institutional infrastructure than the firm-based respondents, but the latter did raise concerns about the
security of Internet transactions and their companies’ data. ‘Guidelines’ were published in December
2001, but further work on the legal and regulatory framework needs to be informed by research on the
measures that are most likely to help businesses to access markets quickly and efficiently.
The training and availability of skilled personnel was perceived as an important issue by several firms in
the sample. As Kenya has programmes at various levels for training computer technicians, information
specialists, programmers, and other technical personnel, research is needed to determine the nature of the
gaps between supply and demand in this area, especially with respect to nature and size of existing
courses and the effective demand for graduates.
This study has confirmed the results of earlier research that showed that firms in the Kenya garment
industry do business very differently as some are full manufacturers that design their products, source all
of their inputs, and produce and market their outputs, while others are “cut-make-and-trim” contractors.
Some firms source a large proportion of their raw materials locally; others obtain their inputs from the
global market. Some firms have close relations with a few customers and/or suppliers; while others deal
with many different customers and suppliers. These differences appear to influence both the form and
extent of a firm’s likely involvement in computer-mediated trading. The variety of involvement with B2B
e-commerce observed in this study may be typical of the situation in Kenya or it may suggest that this
industry sector has developed or is developing a preferred way of doing business. These possibilities
deserve further investigation.
The fourth issue that deserves further investigation is the extent to which firms in the Kenya garment
sector will face external demands to implement some form of B2B e-commerce that goes beyond the use
of e-mail and web searching. One firm in the sample had been strongly encouraged to join an emarketplace by one of its customers. This may become an important issue if firms in Europe or the US
begin to require firms in Kenya to participate in B2B e-commerce, because firms that are willing or able
to comply could risk losing their positions in the marketplace.
Overall, the results of this study suggest that Kenyan garment firms are becoming involved in B2B ecommerce to varying degrees and that the applications in use range from minimal ‘e-mail only’ to
sophisticated supply chain management. These empirical results are a major contribution to the discussion
about the potential of B2B e-commerce for firms in developing countries since most of the discussion to
date is theoretical rather than empirically grounded. To provide guidance to industry on future e26