Women, Africa and Business

"The glass ceiling will go away when women help other women break through that ceiling." – PepsiCo. CEO Indra Nooyi

Going through my usual business of emails, tweets and news browsing, I noticed several leads on African Women and Business:

- Wharton Africa Business Forum hosts a panel on Women in Business

- Munyua writes a chapter in Book, African Women and ICTs, titled, "Women entrepreneurs in Nairobi: examining and contextualizing women’s choices"

Just a quick weekend note. I am always looking for more great stories and examples of women and business particularly in social entrepreneurship initiatives.

Re-cap: IDIA 2009 conference

Purpose:




I think conferences are in much need for visual stimulation like the beautiful animals (hyena above) of Kruger in order to develop creative and innovative ideas of research. This was the setting of the International Development informatics Association 3rd conference in South Africa.

The purpose of participating in this conference was to present my conference paper based on the research that I had conducted under my 2008/09 IDRC Professional Development Award to an international academic audience. My paper is co-authored with Kenyan, Jason Musyoka, and titled, “Re-thinking Acute Emergencies Response through Communication Technology in African Rural Communities.” The paper can be found here. The IDIA conference was a conventional meeting of practitioners and researchers working in the field of community and development informatics. A majority of delegates seemed to be affiliated with Monash University who were the local organizing committee as well as South Africa’s Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) – Meraka Institute who is a current IDRC partner. According to the roster, there were 35 presenting delegates based at South African based institutions, and the others were from institutions in Australia (8 mainly Monash University), USA (4), Nigeria (2), Sao Tome (1), Brazil (1), India (1), Pakistan (1), Kenya (1), UK (2), Mozambique (1), Botswana (1), and UAE (1).

The conference venue was inside the Kruger National Park at the Berg-en-Dal camp. Since delegates were based in the camp (you cannot leave the camp after 6pm), there was no escaping the sounds of the creatures that creep in the night; it made for a wonderful experience of roars and tweets just outside one’s cottage. The conference room itself was in a dark, face-brick façade room which was not conducive to the best lighting but presenters seemed to manage regardless.


Highlights of IDIA09:

My presentation: This was my first time presenting the research that I conducted in Winneba, Ghana, on the perceptions of acute emergency response in a peri-rural community where mobile phones and emergency hotlines have been introduced in the area. From the overwhelming questions and comments that I received, it seemed like the 20 odd persons at my presentation found the topic stimulating and a need for further research in the area. My presentation can be found by clicking here: http://bit.ly/oe8a2

IDRC Partners: While the conference was mainly composed of African-based projects, I had the pleasure of meeting two researchers who presented their IDRC-funded projects within ICT4D - PanAsia. They were the only two projects coming from the Asia region and definitely added diversity to the conference (only paper on rigourous sampling methods and only paper specifically on gender and ICTs). First, there was P. Vigneswara Ilavarasan (Vignesh), from India, (IDRC Project: "ICTs and Urban Micro-enterprises: Identifying and Maximizing Opportunities for Economic Development ") who presented a paper that exhibited their comprehensive multi-stage probability sampling method that was recently piloted in Mumbai, India. Their intensive work using maps provided by government (some of which were hand-drawn) and random selection of the locales emphasizes the need for future research in the area of ICT and development to take a more rigorous approach to research design.

The second IDRC-funded project was presented by Nazima Shaheen (photo on left) from Pakistan and topic was on "The Gender Digital Divide in Rural Pakistan - To Measure and to Bridge It ". This is the first time for Nazima to present her preliminary results of new statistics on Pakistan’s ICT usage with aggregated gender data. Nazima has also submitted a paper (The Prospects and Challenges for Women Empowerment through Open ICT4D in Pakistan) to IDRC’s ICT4D upcoming conference in March 2010.


Rhetoric and Rigour Debate: Another well-received paper was presented by Ron Weber (Dean of Monash University- Australia) titled, “Research on ICT for Development: Some reflections on rhetoric, rigor, reality, and relevance.” He states that the ultimate goal of research should be to build theory and ICT4D research should be building upon this theory with rigourous research. From his sample of reviewed ICT4D journal articles, his findings interpret that this interdisciplinary field leans more on rhetoric and lacks of such research rigour. His paper is certainly a bone of contention for ICT4D researchers to ensure that they spend the time to develop well-thought out research methods, paradigms, their values and theoretical frameworks before jumping into the field.

From Kagiso Chikane’s (Meraka Institute manager, CSIR) presentation, she finds the continuous challenge for their ICT4D projects is trying to quantify the impact of their work on development. Also how does one find the technical and financial support from the communities to continue running these intervention projects that have shown positive change in a community? There were several papers presenting the work by the Council for Scientific Industrial Research (CSIR), Meraka Institute particularly discussing their technology intervention work on the Living Labs, and the Digital Doorways.

Zimbabwe and ICT Policy: On the African research, there was an excellent presentation by Tendai Chari on the political economy of telecom policy in Zimbabwe titled, “Information and Communication Policy Formulation and the Information Divide in Zimbabwe.” His findings show how ICT policy in Zimbabwe is actually only modified when there is a result from a judicial court cases against unfair government telecom policy. While the court cases usually forced government to change their law, this practice results in a process that has no democratic consultation or participation mechanisms for the citizen. It would be interesting to link his research to the political economy and broadband infrastructure work being done by the CICEWA project.

I thought that Mutshewa’s fascinating paper, “A survey of the commercial activities created by the mobile telephony for the informal business sector in Botswana” could possibly be linked with Dr. Sylvestre Ouédraogo research on the Informal Sector and ICTs in West Africa.


Young African ICTD Researchers: I had the chance to meet Kenyan PhD candidate (University of Cape Town), Shikoh Gitau, who presented her preliminary field research on the results of training women to first time mobile internet users in Cape Town’s Khayelitsha informal settlement area. She is one of the several bright young African scholars who were presenting ICT4D research at the conference. As there is a growing number of young African researchers who are individually investigating the changes in African society as a result of communication technologies such as mobiles and internet, it may be a good idea to start linking them together and see whether research collaboration and learning can effectively take place.

Radio and Convergence: Two delegates were interested on how their findings illustrated how radio messages have influenced a citizen’s interest in new social media such as Facebook. In Shikoh’s presentation, she mentions that her training intervention was initially set to teach women the use of email and job searching with mobile phone internet. However, during her training, the participants wanted to learn about Facebook because of the local radio station’s promotion of information on the Facebook platform. I have sent both delegates information about Acacia’s project named ‘Radio, Convergence, and Development in Africa’.

ICTD Research and Policy Influence: Policy and research debate flared up during the conference. Walter Brown (Monash University) presented on South African Communications Forum (SACF) new platform for South Africa’s ICT policy reform: Vision 2020. This SACF group recently presented a draft report on their planned process to influence government policy formulation which hopes to create a more conducive environment for developing and implementing ICT in South Africa. He asks how academics can be involved in such a process for change. One CSIR delegate believes that there is a need for institutions and researchers to be familiar with policy and their issues because their research needs to remain relevant in order to provide evidence that substantiates changes in rules and regulations. Another delegate emphasized the need to work with NGOs that fit with your cause as a NGO’s lobbying efforts will be effective in influencing policy makers.

Overall, good conference for learning about development informatics projects and research particularly in the sub-Saharan Africa region. After experiencing a space like this, I definitely think more informal meeting opportunities for African researchers are necessary to discuss and collaborate on similar projects. I can't wait for those opportunities!

Conference Paper: Mobiles and Perceptions of Mobile / Emergency Response in Peri-rural Ghana

This presentation was prepared for the 3rd International Development Informatics Association (IDIA) Conference. 28-30th October 2009 Johannesburg; South Africa. The draft paper and report on the conference will be posted on this space very soon.

Special thanks to Wireless Africa research partner, One Village Foundation, and Mr. Kafui Prebble, for the organization's logistical support back in November 2008 for this field research.

Conference Paper Abstract:

Local rural communities frequently receive little assistance in resolving acute emergencies. In rural areas, emergencies are thus resolved using alternative local mechanisms and adapted practices mediated through available technologies. However, local mechanisms may lead to various barriers such as potentially asymmetrical emergency information to a certain population and can remain on a “who-you-know” basis. Individuals who are new to an area or those disadvantaged with poor social networks are limited to time-consuming and costly options for assistance during emergencies.

RE-THINKING ACUTE EMERGENCIES RESPONSE THROUGH COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY IN AFRICAN RURAL COMMUNITIES

View more presentations from kdiga.

Reactions and Portfolios

(photo from http://www.bevoda.ca/photos.htm)


The Canadian International Development Agency react to Minister Bev Oda's statements to the Ottawa's newspaper, the Embassy (article here). These comments include the lack of health experts in their programs as well as their focus on spending money and not on measurable results. Wow.

In the same edition, the Embassy reports on seven African diplomats in Ottawa speak out to the Senate Foreign Affairs committee on the drop of African countries from the priorities of the upcoming aid spending (article here).

Other new publications:

Portfolios of the Poor:
How the World's Poor Live on $2 a Day
Daryl Collins, Jonathan Morduch, Stuart Rutherford & Orlanda Ruthven

How the poor are able to find solutions on $2 a day. I love this type of research as it is very very difficult to build systematic research that records what low income individuals spend everyday. At one point in my research, I tried to record six households and ask them to record their last ten phone calls and SMS. First of all, the tool must be super easy to understand and second, you need to have a contingency plan when an individual is illiterate. The first chapter of the book is free of the website, but can't wait to get my hands on a copy of this book.

Here is the link to the website: Portfolios of the Poor and Financial Access Initiative.

IDRC - MENA Workshop & ICTD Conference

– Doha Qatar April 16-21, 2009

I had drafted up this trip report a while ago but have been so busy with another conference paper, that I pushed it aside. I also found that several comments had already chatted a bit about the ICTD conference, however, I didn't see much written on the Young Researchers Workshop nor a pre-conference event hosted by IDRC for Middle East and North African researchers. So here it goes!

The IDRC team arrived in full force to learn about the Middle East and experience the extraordinary enthusiasm of Middle East and North Africa (MENA) researchers while at the same time update themselves on the latest upcoming research that the world has to offer in ICTD.

Day One was a pre-conference workshop titled, "MENA Research Capacity Building Workshop." The objective of the workshop was to strengthen ICT4D research capacities in North Africa and the Middle East.



The Doha Seef Hotel venue was a large room that was divided off to make the room not feel massive, but unfortunately the room size did not make for ideal acoustics especially when attempting to work with a large multi-lingual group.

Delegates were invited from all parts of the region including Morocco, Algeria, and Oman. After introductions and review of the expectations, the delegation broke out in to a World Café style of facilitation.

In small groups that rotated during the session, the crucial questions of “What is ICT4D, how do you interpret the ‘D’ and what makes a successful ICT4D project” were asked. In the discussions, the delegates who had not really explored this area became engaged and did creative critical thinking about how their areas of study could attempt to transform the area of ICT4D. One response to the meaning of ICT4D: “when it contributes to a more humane and sustainable world for more people.” Within the discussions, I found the delegates emphasize the meaning ICT4D as transformative change in the lives of ordinary people.

The researchers from "Strengthening ICT Research Capacity in Asia (SIRCA)" presented their ongoing work including some of the projects that they are going to be funding within their grant competition.

(Photo: Dalia sells her proposal at the ‘Souk’)

In the afternoon, the MENA participants engaged in the “Proposal Souk” where they posted up their proposal and the rest of the audience would come by and listen to their proposal’s “sales pitch”. This great engaging activity got people on their feet after a long day of workshop. The end of Day 1 was left with high energy and prepared the delegates with open ears and eyes for the conference.


(Photos: ICTD conference – lunch hour ‘pow-wow’)

During the ICTD conference, the facilitators for the workshop planned debriefing sessions at lunch hour to discuss and analyzed the different papers being presented. This lunch time gathering brought the workshop participants together like a team and helped to build that trust and discussion which would follow for the next days after the conference and into the workshop conclusion.



ICTD2009 Proceedings Online:
http://www.qatar.cmu.edu/~yonina/ICTD2009Proceedings.pdf (warning 35mb)

The first conference was hosted in UC Berkeley and then it was followed with Bangalore.
The event boasted in presenting the best scholarly work on the use of ICTs for development, both in technical and social science areas. There were over 250 submissions to the conference and all papers underwent a double-blind peer-review process. One of the paper reviewers indicated uncertainty of the transparency of the review process. Also, the reviewer was unsure as to who decides the criteria for the review process. Some of the delegates felt that the conference had a bias towards American chosen presentations. There were 19 oral presentations, and 27 others for poster presentation to a more than 300 person audience. Several IDRC partners were presenting such as a demonstration booth hosted by e-Fez (Asmae and Driss).

Pam Zahonogo, RIA! Researcher from Burkina Faso, presented the RIA! poster and paper, Mobile Telephony Access and Usage in Africa, which has received some conference coverage from Eric Hersman’s popular website, White African. Beyond the conference, a quick search has found RIA! Recent household survey work being utilized and reference by numerous authors.

Young Researchers Workshop


One of the first workshops was the Young Researchers Workshop. The workshop drew in an exciting atmosphere of young up-and-coming PhD researchers working in all parts of the world. In their call for papers, the committee selected 12 papers (I posted them online here) to be presented at the workshop. Senior researchers were then part of a committee that gave feedback to the presentation. As it was one of the first workshops of the conference and the other workshop was postponed to a later time, the room was packed with audience members of over 70 persons. Each delegate had approximately five minutes to talk about the challenges of young researchers in the field of ICTD.

The presenters had backgrounds ranging from computer science, geography, social science and development. It was clear however, that some presenters did not necessarily feel these disciplines quite fit into the research work that they were engaged in. A majority of the discussion included cross-disciplinary and trans-disciplinary definitions of ICTD. Those under the discipline of Computer science were trying to re-align their actual discipline objectives – how to get the discipline to evaluate not just the computer programming aspect but also to evaluate the other external and internal factors of a research project in order for that computer program application within development to succeed! Some of the delegates included those from the University of Washington, who were working on with OpenMRS and D-Tree international, and Commcare, to the Royal Holloway University of London who were working on participatory model tools to conduct field research. Among the papers, 10 out of the 12 presentations were about work conducted in Africa. (The other two were in China and Albania.) Another disturbing reflection comes from Tim Unwin’s (one of the Senior Researcher Judges) blog reflection on the workshop: “the much academic discourse plays to the tunes of conductors who are not necessarily particularly interested in the needs of the poorest and most marginalized"

I feel that part of the reflection may have come from my paper (as well as others) to how we cannot remain in the status quo of the current engagement of women (and other marginalized groups) in ICT4D work. For a little taste of the Young Researchers Workshop, watch Paulo Brunello’s work.


In the afternoon, the remaining individuals (most of the audience disappeared to the other three sessions taking place) split up into groups and discussed some of our stories in ICTD. My favourite activity was ‘speed-dating’ where those who identified with the social science stayed in one line and then the computer scientist were in another line. Then we had 60 seconds to figure out how the social science could work with the computer science in a project together. All of the delegates wished there was more time to do this activity because only then was there creative brainstorming on how one could overcome those difficulties of a multi-disciplinary field.

That's all I really wanted to highlight from the conference, but here is Prof Heeks' comment on Bill Gates and ICTD, a short piece by Jonathan Donner and a little travel report by Stephane Boyera.

Of course, I made sure to sneak out to check out the Museum of Islamic Art (very amazing) and the souk waqif - must sees when in Doha (photos in kdiga's Flickr).

Recap on Business Plans from the Slums

“The role of business skill development in catalyzing dynamic economies and alleviating African urban poverty”
Green College, University of British Columbia

Yesterday, I returned to the old stomping ground of my university and business school, Sauder School of Business, to engage in a workshop discussing issues of social entrepreneurship and development in Africa. The workshop was a fundraiser for the Sauder Africa project Social Entrepreneurship 101. I have been following SE101 since 2007 when I first mentioned to Nancy Langton about the wonderful work of the Kimathi Information Centre and their full-spirited leader, Jose Ngunjiri. They continue to be partners in helping to train young entrepreneurs through a business planning course to this day.

I was quite unsure what to expect from the workshop besides listening to some experiences of work in Africa. My uncertainty then turned to a feeling of inspiration – I sat in this room and started to hear the thoughts of Canadians genuinely committed in the issues of development and business both at home and in Africa and beyond. The discussion was extremely engaging between the audience and speakers in trying to capture what makes a successful entrepreneur in the most dire of circumstances. Here is a little bit about the speaker’s discussions and how I related to their work.


Photo (left to right): Nancy, Dale, Stephen, Marcia, Joanna, Rob


Marcia Nozick, Executive Director of Eastside Movement for Business and Economic Renewal Society - EMBERS

Marcia, who has been working in community development since 2001, became involved in EMBERS mainly because she lives in the neighborhood. At the time, she was looking for ways to get involved with the marginalized in what is known as one of the poorest area codes in Canada, the downtown eastside (DTES). EMBERS is basically a business training for those in the DTES who are ready to start their lives fresh as an entrepreneur. She mentions a great deal of support (some for nearly 4-5 years) that is provided for nearly 135 of the new businesses. EMBERS provides a tremendous amount of resources in an attempt to help the businesses succeed such as the financing 3 to 1 program. For example, if the business raises at least $600, the organization matches another $1200 in order for the business to leverage the capital and grow. Of course, these business owners overcome major barriers (some without identification, can’t open bank account, navigating business regulation forms, etc).

It is just hard for me to imagine what Africa could be like if such abundant resources were available to entrepreneurs as they are here in Vancouver. While so geographically apart, many challenges are the same in attempting to develop a business from one’s bare hands.

Dale Albertson, Executive Director of African – Canadian Continuing Education Society

ACCES is simply providing education programs in Kenya. He approached the workshop less about his organization and more about some of the literature that has helped him understand micro-enterprise, mainly quoting work from Development in Practice journal. He asks what is the motivation for creating microenterprises in disadvantaged areas? The motivation is to provide one’s basic needs and dealing with lack of security. Thus in such mindset, most entrepreneurs have no thought as to what activities they wish to pursue. Instead they copy the businesses that are common around their community. Why? The individuals are extremely risk adverse; they are not interested in starting in a venture they know nothing about. The biggest question in their minds is how to make money in the least amount of time given the limited resources. Thus, the businesses gravitate towards those industries that already exist. He also states that less than two percent are products that are differentiated from those that currently exist. His last main point was that those with a vision tended to end with better futures and those with formal training had the better visions.

While I can understand the motivation reason mentioned by Dale, I also wonder whether there is some deeper disruption also taking place that keep people from having a totally new product in their community market. I wonder whether differentiating your product also brings animosity and jealousy to the community which some would rather avoid. I recall my time in Uganda when a farmer mentioned who some of them were attempting to grow a new product, apples as was demonstrated by the extension workers. The problem is that apples are expensive to grow with the cost of all the inputs compared to the other crops, so not all farmers could grow in it the area. Once a few farmers attempted to grow the apples, many would steal the apples or cause harm to the apple growers. Those growing apples had to ban together at night to protect the apples. Now I wonder if someone decided to go against a sign of solidarity (ie growing the same crops, selling the same goods, etc), do they always experience such negative reactions from their communities, thus avoid such confrontation? Such innovators have a tough barrier to overcome if this is true.

Rob Kozak – Researcher for Africa Forests Research Initiative on Conservation and Development - AFRICAD, Professor of Sustainable Business Management, UBC

Rob is a researcher who clearly wants to addresses the linkage between poverty and forestry in Africa through alternative forest tenure business models. He states that 90% of the rural poor are dependent on the forest (either for subsistence, housing, food, medicine, etc). A majority of the forest business utilizes the concession based export model where large tracts of land are sold to multi-national corporations. From such models, little wealth goes back to the communities in the forest and the communities usually have limited rights of land access. He asks the question what could these communities (particularly indigenous communities) do to formalize or legitimize a business in forestry, otherwise move out of the informal sector? He knows that direct finance and subsidies do not work so what is required are interventions with sound business principles. Since most of the small and medium size forest enterprise cannot compete with the MNCs, how can they sell to smaller niches or domestic markets? How do we enable business for these local business persons?

In his talk, he mentions attempting to assist the most marginalized in the forests of Congo, the pygmies. I had the chance to visit a group of pygmies at the edge of the Rwanda / Uganda border as well as those near Bwindi forests (best known for the endangered silverback gorillas). The pygmies have been pushed out of their homes in the forest, some for the reasons of conservation of endangered animal species. The communities were given no exit strategies to help them survive out of their usual hunter-gather societies. The people are extremely impoverished, many treated as unpaid workers on agriculture land (only fed a small meal a day), those disabled are left to beg from home to home or steal small potatoes when they can. It is actually one of the saddest situations to see and ask how they are forced to survive. Rob and his group have a huge weigh on their shoulders to attempt to gain some legitimate rights to land back to these indigenous people.

Joanna Buczkowska – Managing Director for UBC Centre for Sustainability and Social Innovation, Development Advisor for SAWA Global

Joanna mainly spoke from her work with SAWA in showcasing grassroot leaders in 50 of the poorest countries in the world. They are currently looking for innovative ways for these amazing individuals to show case their work (ie. Video) and how to mentor or connect these heroes to each other and the rest of the world. A major criteria that has helped their program to succeed is to ensure that the heroes are active partners in the dialogue of the program. I love the sprinkles of inspiration from their website and have a few names I would love to drop into that program for sure!

Stephen Nairne – Managing Director for Lundin for Africa

Stephen’s organization helps to provide social venture capital to organizations in Africa. They currently are working with eleven projects in nine countries. They attempt to scale businesses in West Africa as well as provide funds for technical assistance. He asks how to get businesses into the formal sector and become taxpayers. The process can take in some areas five to ten years. He mentions their support towards the Acumen Fund which generally invests capital in bottom of the pyramid institutions. I also like his keen interest in the growing area of mobile banking.

Overall, the event was well worth attending and look forward to hearing more about these organizations in the future.

Canada dead set on improving their development aid bucks

I’m back home in Vancouver and it has been a real treat to have time to myself. I get to finish up some reports long overdue, catch up with friends and family and catch up with Canadian news in international development. It looks like I came at the right time as the Minister of International Cooperation, Honourable Beverley J. Oda just announced the new Canadian strategy to international development – greater efficiency and greater focus.

Her speech was super straight forward and you know exactly what they want to do: 80% of resources towards 20 countries to increase food security, stimulate sustainable economic growth and secure the future of children and youth. Bam.

Other sidenotes include sending 15% of their Ottawa-based staff into the field and no more ‘tied aid’ – as in buying food aid in the local countries as opposed to using Canadian food and suppliers which costs up to 30% more! The Ministry is also adding a Democratic Promotion Agency – self-explanatory.

My thoughts – do it. The Ministry has only $2.1 billion to play with this year in aid, they are obviously responding to that terrible Senate report that on CIDA, Overcoming 40 Years of Failure, and we hope this criticism will shape them into a more effective agency.

While some of the criticism has already come through that this new strategy does not direct state its efforts towards poverty alleviation, the idea of increasing food security is absolutely directed at the poor. The workers at farms who are a majority women can help improve their livelihoods with improved inputs and technology for farming and hopefully see better healthy crops in the future.

I’m just stoked that Mozambique has remained as one of the priority countries!

Music in April

A few of my passions have been cropping up lately, much to my delight. 1) Good booty-shaking music. The Cape Town International Jazz Festival is coming up fast on April 3-4 and they have an insane line-up for the Saturday. A few of my favourites: Zaki Ibrahim (Canada), Napalma (Brazil), 340ml (Mozambique), Maceo Parker, Hugh Masekela and last but not least, MOS DEF! The decision to through down cash for a flight for this one day might be worth it!

When I get a chance, I like to flip over to CBC Radio 3, and Exclaim magazine websites to see what is going on back in the Canadian music scene. Lo and behold, a group that has grabbed my heart: Thunderheist! The Nigerian born, Canadian singing in this crew and the DJ have unleashed my inner soul of good dance, bass crunk, I can’t wait to get home and buy their album to be released March 31! It’s also ashame that they will be touring with Exclaim and they will be at the Biltmore on April 25… but at the same time as the Ski and Board Festival in Whistler… oh, how can I be in two places at the same time??? Oh and up on the hill, there is Metric (new album released April 14) and DJ Z-Trip on the 24 and 25 April. Too much good stuff at one time!

ICTs in Burkina and my Research

ICT Art in Burkina Faso

Still on the artist theme, shift to check out the mural work coming from Burkina Faso. I posted this one which has a computer user asking about finding a husband online. Yup. Penpals or mail order brides go online. I find it as a real reflection of how computers are starting to influence a few lives in West Africa.



As for ICTs on my front, I’ll be heading to the shindig, ICTD2009 conference in Doha mid April. There is this Young Researchers Workshop which should be fun, if you are hopefully looking for innovation gong show. I hope there is beer. Here’s my paper on my current work and the struggles of young African scholars in finding opportunities in collaboration.


ICTD Submission Final(2)

Publish at Scribd or explore others: Press Releases Other research africa

I also just submitted this short article about access to knowledge and gender to the genderIT.org website, will post if it ends up making the cut!

Besides the conference, I’m busy trying to sum up my research work on emergencies and ICTs in Ghana and Uganda. I’ve got my TAMs Analyzer qualitative tool working by my side. It just gets so tiring trying to get through the scripts and make sense out of it all. And especially when there is so much excitement coming up in April!

Happy International Womyns Day

I have never really celebrated it before but glad to acknowledge all the amazing women making it happen, in small ways or big ways. I am talking about the ladies who can break social norms and do what they want to do because it makes them happy and because they are creative passionate people.

Those are all my girls back in Vancouver, and those I have known throughout my stints to Europe (especially Belgium), Mozambique, Kenya, South Africa and beyond. And my mom, my grandma and girl cousins and nieces.

There is still a strong fight to give women the capabilities and chance to strive for their ideal job or ideal life. If things remain as it is, then we'll never see a world of non-violence and equality for all people. So even if you don't feel the pressure of inequality from where you are, know that it is still strong in other parts of the world, and we can always use your strength or words of support to know that you believe in a better world than what exists today.

fighting words for International Womyns Day (weekend).

Check out women and technology history:

wyatt, sally. 2008. Feminism, Technology and the Information Society: Learning from the past, imagining the future. Information, Communication and Sociey 11(1) - 111-130.

Within the article, it mentions Donna Haraway's 1985 "Manifesto for Cyborgs," -
"Taking responsibility for the social relations of science and technology means refusing an anti-science metaphysics, a demonology of technology, and so means embracing the skillful task of reconstructing the boundaries of daily life, in partial connection with others, in communication with all of our part" (1985, page 100) - Summary: Women's lives are intimately entwined with technologies.