Title: Mobile technology, gender and development in Africa, India and Bangladesh
Author: Jukka Jouhki
Source: An Anthropologist Goes Techno blog
Date (published): 07/02/2009
Date (accessed): 07/12/2009
Type of information: blog post
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
One problem shared by the poor in all developing countries is lack of affordable access to relevant information and knowledge services. There is widespread consensus that information and communication technologies (ICTs) present the best solution to this problem, with mobile phones showing particular promise. Mobile phones are more affordable than computers, require less infrastructure, do not require the user to have much technological knowledge or even to be able to read and write, and are easy to carry from place to place. They lend themselves to flexible usage (text, voice and two-way communication), do not require special training, and the costs of connectivity are relatively low...Yet the introduction of new technologies does not itself automatically lead to economic growth and increased well-being. Privatization of teleservices has created the institutional problem of how states, service providers and NGOs can co-operate to provide developmental applications in affordable ways...To maximize the potential benefits of mobile technology solutions, closer attention must be paid to poverty’s dynamics, causes, and consequences. Poverty does not result merely from lack of connectedness to the information society, it is also a result of market restrictions, repressive governments, social injustice, and human exploitation. One of the most serious and far-reaching barriers to the eradication of poverty is gender inequality..."
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