A global network of people using mobile technology for social impact.
In the West African nation of Mali, back street vendors power the mobile phone market. The major players -- Ikatel, a division of France Telecom, along with the homegrown Malitel -- have official stores, but most of their sales come from the street. In West Africa, subscription service is rare. Instead, mobile phone users purchase plastic-wrapped cards of varying denominations, scratch off a silvery bar much like those found on an instant lottery ticket, and recharge their phones with the code hidden underneath. These cards can be purchased from tin-roofed convenience shacks, egg sandwich vendors, or random men walking down the street, stacks of soccer jerseys slung over their shoulders.
Mobile banking is taking off, with the potential to change entire economies where the majority of people currently are currently "unbanked," as the term goes. There have been been several very interesting reports and articles recently on the topic. On the Foreign Policy blog, World bank consultant Christine Bowers writes about the enormous economic implications that mobile banking has for the world's poorest:
Poor farmers often lack credit to purchase agricultural inputs, and rely on their buyers to provide it. This paper considers the effects of mobile phones on traders of perishable foodstuffs operating between Tanzania’s Southern Highlands and Dar es Salaam’s wholesale market, with a particular focus on the importance of credit in the relationship between potato and tomato farmers and their wholesale buyers.
It argues that the ability to communicate using these new information and communication technologies (ICTs) does not significantly alter the trust relationship between the two groups. It also suggests that farmers, in effect, often have to accept the price they are told their crops are sold for – irrespective of the method of communication used to convey this message – because their buyers are also their creditors. In this situation, many farmers are unable to exploit new mobile phone-based services to seek information on market prices, and potential buyers in other markets. Doing so runs the risk of breaking a long-term relationship with a buyer who is willing to supply credit because of their established business interaction.
It is suggested that, under a more open system than currently exists in Tanzania, mobile-payment (‘m-payment’) applications should target these creditor-buyers as key agents in connecting farmers to the credit they so often require.
Today's Mobile Minute brings you coverage about contactless mobile payments in the U.S., a report on trends in technology and health, research that covers how mobiles can help economic development in Africa and the challenges that are hindering that development, a data gathering platform from Nokia that is now open-source, and the announcement of the mHealth Summit's keynote speaker.
Two years ago, Bev Clark, the co-founder of Kubatana.net, was awarded a large grant as part of the Knight News Challenge for Freedom Fone, an open-source software platform for distributing news and information through interactive voice response (IVR) technology. Freedom Fone was officially launched in late February of this year and has since been downloaded about 200 times, said Amy Saunderson-Meyer of Freedom Fone.
Freedom Fone leverages audio as a mobile function using IVR, a technology that allows a system to detect voice and keyboard input. IVR allows a user to call, enter or say specific numbers, and listen to or contribute audio content. (Many readers are already familiar with IVR - you’ve likely encountered it when you call a customer service number and are prompted with instructions to press numbers for different issues or service departments.)
Since the launch, Freedom Fone has provided support to specific organizations including Equal Access in Cambodia, Small World News TV, TechnoServe, One Economy Corporation, and Africa Youth Trust.
Recently, Freedom Fone was adapted by two farm radio stations through the African Radio Research Initiative, a 42-month project supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and implemented by Farm Radio International in partnership with the World University Services of Canada. The aim of the AFRRI project was to asses the effectiveness and impact of farm radio in many parts of Africa.
Freedom Fone leverages audio as a mobile function using IVR (interactive voice response), a technology that allows a system to detect voice and keyboard input. IVR allows a user to call, enter or say specific numbers, and listen to or contribute audio content.
Bartholomew Sullivan, a regional ICT officer for AFRRI, was on site to set up Freedom Fone at Radio Maria in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. It was the first time Freedom Fone partnered with a group outside of its own projects.
AFRRI works with 25 radio stations in five countries in Africa. Stations include private, public, national, and community radio stations with established listeners in varied agricultural zones. Freedom Fone was introduced at two of these radio stations: Radio Maria (a faith-based station that also broadcasts health and agricultural information across the country) in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and Volta Star radio (the national broadcaster) in the Volta region of Ghana. Before the project, neither station had an existing IVR system in place and the primary feedback loop with listeners was through written letters.
Any individual or group interested in integrated voice response, especially in how it can be used at a radio station.
One benefit to Freedom Fone integration at an established radio station is the ability to promote the IVR service. At Radio Maria, the broadcasters relied on the large number of existing listeners to promote and explain the service including the specific local numbers to call. The group created a special jingle and message to promote the competition.
Another thing that worked well was the ability to set up multiple call-in numbers for each of the main local mobile providers in the region: Vodacom, Zain, and Tigo. This allowed listeners to call from their respective networks, making it cheaper. The group used similar sounding numbers for each of the networks.
The participatory radio campaign approach was to enhance existing systems, not add new content or processes to the farm radio stations. So, Sullivan and others were able to incorporate and adapt Freedom Fone to best match the needs and uses of the listeners.
A more general success for Freedom Fone is the ability to provide an alternative, mobile-based medium for news and information.
The projects at Radio Maria and Volta Star (and specifically in regards to Freedom Fone) were not without challenges and issues, including reliable hardware, cost, human error, power, and training.
One challenge is obtaining high-quality or dedicated hardware. In Tanzania, Sullivan bought a second-hand computer locally to host the Freedom Fone software. Cost can be an issue with some hardware as well.
Human error is a challenge inherent with Freedom Fone, which ironically stems from the high adaptability of the platform and the ability for control many parameters of the IVR process.
Power is an issue, especially in areas with unreliable power because, “when the computer is off, then Freedom Fone is down,” Sullivan said. Similarly, infrastructure is really important, including having backup power supplies for power outages.
Another issue to incorporating Freedom Fone at established organizations is training.
Finally, another challenge with Freedom Fone was the ability to deal with user error or confusion.
As part of our “Mobile Research at Your Desk” series, this week we present a white paper written by Hernán Galperin in collaboration with the Diálogo Regional sobre la Sociedad de la Información (DIRSI) and International Development Research Centre (IDRC). He attempts to shed some light on the affordability of mobile phones between Latin American and Caribbean countries and compare tariffs with the rest of the world.
Recognizing that developing a single standardized metric for mobile affordability is a challenge, the author used a well-established OECD method - a basket of services - to estimate the cost of a set of mobile services specified for low-volume users.
The data exposes the reality of mobile affordability for the bottom of the pyramid.
Cost of Mobile Services and the Affordability Gap in Latin America and the Caribbean - Research Ignite #2 from MobileActive.org on Vimeo.
Hernán Galperin offers a quantitative analysis using a sound approach to predict affordability of mobile tariffs. In the report, it is acknowledged that price of handsets or connection charges are not accounted for, and it is clarified that per-minute calculation can result in an over-estimation of cost.
In another report, Galperin and colleague Judith Mariscal share mobile opportunities informed by survey results of 7,000 individuals in low income households. Discussed there are perceptions of mobile service costs, and patterns of mobile usage, and both reasons for and barriers to mobile adoption. With colleague Roxana Barrantes, Galperin demonstrates the relationship between costs of mobile services and mobile penetration and discusses the savings incurred by low income users with micro-prepayment and per-second billing schemes.
All three papers can be accessed in our mDirectory for your reading.
MobileActive.org's content license is here. Please note that some materials in this slidecast may be separately copyrighted by the respective authors of the papers we presented. Images and materials are used here with the author's permission.
This study analyses the cost of a low-volume basket of mobile services across a sample of Latin American countries, and contrasts these results with standard income and poverty indicators. The main goal is to establish how affordable mobile services are for the poor.
Three general findings emerge. First, the poor generally pay a cost premium for using prepaid subscriptions that allow better expenditure control, though in many cases this premium is much lower than expected.
Second, affordability is an important predictor of mobile penetration. Overall, while affordable handsets and the callingparty-pays system allow a significant number of low-income Latin Americans to become mobile subscribers, the results reveal that the current tariff structure has an inhibiting effect on service consumption by the poor.
Third, since affordability is the most significant barrier to extending the reach of mobile services, as well as the range of services used by the poor, priority should be placed on policies aimed at reducing tariffs and stimulating the introduction of commercial innovations for low-income groups.
Access to telephony for low-income groups is largely based on different strategies of mobile telephony usage. The main goal of this research project is to explore the strategies employed by the poor in Latin America and the Caribbean to access and use mobile telephony services, as well as to identify the major market and regulatory barriers for increased penetration and usage. More generally, it seeks to contribute to the discussion on how access to mobile telephony contributes to improving the livelihoods of the poor –what we call mobile opportunities.
Our results show that mobile telephony is highly valued by the poor as a tool for strengthening social ties and for increased personal security, and that it is beginning to prove useful for enhancing business and employment opportunities. Overall, the survey results suggest that the acquisition of mobile phones by the poor has an economic impact reflected mainly in improved social capital variables such as the strengthening of trust networks and better coordination of informal job markets. These findings reveal the continued need to develop innovative business models that extend the market frontier for mobile telephony. They also highlight the urgent need to rethink public policies that are premised on the mobile phone as a luxury good. Clearly, for the poor, mobile telephony has long been the most cost-effective and accessible alternative.
The Swedish International Development and Cooperation Agency (Sida) recently published a report, The Innovative Use of Mobile Applications in East Africa, that provides an overview of the current state of mobile phone applications for social and economic developments in East Africa. The report seeks to answer “what hinders the take-off of m-applications for development in East Africa" and asks what role donors should play.
While mobile phones are the main channel for information in East Africa, with mobile penetration covering over 40% of the population, sustainable, scalable mobile services for social and economic development are limited. The report is supported by secondary data, statistics, and field work carried out in Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania, along with numerous interviews, meetings and discussions with key stakeholders in East Africa. Major trends in mobile usage, barriers for increased use of m-applications, as well as opportunities for scaling are discussed.
Barriers: High Cost of Ownership.
India is a country of villages, with over 70% of its population living in rural areas. For mobile operators, this means future mobile subscribers in the country are going to come from India’s villages.
Between 2002 and 2006, mobile penetration increased by a more than 40% in India (source ITU). Still, rural penetration is low, making up just over one fifth of the total mobile user base in India, as reported by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India in 2007. The future of the mobile industry is exanding in rural India, but what do mobile operators need to do to tap into this market?
In 2009, Accenture, a global management consulting company, surveyed 2,400 current and potential rural consumers and interviewed 15 senior-level executives representing the mobile telephony ecosystem. The goal was to understand the needs of rural customers for mobile services and identify the value propositions for rural services by mobile operators.
The Swedish International Development and Cooperation Agency (Sida) recently published a report that gives an overview of the current state of mobile phone applications for social and economic developments in East Africa. Drawing on successful adoption of mobile applications in the Philippines, this Sida report seeks to answer “what hinders the take off of m-applications for development in East Africa and what role donors play in the process.” While mobile phones is the one of the most widely accessible gateways for information in East Africa, with mobile penetration covering over 40% of the population, sustainable, scalable mobile services for social and economic development are limited. The report is supported by secondary data, statistics, and field work carried out in Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania, along with numerous interviews, meetings and discussions with key stakeholders in East Africa. Major trends in mobile usage, barriers for increased use of m-applications, as well as opportunities for scaling are discussed.
This study focuses on the affordability of the OECD’s low-usage basket of mobile telephony services, which includes 360 calls and 396 text messages (SMS) a year, segmented by duration, time of day and destination. In other words, the study compares the monthly cost of prepaid service for a user who makes approximately one call and sends one text message per day. Because our main interest lies in estimating the affordability of this basket of services for users at the bottom of the income pyramid, two indicators are used: (1) The proportion of income that the cost of this basket represents for users in the third income decile, which acts as a proxy for income at the bottom of the pyramid; (2) The affordability gap, which corresponds to the difference between the cost of the basket and 5 percent of the income of the potential users in each income decile.
The main findings are summarized. (1) There is significant dispersion of mobile telephony tariffs in the region, with costs of the low-usage basket ranging from US$45 in Brazil to US$2.20 in Jamaica (in current dollars). The average for the region is US$15. (2) For users who consume a minimum basket of mobile services, prepaid service is less expensive than post-paid service in 13 of the 20 markets in the sample. (3) Overall, mobile telephony tariffs in Latin America are significantly higher than those of OECD countries (2 times more) and other emerging markets (3 times more). (4) The only country in the region in which mobile telephone
services can be considered affordable for low-income users is Costa Rica. (5) Despite advances in the adoption of the service, the results of this report highlight a significant affordability gap that limits consumption of mobile telephony services for most people in the region, and point to a need for continued efforts and initiatives to reinforce competition in the market and review the heavy tax burden that affects mobile telephony service in the region.
The GMSA reports that the mobile subscriptions worldwide is at 3 billion (2008) with 270 million subscriptions in Africa at the end of 2007. This policy paper considers the challenges faced by public policy makers in understanding the true number of individuals with mobile access. There are many reasons why customers might have more than one phone, phone number or SIM card, which results in the double-counting of customers. As a result, it is difficult to assume that the number telephone numbers or SIM cards translates into individual customers. The author discusses the issue of ambiguity in the estimates of mobile teledensity as an indicator for the MDGs and the subsequent challenge for public policy makers in interpreting the large numbers and how they reflect the reality of their countries, cities, towns and villages. Case studies in Bulgaria and South Africa are presented.
The use of mobile phones for quick-time data collection is proliferating around the world. To get a better understanding of the scale and scope of these new data collection efforts, we partnered with UN Global Pulse initiative to conduct a survey of present and planned mobile data collection efforts. The survey results will help identify new, quick-time data sources.
The first findings of the global survey have been compiled in an inventory. The inventory is a living document that will be regularly updated as we become aware of new projects. If you are managing a mobile data collection project and you would like to have it featured in the inventory, please contact us or leave a comment.
The inventory is posted in a Google Spreadsheet here: http://bit.ly/mobdatainventory.
We are also currently conducting for UN Global Pulse a mobile phone survey across multiple countries including Uganda, India, Mexico, Ukraine and Iraq. The survey is being conducted via text message and uses simple questions to understand how populations in different parts of the world perceive. We are drawing on our extensive network of partners on the ground to conduct the survey and will make the results publicly available (albeit in an anonymous and aggregate format). The survey is an exercise in rapid, bottom-up data collection. Questions in the survey focus on economic perceptions, including:
At Aware Networks we develop mobile applications for consumers and organizations. Our Cliqtalk product enables the creation of mobile communities that collaborate on topics of shared interest. We work with associates to deliver mobile Web services and offer consulting services in cellular telephony and software technologies.Our website is at: www.awarenetworks.com
Across developing countries, millions of people rely on informal economic activity and local level networks to earn their living. Most of these populations are from bottom of pyramid and they don’t have access to basic financial services/banks as access to them is costly and very limited. However, the outstanding growth of mobile sector worldwide has created a unique opportunity to provide social and financial services over the mobile network. With over 4 billion mobile cellular subscriptions worldwide, mobile network has the ability to immediately offer mobile banking to 61% of the world population. A study states the biggest share of mobile payment users will be in the Asia/Pacific region by 2012 (Gartner, 2008). In the context of being the most promising ICT market and the largest inbound remittance receiver, this region is expected to be the hub of m-banking transactions.
The paper starts with an overview of existing models of m-banking and then examines the m-banking regulations in some South Asian countries and of the countries where (e.g. the Philippines, Kenya, South Africa) m-baking/payment systems are already in practice or a success. The concerns of financial regulators and policy measures taken so far are discussed.
The key questions this paper aims to answer:
⇒ What are the practiced models of m-banking/payment systems?
⇒ What concerns are generally raised by financial regulators?
⇒ Which m-banking/payment models have drafted or enacted in South Asia?
⇒ Which m-banking/payment models have are enacted in the countries where it is a success?
⇒ What constitutes a proportionate regulatory approach?
The answers to the above questions helps to identify a way forward which can expedite adoption of m-banking/ payments service in South Asia successfully and quickly.
Nokia Life Tools aims to give users direct access to information that can change how they do business. Launched in 2008 in India, Nokia Life Tools deliver agricultural information, educational resources and entertainment to users over SMS. At the end of 2009, Nokia Life Tools expanded to Indonesia.
The service allows subscribers to receive updates on chosen topics – market prices, news tips, weather forecasts, English lessons, exam preparation, or entertainment. The SMS-based service sends basic text messages on an icon-driven interface; the delivery system ensures that the service works wherever mobile phones work. The information that is sent out to the consumer’s mobile phone is targeted to the person based on his or her location.
The tools’ primary services are agricultural and educational; entertainment is supplementary, providing users with ringtones and sports updates among other services.
Nokia Life Tools aims to:
Nokia Life Tools is an SMS-based service that provides hyper-localized information to its subscribers in three sectors: agriculture, education, and entertainment.
The target audience of Nokia Life Tools are users in emerging markets who want access to reliable agricultural information (including market prices, weather forecasts and crop recommendations) and educational opportunities (such as English language instruction).
According to Dinesh Subramaniam, senior manager of communications for Nokia, collaborations with local partners such as agricultural boards, meteorological departments and educational boards have helped create the hyper-local information needed for the service to run.
One of the biggest challenges facing the program is the initial collection of data; creating specifically targeted information for different regions takes time and manpower, which limits the speed with which the program can be rolled out to new countries.
The Vodafone Americas Foundation is announcing the last call for nominations for the second annual Wireless Innovation Project, a competition to identify and reward the most promising advances in wireless related technologies that can be used to solve critical problems around the globe. Proposals will be accepted through February 1, 2010, with the final winners announced on April 19, 2010 at the annual Global Philanthropy Forum in Redwood City, California.
CellBazaar, often called the "Mobile Craigslist of Bangladesh", has provided a martketplace to buy and sell goods and service to Bangladeshis for three and a half years now. We reported on the organization previously in April 2008. Since then, the service has grown and has now user base of just under 4 million. Cell Bazaar processes 1000 posts/day, and founder Kamal Qadir was chosen by the World Economic Forum as a Young Global Leader in 2009.
I caught up with Kamal recently and talked to him about two things that I had wondered about CellBazaar that had not been emphasized in the coverage they have received.
"Innovations in Mobile Data Collection for Social Action," a workshop co-hosted by MobileActive.org and UNICEF in Amman, Jordan, featured Ignite Talks -- five minute presentations by inspiring people who are using mobiles for social action in the Middle East -- and interviews with key participants. Jacob Korenblum describes the work of Souktel in Palestine, and Erica Kochi from UNICEF Innovation, the co-host of the event, illustrates why data collected by mobiles is so important for their work in Iraq.
This guest post was written by Joshua Haynes who is studying for his Masters of International Business, at the Fletcher School at Tufts University. Reposted with Hayes' permission.
Projet Alphabétisation de Base par Cellulaire (ABC), conceived of and spearheaded by Tufts University professor Jenny Aker, uses mobiles phones as tools to aid in adult literacy acquisition in rural Niger.
Adult literacy in rural areas faces an inherent problem. In Niger, for example, there are no novels, newspapers, or journals in native languages like Hausa or Zarma. The 20% of Nigériens who are literate are literate in French. The vast majority of rural villagers have struggled to maintain their livelihoods since time immemorial without ever knowing how to read a single word. What’s the point of literacy if there is no need for written materials?
This review considers the differences between the adoption rates of M-PESA in Kenya and Tanzania and tries to highlight some of the reasons that the same service launched in seemingly similar countries has yielded such different results. This paper is intended as a discussion document for mobile network operators considering launching a mobile money service.
Safaricom launched M-PESA in Kenya in March 2007 and has since become the most famous and probably the most successful implementation of mobile money service to date. In May 2008, 14 months after the launch, M-PESA in Kenya had 2.7 million users and almost 3,000 agents. Today, over two years since its launch, M-PESA has gained 7 million registered customers and has 10,000 agents spread across the country. This exceeds the reach of any other financial service in Kenya.
Finaccess 2009 showed that M-PESA has become the most popular method of money transfer in Kenya with 40% of all adults using the service. The same Kenyan survey also shows a dramatic increase in national remittances; from 17% in 2006 to 52% in 2009, which may be attributed to the ease of money transfer through ubiquitous M-PESA agents. Many mobile network operators have been eager to repeat M-PESA’s success in Kenya, but the formula for this success is not yet clear. One year after the Kenyan launch, Vodacom launched M-PESA in April 2008 in Tanzania. The user uptake of the service in Tanzania has been much slower compared to its northern neighbour. In June 2009, 14 months after the launch, M-PESA in Tanzania had 280,000 users and 1,000 agents (Rasmussen 2009).
This report was commissioned by the GSMA and undertaken by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) to examine the link between regulation and the digital divide. The emphasis has been on Sub-Saharan Africa because of the region’s relatively low level of penetration and significant, unfulfilled demand. Mobile has clearly emerged as the main solution to providing communications for the world’s unconnected. Mobile has already brought significant benefits to economies and societies across much of the developing world, but much potential still exists in Africa, where fixed-line communication alternatives are extremely limited.
This report investigates how a move towards best-practice regulation would promote an increase in mobile investment and help to realise this potential. Specifically, the analysis explores the impact of regulatory policy and government intervention on the level of risk associated with operator investment decisions. In light of this, we examine how reduced regulatory risk could improve investment levels and reduce the cost of mobile ownership. We then consider the impact this could have on penetration levels, and the corresponding knock-on effect for GDP.
This paper puts forward explanations and backgrounds to the remarkable difference in user uptake of the m-banking service M-PESA in Tanzania compared to the same service in Kenya. Data gathered from user and industry interviews, conducted during a field study in Tanzania between March-May 2009 is together with literature from Kenya used to compare the m-banking environment in the two countries.
M-PESA is provided by mobile network operators (MNOs), Safaricom in Kenya and Vodacom in Tanzania. Both are the leading MNO in their respective country although Vodacom has a substantially lower market share and turnover compared to Safaricom. This simple fact resonates in many areas affecting M-PESA, such as: size of marketing budget, M-PESA's priority within the organization and the company's ability to quickly sign up agents and attract initial customers. Differences in the general economic situation, the geography and political history are also put forward. Kenya has a stronger economy, a higher GDP and a more developed banking system. This has contributed to the financial literacy in the country which is an important factor when communicating a service like M-PESA.
Among the differences between the two implementations, we suggest that the three most influential factors to the user uptake have been the two companies ability to transform their airtime distribution into an agent network, the marketing strategy which needed to be adopted to the specific settings in each country, and the geographical and demographic conditions.
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