Emma Theofelus, Namibia's minister of information and communication technology.

Countries in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) are working to standardise roaming rates in order to avoid additional expenses for mobile customers while crossing borders.

Emma Theofelus, Namibia's minister of information and communication technology, said yesterday that she has engaged her counterparts from Angola, Zimbabwe, and Zambia to sign collaboration agreements that will result in the harmonisation of roaming rates.

This, she said, will be an extension of a collaboration that saw Namibia and Botswana reduce roaming charges in order to improve cross-border communication and deepen ties.

Roaming prices between Botswana and Namibia have just been cut by up to 60% for calls and data while travelling between the two countries.

The move comes as the 16-nation SADC bloc works to uniformly enforce mobile communication costs across the area by establishing One Network Area.

Theofuelus pointed out that expanding this program will considerably improve the lives of Namibians by providing greater and more affordable access to connectivity.

“Our collaboration with Botswana is a testament to our efforts to deliver affordable communication services to all Namibians, which will ultimately have a positive snowball effect on other sectors such as trade, tourism and general cross-border connectivity,” said Theofelus.