By Jennifer McPhee
It’s a bustling Saturday morning at a market in Uganda and the sound of ringing cell phones echoes among the stalls.
Cell phone use has become commonplace in many African countries, even in many isolated areas that lack adequate drinking water or landlines. Relatively few Africans have fixed lines, which are too expensive, non-existent, or don’t work because of poor maintenance, floods and copper cable theft.
In fact, Africa has the fastest-growing cell phone market in the world.
Between 1999 and 2008, the number of mobile subscribers rocketed from 7.5 million to more than 282 million. And about 66 percent of Africa’s population now has access to a mobile phone signal. Some countries such as Kenya, Rwanda and Uganda have coverage rates above 90 percent.
Turning to Technology
There are a variety of reasons why people in these nations have turned to technology. For example, locals benefit by gaining easier access to information. Vendors who once travelled to nearby cities to see if suppliers had their wares now save precious time and money by calling first.
And instead of journeying along crumbling roads to find the nearest working pay phone, farmers can send a quick text message to check crop export prices and ensure they get a fair deal. Others use cell phones to summon medical help, get HIV information and keep in touch with family members.
A growing number of studies confirm that cell phones help the poor in developing countries. Studies commissioned by Vodafone in 2004 found that African nations that use cell phones have a higher rate of economic growth, attract more foreign investment and help small businesses become more efficient.
Another study published in the Quarterly Journal of Economics in 2007 found that profits of a group of poor fisherman in India increased by an average of eight percent after they began using their phones to find the best sardine prices.
Saving Money and Building Futures
Cell phones are also fast-forwarding development in South Africa by giving the rural poor access to banking services. Conventional banks are clustered in wealthy areas and charge high fees or require documentation that many people simply don’t have. This has trapped low-income South Africans in the informal cash economy.
But three years ago, a South African bank joined forces with a major cell phone company to offer mobile banking. Account holders are finally able to securely deposit their savings instead of hiding money where it can be stolen. And they can use text messages to pay for goods or transfer money to family and friends.
What World Vision is Doing
But far too many Africans still can’t afford to buy even a second hand cell phone. And that’s placing them at an enormous disadvantage.
To help get more phones into the hands of people in the developing world, Vision Fund, a microfinance institution owned and operated by World Vision, empowers poor villagers by loaning them money to purchase a cell phone. These entrepreneurs then pay off the loans and boost their incomes by selling phone services to locals on a per-call basis.
And recently, Vision Finance Company, a World Vision funded microfinance institution based in Kigali, Rwanda, was voted best distributor of phones in the country.
What You Can Do
Poverty and other obstacles still prevent many Africans from taking part in the telecommunications revolution. But the explosive growth of cell phones on the world’s poorest continent hints at a possible future where the chasm that separates lives in world’s poorest and richest countries may be partly narrowed by consumer technology.
Support an entrepreneur in the developing world through World Vision Canada’s micro-loan program. Click here.
Read about how World Vision is helping farmers in Niger overcome desertification through innovative eco-farming methods.
