Wednesday, October 04, 2006
"The business has spoil"
"Right now the business has spoil," "the business has gone down" - recurring phrases as I talk to mobile payphone operators, mobile phone vendors and prepaid card vendors around Accra.
Why has the business "spoil"? Mainly because of a saturation of entrepreneurs and small-scale companies offering these products and services. And in the case of the payphone operators, also because of the introduction of the unit transfer system, which means fewer people choose to use the payphone to make calls preferring instead to transfer micro units to their phones.
What this tells me is that in Accra at least, the people who were using the Space to Space service when it was at its peak, were mostly mobile phone owners, or became owners somewhere along the line. Non-owners are so few (or make so few calls) relative to owners, that the exodus of those who have their own mobile phones from the Space to Space economy has been greatly felt by operators.
The unit transfer SIM cards have practically become a black market item and so most payphone operators cannot take advantage of this latest trend to provide the unit transfer service as well. Not necessarily a bad thing at this point in time? The mobile phone companies that have this system may be trying to keep their networks from becoming any more congested than they already are - one company in particular has a big problem in this area...
Tuesday, September 19, 2006
Mobile phone companies don't like to talk?
At last! Two interviews with mobile phone company officials last week, and a third one coming up later today. The fourth company - which is the one I actually need the most - is proving to be a very slippery customer. I've tried three different routes to get a foot in, and am still trying...
Thursday, August 31, 2006
Apemanim
The village I visited over the weekend seems an adequate choice for a rural research site. It's a good example of a community living at the margins of the electronic information society.
Apemanim is a small village in the Ashanti region of Ghana, about 280 kilometers away from Accra. Leaving Accra at about 4am, it took us nearly 6 hours to drive there (including a stop for breakfast at a guest house in Kumasi, where the menu included English breakfast and Continental breakfast, but no Ghanaian breakfast!). You can also get there by flying from Accra to Kumasi and then taking a car from Kejetia to the village. It is about 20 kilometers away from Kumasi, the last 6 km stretch being a rather bumpy, untarred road that runs right up to and through the village. From conversations I overheard during my visit, the state of the road is a matter of concern for the people for a number of reasons, some of which are that few public transportation vehicles frequent that route, and large trucks winning sand nearby also cause further damage to the road. During the 6km drive I counted 7 space-to-space outfits, including one at Apemanim. Most of them, however, were clustered within the first 2 km or so.
The population is about 300 and small-scale farming is their major occupation (mainly tomatoes, pepper and garden eggs). There are about 50 dwelling structures, some built with cement blocks, others a mixture of clay and sand. According to the chief of the village, although Apemanim is physically close to Kumasi, the capital city, it is “incredibly far away” in terms of living standards. He considers his community and its people to be poor, although the precise poverty level is yet to be ascertained. His development priorities are education and job creation.
Utilities and infrastructure in the village are basic.
Electricity: The community has access to electricity, although not all homes are connected – e.g. some tap power from other houses.
Water: There is no running water in homes. The village has water via borehole.
Education: There is a primary school and kindergarten. Most children of school-going age do attend.
Telecommunications: there are no fixed lines. Due to Apemanim's closeness to Kumasi, the signals of most of the mobile phone companies can be received. But only a handful of people own mobile phones - our preliminary estimate is about five (practically all relatively high ranking members of the community). There are two Space-to-Space operators.
Broadcasting: The queenmother may be the only one who has a TV set. By far the most widely used electronic media is the radio, which most residents have.
Print media: There is no print media presence in the village. For newspapers one has to go into Kumasi.
Postal services: There is no post office here. Residents have to go to Kumasi for postal services.
During my visit I met the chief, the queenmother and some of the residents, and also took a walk around some parts of the village. I briefly met one of the families who offer a mobile payphone service. All seemed quite willing to talk with me when I return for a longer stay.
Apemanim is a small village in the Ashanti region of Ghana, about 280 kilometers away from Accra. Leaving Accra at about 4am, it took us nearly 6 hours to drive there (including a stop for breakfast at a guest house in Kumasi, where the menu included English breakfast and Continental breakfast, but no Ghanaian breakfast!). You can also get there by flying from Accra to Kumasi and then taking a car from Kejetia to the village. It is about 20 kilometers away from Kumasi, the last 6 km stretch being a rather bumpy, untarred road that runs right up to and through the village. From conversations I overheard during my visit, the state of the road is a matter of concern for the people for a number of reasons, some of which are that few public transportation vehicles frequent that route, and large trucks winning sand nearby also cause further damage to the road. During the 6km drive I counted 7 space-to-space outfits, including one at Apemanim. Most of them, however, were clustered within the first 2 km or so.
The population is about 300 and small-scale farming is their major occupation (mainly tomatoes, pepper and garden eggs). There are about 50 dwelling structures, some built with cement blocks, others a mixture of clay and sand. According to the chief of the village, although Apemanim is physically close to Kumasi, the capital city, it is “incredibly far away” in terms of living standards. He considers his community and its people to be poor, although the precise poverty level is yet to be ascertained. His development priorities are education and job creation.
Utilities and infrastructure in the village are basic.
Electricity: The community has access to electricity, although not all homes are connected – e.g. some tap power from other houses.
Water: There is no running water in homes. The village has water via borehole.
Education: There is a primary school and kindergarten. Most children of school-going age do attend.
Telecommunications: there are no fixed lines. Due to Apemanim's closeness to Kumasi, the signals of most of the mobile phone companies can be received. But only a handful of people own mobile phones - our preliminary estimate is about five (practically all relatively high ranking members of the community). There are two Space-to-Space operators.
Broadcasting: The queenmother may be the only one who has a TV set. By far the most widely used electronic media is the radio, which most residents have.
Print media: There is no print media presence in the village. For newspapers one has to go into Kumasi.
Postal services: There is no post office here. Residents have to go to Kumasi for postal services.
During my visit I met the chief, the queenmother and some of the residents, and also took a walk around some parts of the village. I briefly met one of the families who offer a mobile payphone service. All seemed quite willing to talk with me when I return for a longer stay.
Thursday, August 24, 2006
Activity Report
I've conducted six interviews so far, ranging from about 8 minutes to one hour:
Two with management of one of the largest and oldest mobile phone sales companies in Ghana;
One with a mobile phone accessories vendor who works by the roadside;
One with a vendor dealing in mobile payphone setup materials; and
Two with a mobile payphone operator (part of an on-going interaction with this operator).
The interviews with the payphone operator and the vendor of the setup materials included sitting with them for up to one hour to observe them at work.
My efforts to get an interview with an officer at another of the larger mobile phone sales companies were met with a bit of frustration, but I figure I can get the information from other sources anyway so I’ve dropped that one for now. I've already made contact with an individual, a white-collar worker who also deals in mobile phones, and an interview is in the works.
In addition:
- from hanging out with the mobile payphone operator, I have two people (both men) who have agreed to be contacted by me later to be interviewed as mobile payphone users. One of them works at a department store, the other owns a shop selling beverages (alcoholic beverages, I believe).
- an operator at one of the institutionalized mobile payphone services on a university campus has agreed both to be interviewed and to have me sit at the payphone location to observe activities.
- I have made initial contact with officials at three of the mobile phone companies. I'm working on the fourth one. I had an interview scheduled with a manager at one of these companies last week but we've had to reschedule for early September.
- I have an appointment next week with an informant - a former employee of one of the mobile phone companies.
- I've had several informal discussions with friends, acquaintances, taxi drivers, payphone operators, etc. in Accra and Tema about their use of mobile phones.
- I am paying a preliminary visit to a small village in the Ashanti region this weekend (Saturday, August 26) to assess its potential as a rural research site. More on that when I return…
Two with management of one of the largest and oldest mobile phone sales companies in Ghana;
One with a mobile phone accessories vendor who works by the roadside;
One with a vendor dealing in mobile payphone setup materials; and
Two with a mobile payphone operator (part of an on-going interaction with this operator).
The interviews with the payphone operator and the vendor of the setup materials included sitting with them for up to one hour to observe them at work.
My efforts to get an interview with an officer at another of the larger mobile phone sales companies were met with a bit of frustration, but I figure I can get the information from other sources anyway so I’ve dropped that one for now. I've already made contact with an individual, a white-collar worker who also deals in mobile phones, and an interview is in the works.
In addition:
- from hanging out with the mobile payphone operator, I have two people (both men) who have agreed to be contacted by me later to be interviewed as mobile payphone users. One of them works at a department store, the other owns a shop selling beverages (alcoholic beverages, I believe).
- an operator at one of the institutionalized mobile payphone services on a university campus has agreed both to be interviewed and to have me sit at the payphone location to observe activities.
- I have made initial contact with officials at three of the mobile phone companies. I'm working on the fourth one. I had an interview scheduled with a manager at one of these companies last week but we've had to reschedule for early September.
- I have an appointment next week with an informant - a former employee of one of the mobile phone companies.
- I've had several informal discussions with friends, acquaintances, taxi drivers, payphone operators, etc. in Accra and Tema about their use of mobile phones.
- I am paying a preliminary visit to a small village in the Ashanti region this weekend (Saturday, August 26) to assess its potential as a rural research site. More on that when I return…
Thursday, July 27, 2006
Preliminary observations
It's almost five weeks since I started fieldwork proper in Ghana. So far, I've done a lot of walking, mainly around the Osu, Cantonments, and Accra-Circle areas to observe mobile payphone operators in the urban setting. It is not entirely accurate to refer to them as "Space-to-Space" operators anymore since they not only offer connection to different networks, but Areeba and OneTouch have also introduced corporate versions (iTel 'pop' for Areeba, and One4All for OneTouch). I'm yet to find out exactly how the corporate versions work - I have an interview with an official of OneTouch next week, which should be enlightening. I also have a couple of interviews lined up with companies that sell mobile phones and accessories. The original plan was to have just two interviews with major equipment vendors but seeing the large number of one-person mobile phone sellers with their little displays all around town, I think I should add a couple of those too. I'm looking around Tema as well, simply because I live there.
There's a lot of activity in the market - handset and SIM card prices are falling, call charges are falling, free in-network calling has been introduced (though mainly available only between midnight and dawn!), competition is intense... Subscribers can purchase small amounts of prepaid units via "vouchers" rather than prepaid cards if they cannot afford the full value of a prepaid card. Mobile to mobile unit transfers seem to be overtaking, even threatening to displace mobile payphones - several operators are offering this service on its own, or in addition to the mobile payphone service. In fact, at first glance, use of mobile payphones in the areas I've seen so far seems rather low. More on how that's working out after some interiews. What is quite interesting to me though, is the development of a new industry around the production and sale of materials and tools for the mobile payphone and unit transfer system. One of the areas of concentration of this industry is close to the Circle Neoplan station. Several young men can be seen making and/or displaying items such as box stands branded with variations of the "Space-to-Space" label, umbrellas, banners advertising services and price lists, and clock timers, practically everything except the phone itself.
Fieldwork begins
Sporadic updates on my dissertation project will feature here...
