Title: Mobile-Phone Farming
Author: Devin Banerjee
Source: WSJ.com
Publisher: The Wall Street Journal, Asia
Date (published): 24/08/2010
Date (accessed): 06/09/2010
Type of information: article
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
Which pesticide will protect my crops?

It's a question most farmers in insect-ridden rural India ask themselves or their neighbors. But it's also a question to which very few have the correct answer.

What's the best fertilizer? How do you get rid of bugs? India's farmers long had only their neighbors to turn to. A mobile platform by Tata Consultancy Services is changing that, providing personalized advice through low-end handsets.

That was the inspiration behind mKRISHI, a platform developed by Tata Consultancy Services to provide personalized advice to Indian farmers on low-end mobile phones. TCS, an Asian Innovation Awards finalist, spent two years studying farming patterns in rural India and developing methods to connect farmers to agricultural experts, with the belief that technology could jump-start some of India's seemingly ancient agricultural practices.

"It appears that there is a last-mile gap between farmers and agricultural experts," said Arun Pande, the head of TCS Innovation Labs and the leader behind mKRISHI. "In the absence of correct information and advice which is specific to him, the farmer relies on what other farmers do—or on his traditional wisdom."

In 2007, Mr. Pande traveled through different parts of rural India to meet farmers and understand their business. After listening to their concerns—Will it rain enough in my village this season? Will my crop catch my neighbor's crop disease? Where can I take out a loan?—he saw the opportunity to grow that business by providing personalized responses to such questions.

Title: A Mobile Payment Trifecta in Kenya
Author: Erik Hersman
Source: WhiteAfrican (blog)
Date (published): 28/07/2010
Date (accessed): 03/08/2010
Type of information: blog post
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
Kenya is quickly gaining a competitive advantage in the mobile payments space. Led by mobile operator giant Safaricom with their Mpesa product, the market locally sees huge value in mobile money transactions. Add to that a regulatory system that is relaxed enough for innovation to be encouraged, and you have a great space for interesting things to happen.

Title: Philippine precision farming gets a mobile upgrade
Author: Joel D. Adriano
Source: SciDev.Net
Date (published): 21/07/2010
Date (accessed): 03/08/2010
Type of information: article
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
Rice farmers in the Philippines will be able to dial a specialised service on their mobile phones to obtain tailored advice on fertiliser use when they plant their crops in September.

Scientists at the Philippine-based International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), officials of the Philippine Department of Agriculture, and local private telecommunications firm Globe, have joined together to create the service that will enable poor farmers to tap into sophisticated 'precision agriculture' techniques commonly used in developed countries. These include technologies such as remote sensing, not often available to Asian farmers

Title: From Silicon Valleys to Community Informatics Neighbourhoods—Digital Development Strategies as Though Local Economies Mattered
Author: Michael Gurstein
Source: Gurstein's Community Informatics
Date (published): 02/08/2010
Date (accessed): 03/08/2010
Type of information: blog post
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
"Many (most) countries in the world have in the decade just passed, developed and at least partially implemented what may be called a “digital development strategy”. These strategies are based on a perception that the kind of economic activity that has resulted from the technical/digital development taking place in Silicon Valley and similar such locales particularly in the US is a necessary element of the economic development strategy for any/every country that wants to be competitive and thus prosperous at this time in economic history.

The perception is that the well funded science and technology programs at the leading universities in the San Francisco and California region—Stanford, CalTech, UC Berkeley and so on attracted faculty and produced students whose leading edge work contributed more or less immediately and directly to the generation of technology innovations which in turn led directly to the creation of start-up technology enterprises. These mixed with fairly ready availability of investment capital, in turn sparked the technology (and commercial) digital revolutions of the Internet and other digital enterprises. In turn these enterprises provided the basis for economic advance and importantly (from a government’s perspective) job creation and enhancements to the national revenue stream through taxes and so on.

This logic is probably correct at least in outline (but would be worth examining in some close detail) however, what is rather less obvious is that this model can (or should) be reproduced not just once or twice but repeatedly in tens and hundreds of locations around the world..."

Title: The Economics of Copyright and Digitisation: A Report on the Literature and the Need for Further Research
Author: Christian Handke
Pages: 103 pp.
Publisher: Strategic Advisory Board for Intellectual Property Policy (SABIP)
Date (published): 03/06/2010
Date (accessed): 14/06/2010
Type of information: report
Language: English
On-line access: yes (pdf)
Abstract:
The Strategic Advisory Board for Intellectual Property Policy (SABIP) has commissioned this report in order to inform its research agenda. The report undertakes a critical overview of the theoretical and empirical economic literature on copyright and unauthorised copying. On the basis of this literature, this report also identifies the salient issues for copyright policy in the process of digitisation, and formulates specific research questions that should be addressed to inform copyright policy.
Economists’ theoretical work on copyright has generated a general framework in which to study the effects of copyright on social welfare. The literature identifies a number of costs and benefits associated with copyright. Digitisation is likely to affect the balance struck by existing copyright arrangements and empirical research is needed to capture the implications for the desirable level of copyright protection. So far, empirical studies provide partial answers at best but they may provide useful templates for further research. Progress seems possible, especially if better data becomes available.

This report highlights two issues which are in particular need of further research in order to inform copyright policy:
1. How does digital copying affect the supply of copyright works?
2. Does the copyright system entail obstacles to desirable aspects of technological transition?

Title: Out of thin air. The behind-the-scenes logistics of Kenya’s mobile-money miracle
Source: www.economist.com
Publisher: The Economist
Date (published): 10/06/2010
Date (accessed): 14/06/2010
Type of information: article
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
It is like magic. By clicking a few keys on a mobile phone, money can be zapped from one part of Kenya to another in seconds. For urban migrants sending money home to their villages, and for people used to queuing at banks for hours to pay bills or school fees, the M-PESA money-transfer service, operated by Safaricom, Kenya’s largest mobile operator, is a godsend. No wonder it is used by 9.5m people, or 23% of the population, and transfers the equivalent of 11% of Kenya’s GDP each year; or that it has inspired more than 60 similar schemes across the world.

But despite the apparently frictionless transfer of money through the air, making a money-transfer system work smoothly requires a great deal of backstage effort. Jake Kendall and Ignacio Mas of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Frederik Eijkman of PEP Intermedius, a financial-services firm, explain how it all works in a paper presented in late Ma

Title: Mobile Telephony in Rural Areas: The Latin American perspective
Authors: Lisa M Cespedes and Franz J Martin
Source: i4d (Information For Development), January - March 2010
Publisher: Centre for Science, Development and Media Studies
Date (accessed): 02/06/2010
Type of information: article
Language: English
On-line access: yes (HTML)
Abstract:
Mobile phones offer individuals in rural populations the ability to access and interact with information services and databases.
Consider the numerous ways in which mobile telephony facilitates every day endeavours in addition to offering phone calls and text messaging. The technologies and applications vary from the developed areas to the developing regions, however, people in the most remote and marginalised places of the world are also benefiting greatly from the opportunities that the technology offers to improve their social and economic conditions.
There are 179 million people using mobile phones in Latin America; 82% of those users browse the Internet, 73% send text messages, and 55% are transferring data in different ways1. As a result of the expansion of mobile infrastructure and relatively affordable prices, the use of mobile telephony increasingly takes part of the everyday life of many rural families. As an example, in countries such as Peru, only 0.01% of rural households have access to the Internet while 36.5% have a mobile phone. In Chile, the penetration of mobile telephony is 94.7%.

Title: Mobile Phones and Economic Development in Africa
Authors: Jenny C. Aker and Isaac M. Mbiti
Pages: 45 pp.
Source: Working Paper 211
Publisher: Center for Global Development (www.cgdev.org)
Date (published): 01/06/2010
Date (accessed): 02/06/2010
Type of information: research paper
Language: English
On-line access: yes (pdf)
Abstract:
Jenny Aker Isaac Mbiti examine the growth of mobile phone technology over the past decade and consider its potential impacts upon quality of life in low-income countries, with a particular focus on sub-Saharan Africa. They first provide an overview of the patterns and determinants of mobile phone coverage in sub-Saharan Africa before describing the characteristics of primary and secondary mobile phone adopters on the continent. They then discuss the channels through which mobile phone technology can impact development outcomes, both as a positive externality of the communication sector and as part of mobile phone-based development projects, and analyze existing evidence. While current research suggests that mobile phone coverage and adoption have had positive impacts on agricultural and labor market efficiency and welfare in certain countries, empirical evidence is still somewhat limited. In addition, mobile phone technology cannot serve as the “silver bullet” for development in sub-Saharan Africa. Careful impact evaluations of mobile phone development projects are required to better understand their impacts upon economic and social outcomes, and mobile phone technology must work in partnership with other public good provision and investment.

Title: Explaining ERP Failure in Developing Countries: A Jordanian Case Study
Authors: Ala'a Hawari & Richard Heeks
Pages: 31 pp.
ISBN: 978-1-905469-13-0
Source: Development Informatics Working Paper Series, Paper No. 45
Publisher: Centre for Development Informatics, Institute for Development Policy and Management, School of Environment and Development (SED), University of Manchester
Date (published): 17/05/2010
Date (accessed): 02/06/2010
Type of information: research paper
Language: English
On-line access: yes (pdf)
Abstract:
Enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems are increasingly being adopted by organisations in developing countries. As in industrialised countries, this adoption seems beset by significant rates of failure, leading to a large waste of investment and other resources. This paper seeks to understand why ERP failure occurs.

In doing this, it moves beyond the factor lists that have so-far dominated analysis. Instead, it makes use of the "design—reality gap" model. This conceptual framework aims to be comprehensive but also contingent; sensitive to the specific conditions of any individual client organisation.

The design—reality gap model is applied to a case study of partial ERP failure in a Jordanian manufacturing firm. The model analyses the situation both before and during ERP implementation. It finds sizeable gaps between the assumptions and requirements built into the ERP system design, and the actual realities of the client organisation. It is these gaps – and the failure to close them during implementation – that underlie project failure.

The paper draws conclusions about good practice in ERP implementation relating to both risk identification and risk mitigation, and offers examples of both specific and generic actions that can be undertaken. But it also notes challenges existing in some developing country contexts that may continue to constrain the effective use of enterprise resource planning systems.

Educator's guide to student questions for this paper

Title: Measuring the Information Society 2010
Pages: 124 pp.
ISBN: 92-61-13111-5
Publisher: International Telecommunication Union (ITU)
Date (published): 26/03/2010
Date (accessed): 17/05/2010
Type of information: research report
Language: English
On-line access: yes (pdf)
Abstract:
The latest edition of Measuring the Information Society features the new ITU ICT Development Index (IDI) and the ICT Price Basket - two benchmarking tools to measure the Information Society. The IDI captures the level of advancement of ICTs in 159 countries worldwide and compares progress made between 2002 and 2008. It also measures the global digital divide and examines how it has developed in recent years. The report also features the latest ICT Price Basket, which combines 2009 fixed telephone, mobile cellular and fixed broadband tariffs for 161 economies into one measure and compares these across countries, and over time. The analytical report is complemented by a series of statistical tables providing country-level data for all indicators included in the Index.

(The freely downloadable pdf-version excludes the Annex 4, which features the statistical tables of tariffs used to compute the ICT Price Basket.)