minciu_sodas_en : Message: RE: [working in parallel] Africa

Hello Dear Ed, Steve, Jeff/Joy, Andrius, and All,

Fantastic to hear from folks, and ED, this is excellent "surf stuff", haha!! Now, to get the "surf" to the "turf" (let alone the pedal to the metal...if you do you'll win a medal)!!

I have been through all these urls, and am excited to read more info about some projects I have heard of and seen posts for--like the SMS for HIV/AIDS text messaging, spearheaded by OneWorld in Kenya, for example--and also FOODNET and other programs combining the use of mobile phones, radio, and other ICTs to address food security and agricultural issues, health, income-generation, education, access to markets, et al. And to "meet" some new ones too!! THANKS!

KAIPPG (one of my organizational affiliations) has been using mobile phones, radio, audiovisual means, some computer use, and the arts--especially "storytelling"--in its own programs for several years, and jointly with OVF, The Commonwealth of Learning, and others have made ICTs/ODL a centerpiece of the GRASSUP NOW initiative. For more on these programs, see

http://ictupdate.cta.int/index.php/article/frontpage/29 (see "Kenya: Health and Agriculture Community Radio Network"...and other GenARDIS grant winners, all of whom do projects related to women, agriculture, and technology), and GRASSUP NOW:

http://www.onevillagefoundation.org/ovf/projects/ovf_kenya/grassup.html.

I think I'll post a write-up or two about our work, so you can see how your ideas, findings, dreams, and domains will complement what we are doing already, and can help us to "ramp up" these programs too. The idea of mobile-phone recycling is one which some orgs like CARE have already been implementing to a degree, but perhaps this type of program could be expanded more rapidly with "help" from other quarters...like yours!

Mobile phones, like radios, are everywhere now in Africa, and I am excited to see mention of OneWorld, WorldSpace, and AWID, among other orgs, as some of us have contacts among these already (which can and should be tapped), and KAIPPG is a OneWorld Africa partner. In fact, we have been talking with OW Radio and OW Africa reps about partnering more closely. Jeff, Joy, and I have had recent conversations along the same lines (ie KAIPPG and OVF), so there are a number of promising possibilities for cooperation and joint endeavors, and we'd love to have you (Ed), Kerry, Rick, and others involved too!

I am delighted specifically by the food and agriculture-related urls/articles you have provided, because of the conference I'm helping to organize on the subject of "The Effects of HIV/AIDS on Agriculture and Nutrition in Africa", for 2006 in Nairobi. Some of these resources and orgs will be greatly helpful, and I'd love to see them highlighted, with the hopes that rapid scale-up of proven projects and promising pilots will result. I have spoken with Jeff about the possibility of highlighting some of OVF's work, and would love to think about including you--Ed--and others (Steve? Rick? who else?) who might be interested.

Lastly, for now, it would be great to consider how some of these ideas, projects, and resources can be used to help folks/orgs like Sam Kongere and Udogo in Kenya, the women of Actwid Kongadzem in Cameroon (w/whom Franz and I have been working), and others of our grassroots affiliates and friends working on the ground in Africa, India, and elsewhere.

With greatest thanks for this excellent brainstorming and work, Ed, and I'll post some of what I've mentioned above soon, so we can see how to spin this story out into one of strategic sustainability and systems of supportive spirit. With blessings and all best wishes, Janet

----- Original Message -----

From: Ed Daniel

To: minciu_sodas_en@yahoogroups.com;workinginparallel@yahoogroups.com

Sent: 6/20/2005 1:58:01 AM

Subject: [working in parallel] Africa

It�s been one of those weeks for me - after a recent strategic decision and sorting out stuff with a role shift/concentration over at SalePlane I�ve been interspersing my work commitments with the usual smattering of web surfing, political studies and other curiosities that distract me from my day to day responsibilities and earning a living - I really need to address this, especially as my wife wants me to stabilize and have a family but that�s another discussion - all business introductions welcomed is all I can say ;-)

Last week I had the chance to meet up with a new friend - an ethical investor no less. He�s just taken a stake in an African mobile company. That got my interest. Then this week while listening to BBC Radio 4 I heard about Ghana being a new opportunity to rival India and China�s offshore BPO operations at �2 per head per day so I wonder what the computer programmers cost - hmm, then I got to hear how SMS was the de-facto tool for getting crop prices now in Africa - this piece of news really perked/peaked my interest.

So I got surfing�

http://www.awid.org/go.php?stid=1442

http://www.usaidredso.org/redso.foodsecurity/fsaccomplish.html

http://www.comminit.com/strategicthinking/st2004/thinking-579.html

http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/002306.html

I then spoke about some of this with my dear friend Anders (http://www.on-a-misson.se). As always Anders has a wealth of knowledge to share - I spoke to him in the first place because of his experience with Uganda - he immediately brought my attention to this (below):

MTN Uganda GPRS - forgot to post the GPRS link...

http://www.ugandanews.net/ RSS feed of interest - among the latest feeds in full synchronicity...! Found here!

http://www.mobileafrica.net/news-africa.php?id=343 Jan 10 - 2005!

sustainable business (still not for profit is ok) is my melody - where the revenue stream still can be there - a tipping for great work or added fund to tape on the cellphone with a sticker with your phone#, your name, and hometown placing the metal money with highest value suggested (10 SEK is our "golden coin" - do you have �1 coins, huh?), or buying a supportive t-shirt - check latest at Fundable, working fine! - www.fundable.org Recent and Finalized deals! - having the funds in margin after costs to go with the initiative to cover for the overheads, still the cell-phones could be distributed for free as an investment into local community - but grameen phone is a great initiative/benchmark to support a village communication entrepreneur with a subsidised phone with pay-for-service farmers in the mode I suggest

http://www.grameenphone.com/

found there with first one

http://www.grameenphone.com/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=3:11:1

and to help support fillups of cash cards can be done domestically with distance MTN Uganda...

And in the end - it is all about storytelling!

Imagine Africa with GPRS / 3G - wow!

HotWorld is my vision! And EHAG! Enourmous Hairy Audicious Goal!

http://hotworld.sustainopreneurship.biz - temporary forward to a blogpost from last year, will update to a lengthier note soon to come to digest it further maybe with a dedicated micro-site taking it beyond the blog text of "not ready ideas soon to being action- and doable"...

Quote;

"And - preparing to go Wireless with the soon omnipresent HotWorld instead of just HotSpot at a caf� or HotZone Corporate/College Campus. Terabytes thru the air using the Wireless Access Payment System of cPort with an omnipresent laptop or the "never to come" www.oqo.com or so? (Just wondered what happened to that, by the way - they obviously created some buzz at the CeBIT in the US now ending in May.)

And - including your whole archive of mp3's, videos, online magazines, Internet Radio streamed and creative Cartoons Scott McCloud style with BitPass sold music on the go if you want to add new mu-sic to your archive - or radio - or video - or whatever...experience! Better make it a sustainable one, though...avoiding a blind hunt of just spending time, having the experience perceived with meaning and depth...

So!

THAT could be structuring the future a great deal!"

I realise that the communciatiosn revolution via SMS in Africa needs tremendous support, on the radio it appears the telcos only subsidise handsets by 50% and get famers to club together to pay the rest - that is not right at all! I might also have my facts wrong.

I�ve had 8 calls in the last 2 months from T-Mobile reps asking me to upgrade my phone but none of them can suggest to me what I should be doing with my old phone - I decided to go surfing again and this time went straight to Oxfam having learnt my lesson the last time I got excited about Irag - lets see what they�re doing to help:

http://www.oxfam.org.uk/what_you_can_do/recycle/phones.htm

But sadly here�s the reality - it�s actually a business they�re fo course in this life people still believe you can�t do things for free L

http://www.cmrecycling.co.uk/

Now I�m not trying to piss anyone off here - but lets be real, Africa is certainly going to benefit immensely from a communications revolution - why slow it down. Just think of all the mobile phones that are 2/3 years old but work fine in USA/UK. These phones could be sent to Africa without passing through some broking house and directly to the people. This will empower many African people and create clarity, transparency and foster trust in a new future. Yes they need to pay to use the wireless airwaves but lets also be realistic here - they say that the capacity of the base stations is often maxed in the far-out and distant areas - why, because they�re the people desperate to communicate and find out what the hell people in power are doing to their country! Elsewhere there is plenty of bandwith to share at present, why shouldn�t off-peak be free? Perhaps now you see where I�m going with this�

Furthermore, Janet a while back was talking about education and improving the ICT skills in African people - I enquired we needed to contemplate a bit more than that, fortunately Janet understood I did not mean to be rude. Africa needs now, more than ever, to staff itself with capable people to nurture its own communications revolution - we should do our utmost to support that.

So, penty to digest I know but the end result is 3 newly regitestered domain names and a lot of hope:

Africa-SMS.com

Mobiles2Africa.org

Cellphones2Africa.org

The rest is now over to you, my friends, to share this message far and wide and see if we can help our distant brothers and sisters in Africa and elsewhere - let me know how I can best put to work the domains I�ve registered and I look forward to your feedback.

Ed Daniel.

Each letter sent to workinginparallel@yahoogroups.com enters the PUBLIC DOMAIN whenever it does not state otherwise. http://www.ethicalpublicdomain.org Please credit our authors!

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