Tiba$\eta$sim: Information Access for Low-Resource Environments

Abstract

In Africa, and other places around the world, there are numerous people who do not have access to information from the World Wide Web or other digital sources. This is not an issue of infrastructure only, but also of cultural and social factors, including low literacy. Most rural communities in the Northern Region of Ghana fall in this category, where information in written form and/or English is not accessible due to the inability of majority of community members to read and write. This paper presents Tiba$\eta$sim (originally “RadioNet”); a case-study of an appropriate ICT4D methodology in the development of an information delivery system hosted in low-resource areas, with empirical data from context analysis from the rural communities and other stakeholders. The paper also presents an evaluation of the system and the methodology, by way of User Evaluation and System Monitoring. The paper also shows how contextual issues are catered for through the methodology used. Tiba$\eta$sim focuses on available technologies and appropriate information formats by providing a system that relies on GSM and FM Radio, in the local language(s) of the community. Tiba$\eta$sim was deployed in 5 rural communities, reaching a total of almost 1000 people, providing them primarily farming-related information.