is not based on countries within Africa.

The studies referred to above, found that security and vendor quality was a major factor in e-

commerce adoption. The authors feel those would be significant factors here in Botswana as

well given that the traditional way of business relies heavily on the transparency of business

transactions and the reputation of the business (Yoon, 2007). In some of these studies it is

assumed that their sample populations are already substantially computer literate and know

about the e-commerce services available to them. However for a developing industry of e-

commerce as the one here in Botswana the authors feel this may not be the case so the study

shall also aim to establish whether consumers know about the services and how they learnt

about them e.g. through advertisements or social influence.

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Methodology

The research objectives for this investigation were:

1. To identify the demographic profile of participants and non participants of e-

commerce amongst students in the University of Botswana.

2. To identify factors of e-commerce adoption from literature and distinguish which

factors apply to the target population?

3. To survey the target population on factors that prevents them from not participating in

e-commerce activities and factors encouraging e-commerce adoption.

To achieve the set objectives the survey research strategy was adopted. The use of structured

questionnaires was employed to achieve efficient collection of comparable data in a short

space of time. This approach is in line with common practice in the area of e-commerce

adoption (Folorunso, Awe, Sharma and Zhang, 2006).

The questionnaire was administered to randomly selected students at the University of

Botswana. The respondents were allowed to take the questionnaires and return them at a later

date in instances where it was not possible for the respondent to fill and return the

questionnaire immediately. This allowed the respondent to answer at his/her own

convenience.

The sample population was taken from the students of the University of Botswana. Snowball

sampling was used because this was a faster method of finding students to answer the

questionnaires. A sample size of 120 was used for the research. Ideally the sample size was

meant to consist of at least 20 students from each faculty and contain an equal number of

males and females. However because of the type of sampling used (snowball sampling) and

time constraints, this was very difficult to achieve.

The questionnaire used is adapted from an e-commerce adoption study that was carried out in

Nigeria by Folorunso et al (2006).

All questionnaires allowed the respondents to remain anonymous. Questions were made as

short and concise as possible to reduce the length of the questionnaire so as to encourage the

respondent to participate. The questionnaire consisted of closed questions and included list

questions, rating questions and category questions. A pilot test of the questionnaire was

conducted on 10 students so that any problems concerning structure and language used in the

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questionnaire were identified and corrected before they were administered to the sample

population.

After the questionnaires have been collected, the process of data capturing commenced. The

SPSS software package was the main tool used for data analysis followed. Statistical analysis

was performed in order to address the stated research objectives.

In order to understand the demographic characteristics of participants and non participants of

e-commerce, it was decided to use simple percentage analysis for general understanding.

The factors affecting the adoption of e-commerce by students in the University of Botswana

were analysed using Cross tabulations. Statistical tests were used to determine whether the

student’s academic discipline, gender or level of Internet use were significant factors in the

adoption of e-commerce. The researchers also tried to determine what the significant factors

of e-commerce participation and non participation are in order of importance for the students

of the University of Botswana. The adoption factors of participants and non participants of e-

commerce were compared to the six most common attributes identified in the literature

review for e-commerce services such as convenience, ease of use, access to the Internet,

gender, awareness and security. The detailed findings will now be discussed.

Main Findings

The response rate of the survey was 64.2%. Out of the one hundred and twenty

questionnaires distributed, seventy seven (64.2%) of them were usable, twenty nine (24.2%)

were incomplete meaning that the data was corrupted, and fourteen (11.6%) were not

returned on the required date.

Characteristics of e-commerce participants and non participants

There was an almost equal proportion of male to female respondents in the survey (54.5%

male and 45.5%) which was good for assessing the gender influence in e-commerce use. The

majority of respondents were male and from the business and science faculties.

There were only twenty two respondents (28%) that said they were e-commerce users despite

majority (75.8%) of respondents knowing about e-commerce. This shows that there is

awareness of e-commerce but students still need to be encouraged to use it.

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Internet use amongst all respondents was quite high. A majority (59.7%) of the respondents

said they use Internet every day. This shows that the level of comfort with the Internet

amongst respondents is high and therefore majority of the respondents are computer literate.

In addition to this majority of the respondents (68.8%) are required to take IT related courses

in the duration of their degree apart from the general education computer courses that are

compulsory in the first year of university. Amongst the actual e-commerce participants the

majority is also required to take IT related courses as is the case with non participants. This

shows that IT related courses have an influence on students’ Internet usage. The high number

of e-commerce participants that are using the Internet shows that high usage of the Internet

plays a part in the adoption of e-commerce as found in the study by Liaoa and Cheung

(2001).

Majority (13.6%) of e-commerce participants were male and either from the business faculty

or the science faculty. This however could be attributed to the large number of male

respondents that were from the business and science faculties. In future studies, keeping the

numbers of respondents constant could help determine whether faculty is really a factor in e-

commerce adoption. The engineering faculty did not have many respondents due to the

inability of respondents to return the questionnaires before the cut-off date, which may have

an effect on the results as well.

Most e-commerce participants had heard about the e-commerce service they used from

friends and family (50%) which shows that social influence is a factor in e-commerce

adoption. Very few respondents had heard about e-commerce from university courses (4.5%)

or advertisements (27.3%) or from websites online (4.5%). This suggests that initial

knowledge of these services is spreading by oral communication amongst friends and family.

There is considerable awareness of e-commerce services available amongst e-commerce

participants (90.9%), which show that businesses in Botswana are successfully marketing

themselves to student e-commerce participants.

A significant majority of the non-participants of e-commerce (85.5%) stated that they would

use e-commerce services in the future. This shows that students are open to the idea of new

technologies despite the fact that they may not be using them currently.

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The main use of the Internet for non participants is email (90.9% strongly agree or agree) as

found in the study done by Hinson and Amidu (2006). This shows that most non participants

are still very limited in their use of the Internet.

Factors influencing continued e-commerce use by e-commerce participants

According to the literature, factors that play a part in the adoption of e-commerce include

education level, social influence and security, convenience. These factors were included in

the questionnaire and respondents were required to rate them. Cost effectiveness and the

preference of e-commerce to traditional commerce were also included. All the results are

represented in Figure 1.

Figure 1: Factors influencing continued use of E-commerce (Percentages show the

proportion of E-commerce participants that agreed or strongly agreed with that specific

factor from a predefined list)

The main factor that encourages continued use by students is convenience of the service. All

the respondents agreed or strongly agreed with the statement that e-commerce is convenient.

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The second factor was the cost effectiveness of e-commerce services. A considerable number

of respondents strongly agreed or agreed that this was the reason they continue to use the

service. This shows that despite the high cost of Internet access in developing countries

(Sadiq et al, 2004) users are still able to appreciate the financial benefits of e-commerce use.

The third factor was the receipt of positive feedback which again shows that social influence

is important to encouraging the adoption of e-commerce. Of the respondents, 77.2% strongly

agreed or agreed that positive feedback was the reason they continued to participate in e-

commerce. The fourth factor was the preference of e-commerce to traditional commerce.

Only three respondents felt traditional commerce is better. Majority of the respondents that

preferred traditional commerce were male. A total of 45.4% males agreed or strongly agreed

while only 27.2% females agreed or strongly agreed. This correlates with the study done by

Rodgers and Harris (2003) which found that males are more inclined to adopt e-commerce.

The final factor was the belief that e-commerce is secure. Fewer respondents (54.5%) agreed

with this statement than the other factors. This shows that security is still a concern for most

e-commerce participants despite their continued use.

Factors preventing e-commerce adoption by non participants

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Figure 2: Factors restrict the adoption of E-commerce (Percentages show the

proportion non-participants of E-commerce that agreed or strongly agreed with that

specific factor from a predefined list)

The most significant factor that affects the adoption of e-commerce by respondents was the

concern for security. Most respondents agreed (29%) or strongly agreed (23.6%) that this was

the main reason they did not use e-commerce. This is in accordance with the results found in

the study by Folorunso, Awe, Sharma and Zhang (2006).

The second factor was the preference of traditional commerce to e-commerce. Of the

respondents 47.2% agreed or strongly agreed that this was one of the reasons they did not use

e-commerce. This supports the theory put forth by Massimo et al (2002) that e-commerce is a

relatively new development and the culture within Botswana is taking some time to adapt to

the new method of conducting business. The results also show that females (25.5%) prefer

traditional commerce to e-commerce more than males (21.8%), which supports the findings

in the study conducted by Rodgers and Harris (2003). The third factor was the lack of

awareness of e-commerce. A small percentage of respondents (23.6%) agreed or strongly

agreed that this was one of the reasons they did not use e-commerce. This shows that

awareness, though it is a contributing factor is not a major cause for the lack of adoption.

Users are aware of the services but due to other factors they opt to not use e-commerce

services. The fourth factor was Internet access. Unlike most studies done in developing

countries, it was not seen as a major factor by the respondents (14.6% agreed or strongly

agreed). This is due to the fact that students have free Internet access provided by the

University of Botswana therefore many do not have to pay for Internet access unless it

becomes unavailable at the University. If a similar study was done including the general

population the results would probably be aligned with findings in relevant literature. The fifth

factor as rated by the respondents was the receipt of negative feedback. Not many

respondents saw this as a significant factor. The last two factors had the same percentage

(7.2%) of respondents in agreement or strong agreement. Respondents do not find e-

commerce services hard to use or inconvenient.

Changes that would encourage adoption of e-commerce

Majority of the non participants (60%) selected improved security as the main change that

would encourage them to adopt e-commerce services. Better Internet access was the second

change most preferred by respondents (27.3%) and the third was increased advertising 12

(25.5%). Therefore businesses can concentrate on e-commerce security and advertising to

raise the use of their services. The responsibility for improving Internet access is something

that can be assumed by the Botswana government and telecommunications companies.

Recommendations and Conclusion

There are three ways in which the findings of this research are contributing. Firstly it adds to

the incomplete and scarce literature on e-commerce adoption in the developing world at

large, but more specifically in the nation of Botswana. This study has just been completed

and provides a window of very recent findings into e-commerce adoption in the stated

context. Secondly it frames a particular population group (UB students) and explores the

subtle nuances of adoption factors such as level of education and academic discipline. Thirdly

it provides tangible evidence of the role and magnitude of adoption factors in the stated

context. The results should be interesting to academic and commercial stakeholders who

aspire to establish and expand e-commerce activities locally. A number of recommendations

will now be made based on the findings.

Advertising. The two major factors that encourage continued use of e-commerce services are

convenience of e-commerce and cost effectiveness. Therefore businesses in Botswana should

emphasize these two benefits of e-commerce in their advertising campaigns to encourage e-

commerce participation. Businesses should also ensure that whatever e-commerce services

they are planning to introduce are and remain convenient and cost effective for the consumer.

Security. Companies should improve their online security measures and also address the

security concerns of their consumers by communicating to them what measures have been

put in place to ensure safety or to recover from situations where consumers are the victims of

cyber crime. This will help the consumers gain confidence and they will be more inclined to

adopt e-commerce if they know that someone is liable and there is a way to recover from

cyber attacks.

Tradition vs. Technology. Potential e-commerce participants still prefer to use traditional

commerce methods rather than e-commerce. This is probably because the culture of Internet

use is still developing in Botswana and Internet access is still slightly costly for the average

person. However Internet use is quite high amongst students and if the benefits of e-

commerce were communicated to them they could be more likely to adopt it.

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Internet Access. In their aim to realize their Vision 2016 development goals, the Botswana

government should invest in improving the Internet infrastructure within Botswana. Such

improvements would enable the telecommunications companies and Internet providers to

provide faster and eventually cheaper Internet access for their consumers and as a result

consumers would be enticed to embrace e-commerce.

This research can certainly be expanded to include a wider population in future. It is also

anticipated that comparable assessments at regular intervals as part of a longitudinal study

may yield very useful findings, both for the stated context and other developing countries

where information literacy and e-commerce adoption are less developed.

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