Rwanda on Monday signed a deal with South Korea's largest telecoms provider KT Corp to roll out high-speed 4G internet to most of its citizens within three years.

Rwanda, a landlocked central African state and one of Africa's fastest growing economies, has laid more than 3,000km of fibre-optic cable since 2009 in a bid to develop a service based economy and become a regional leader in information communication technology (ICT).

Critics, however, say almost no large investor has come on board yet.

Rwanda's economy expanded by 9.4% in the 2011/2012 fiscal year but only around 8.3% of the population have internet access at the moment, according to Rwandan officials.

Rwanda said KT Corp will inject around $140 million into a joint venture company, which will be responsible for rolling out a fast 4G LTE broadband network to 95% of Rwandans. Debt and vendor financing will also be needed.

"This agreement with KT marks a major milestone in Rwanda's drive to become a modern, knowledge-based economy - and by expanding our information infrastructure, we will create jobs, support social progress and propel economic growth," Jean Philbert Nsengimana, Rwanda's Minister of Youth and ICT, said in a statement.

Rwanda said the government's equity investment in the joint venture, which has a 25-year term, would consist of using its national fibre optic cable, spectrum and wholesale-only operator license.

Kigali also invited other mobile network operators to invest in the project and provide retail access to 4G LTE wireless broadband services to some 12 million Rwandans.