Mobile phones for good governance – scaling-up issues Johan Hellström World Bank Workshop on Mobile Innovations for Social and Economic Transformation: From Pilots to Scaled-up Implementation September 16, 2009

Johan Hellström UPGRAID what is good governance? relationships between three actors: state, market and civil society three main concepts:  state capability: the ability to get things done  accountability: institutionalised relationships  responsiveness: to act on identified needs and wants of the citizens (DFID, 2006)‏ role of information and communication

Johan Hellström UPGRAID why mobile phones? useful tool with huge potential  access  reach  adoption  interaction  costs  efficiency  no other option?

Johan Hellström UPGRAID what is m-governance? mobile phones for good governance  m-government interaction, reaction, action bottom up participation empowerment

Johan Hellström UPGRAID examples from East Africa government news / information updates law enforcement / safety employment services agriculture services health projects financial services crises management education services mobilisation, empowerment

Johan Hellström UPGRAID the Kampala riots 21 dead, 96 injured, +550 arrested radio stations closed down, TV shows censored, networks jammed, public transportation down asynchronous, biased information Twitter: #kampala (Ushahidi.com)‏ Government sending texts to reassure people?  "Dear Ugandans, our city is safe. Do not be intimidated or alarmed by hooligans. Today is a normal working day. For God and my Country"

Johan Hellström UPGRAID huge potential, but... why are there so many pilots and yet so few that have been scaled-up? why do many projects start from scratch instead of building on existing solutions? why are there many subscribers but yet so few users of existing applications?

Johan Hellström UPGRAID identified challenges infrastructure  limited network coverage, network quality, electricity issues funding and affordability  pricing sensitivity, innovative business models and billing plans, total cost of ownership content  creation, management and relevance

Johan Hellström UPGRAID identified challenges surrounding supporting systems  trouble shooting, capacity building, user uptake, language and literacy issues existence of an enabling environment  laws, policies, regulation other challenges  segmentation, market strategies  lack of documentation and collaboration

Johan Hellström UPGRAID policies and regulation in East Africa deregulated market fairly levelled playing field ICT policies and regulatory regimes are currently being harmonised in EA innovation ↔ regulation powerful operators customer care

Johan Hellström UPGRAID scaling-up definitions ”to efficiently increase the socioeconomic impact from small to a large scale of coverage” (World Bank/Hancock, 2003)‏ a process and an outcome scaling-up: (Jain and Brown, 2000)‏  expanding coverage and organisational size  increasing activities  broadening indirect impact  enhancing organisational sustainability

Johan Hellström UPGRAID vertical/horizontal regional/global  national  local  more  family/kin/  more communities neighbours communities

Johan Hellström UPGRAID 2 other approaches universalist: universal generalisations that can be replicated, directly expanded, or adopted elsewhere with a simple set of rules  examples? contextualist: tailor made to address context- specific conditions  examples?

Johan Hellström UPGRAID scaling up – success factors design phase  too many solutions looking for problems?  do the homework  end-user driven (needs)‏  fit into already existing patterns  consider open standards/content  involve right stakeholders from the start and use local capacity

Johan Hellström UPGRAID scaling up – success factors implementation phase  viable business model / predictable funding flows  involve end-users in content creation where applicable  educate the end-user  proper marketing  critical mass  time

Johan Hellström UPGRAID scaling up - conclusion design itself should have scale in mind don't be afraid of failures pilots  scaling-up? away from projects  a service delivery approach documentation is key

Johan Hellström UPGRAID finally... m-government  m-governance penetration  usage usage  impact scale  success

Thank you! Johan Hellström