Mobile Phones, Livelihoods and the Poor in Sub‐Saharan Africa: Review and Prospect
Gina Porter · Geography Compass · 2012
Abstract This review paper focuses on the potential of widespread access to mobile phones for improving the lives of poor people: the opportunities that mobile phones have already provided, or may soon present, for enhancing their material well‐being. Following a broad review of the diffusion of mobile phones across Africa, discussion is restricted principally to one key issue, livelihoods, due to space constraints. Attention is paid to the linkages between virtual and physical mobility throughout the paper and the final section reflects specifically on possible interactions between expanded virtual mobility and sustainable transportation in the continent, an issue of considerable significance for future development potential in our increasingly carbon‐constrained world.