Cellular growth

Christian Century, June 12, 2007

CELLULAR GROWTH: The Financial Times estimates that fewer than 1 percent of African households have landline telephones. Yet cell phone usage is growing rapidly on that continent: there were about 63 million cell phone users in 2003 but 155 million in 2006. In Africa as elsewhere, cell phones can be used for nefarious reasons: for instance, in Nigeria they are used to intimidate political candidates and voters.

But cell phones are also being used in a World Bank-financed program to integrate ex-combatants into society after the end of the end of the conflict in the Congo. And they are being used to track and control the spread of HIV/AIDS. It is estimated that a developing country's GDP can increase by 0.6 percent when cell phone usage goes up 10 percent (Current History, May).