REGISTERED person-to-person SIM cards increased from 76.6m to 80.7m in the three months ending September, reflecting a 5.0 per cent rise, the regulator says.

The Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority (TCRA) says in its latest quarterly communication statistics report that “mobile and fixed-line subscriptions across five telecom companies” rose from 75.6m to 79.6m, equivalent to a 5.4 per cent increase during the period, a 1.7 per cent increase on average, it said.

Machine-to-machine SIM cards, receiving data on cellular networks, grew from 995,494 to 1.02m, representing a 4.8% increase, it said, indicating that Dar es Salaam had 14.8m SIM cards in use, with Mwanza a distant second with 5.3m cards.

Arusha was third with 4.9m, Mbeya showing 4.6m and Dodoma indicating 4.3m registered SIM cards.

North Unguja had 73,743 SIM cards, South Unguja elevated at 110,970 and South Pemba shoeing 124,472 SIM cards, are regions showing the fewest registration of cards, the report noted.

There was a ten per cent annual growth rate in the number of SIM cards and a nine percent annual increase in the penetration rate of SIM cards among the population, it said.

Penetration reached 111 per cent by end of last year, where for every 10 residents, there were 11 SIM cards, with phone costs remaining largely unchanged, it said.

The cost of making calls within and outside networks, local SMS, international SMS, and data hovering at the same cost levels.

Call charges for East Africa decreased by 2.0 per cent while charges for other countries increased by 4.0o per cent, which analysts say it implies cost recovery for reducing sensitive EAC inward calls, by augmenting costs for less sensitive calls.

All service providers charge 30/- per minute for calls within and outside the network, except Halotel, which charges 10/- per minute within the network and 20/- outside the network.

"The average voice service rates within a network for the quarter ending September 2024 remained as in the quarter ending June 2024. International voice service rates varied among providers, with the average voice service rate per minute for East Africa standing at 696./68 and 1,948.22 for other countries," the report said.

July 2024 recorded the highest number of voice minutes compared to other months in that quarter with 41.1bn minutes used in the quarter ending September 2024, compared to 39.6bn minutes in the quarter ending June 2024. 

However, the number of minutes within the network was higher within each network on average compared to those outside the network in the quarter ending June 2024, it added.