Albert Abane

Youth, mobility and mobile phones in Africa: findings from a three-country study

The penetration of mobile phones into sub-Saharan Africa has occurred with amazing rapidity: for many young people, they now represent a very significant element of their daily life. This paper explores usage and perceived impacts among young people aged c. 9–18 years in three countries: Ghana, Malawi and South Africa. Our evidence comes from intensive qualitative research with young people, their parents, teachers and other key informants (in-depth interviews, focus groups and school essays) and a follow-up questionnaire survey administered to nearly 3000 young people in 24 study sites. The study was conducted in eight different sites in each country (i.e. urban, peri-urban, rural and remote rural sites in each of two agro-ecological zones), enabling comparison of experiences in diverse spatial contexts. The evidence, collected within a broader research study of child mobility, allows us to examine current patterns of usage among young people with particular attention to the way these are emerging in different locational contexts and to explore connections between young peoples phone usage, virtual and physical mobilities and broader implications for social change. The issues of gender and inter-generational relations are important elements in this account.

Where dogs, ghosts and lions roam: learning from mobile ethnographies on the journey from school

This paper draws on mobility research conducted with children in three countries: Ghana, Malawi and South Africa. It has two interlinked aims: to highlight the potential that mobile interviews can offer in research with young people, especially in research contexts where the main focus is on mobility and its impacts, and to contribute empirical evidence regarding the significance of everyday mobility to young peoples lives and future life chances in sub-Saharan Africa. During the pilot phase of our research project on children, transport and mobility, the authors undertook walks home from school with teenage children1 in four different research sites: three remote rural, one peri-urban. As the children walked (usually over a distance of around 5 km) their stories of home, of school and of the environment in-between, gradually unfolded. The lived experiences narrated during these journeys offer considerable insights into the daily lives, fears and hopes of the young people concerned, and present a range of issues for further research as our study extends into its main phase.

Mobility, education and livelihood trajectories for young people in rural Ghana: a gender perspective

This paper examines the gendered implications of Africas transport gap (the lack of cheap, regular and reliable transport) for young people in rural Ghana, with particular reference to the linkages between restricted mobility, household work demands, access to education and livelihood potential. Our aim is to show how mobility constraints, especially as these interact with household labour demands, restrict young peoples access to education and livelihood opportunities. Firstly, the paper considers the implications of the direct constraints on young peoples mobility potential as they travel to school. Then it examines young peoples (mostly unpaid) labour contributions, which are commonly crucial to family household production and reproduction, including those associated with the transport gap. This has especially important implications for girls, on whom the principal onus lies to help adult women carry the heavy burden of water, firewood, and agricultural products required for household use. Such work can impact significantly on their educational attendance and performance in school and thus has potential knock-on impacts for livelihoods. Distance from school, when coupled with a heavy workload at home will affect attendance, punctuality and performance at school: it may ultimately represent the tipping point resulting in a decision to withdraw from formal education. Moreover, the heavy burden of work and restricted mobility contributes to young peoples negative attitudes to agriculture and rural life and encourages urban migration. Drawing on research from rural case study sites in two regions of Ghana, we discuss ethnographic material from recent interviews with children and young people, their parents, teachers and other key informants, supported by information from an associated survey with children ca. 9–18 years.

Increasing children's participation in African transport planning : reflections on methodological issues in a child-centred research project.

This paper examines the potential for applying child-centred research methodologies which involve children doing their own research (with adult facilitators) within a transport and mobility context in West Africa. Relatively little attention has been paid to the transport needs of the poor and powerless within African transport policy and planning: the specifics of children and young peoples transport and mobility needs are essentially unknown and unconsidered. Using evidence from a small pilot study in Ghana, we reflect on both the opportunities and the challenges of work in this field. Although the paper is focused on the specific issues raised by child-centred research, it raises broader questions regarding the potential for research partnerships with vulnerable groups and, more specifically, the challenges of developing more collaborative research processes within transport studies, where technical priorities still regularly triumph over social concerns.

Out of the reach of children? Young people’s health-seeking practices and agency in Africa’s newly-emerging therapeutic landscapes

Despite a dominant view within Western biomedicine that children and medicines should be kept apart, a growing literature suggests that children and adolescents often take active roles in health-seeking. Here, we consider young peoples health-seeking practices in Ghana: a country with a rapidly-changing therapeutic landscape, characterised by the recent introduction of a National Health Insurance Scheme, mass advertising of medicines, and increased use of mobile phones. Qualitative and quantitative data are presented from eight field-sites in urban and rural Ghana, including 131 individual interviews, focus groups, plus a questionnaire survey of 1005 8-to-18-year-olds. The data show that many young people in Ghana play a major role in seeking healthcare for themselves and others. Young peoples ability to secure effective healthcare is often constrained by their limited access to social, economic and cultural resources and information; however, many interviewees actively generated, developed and consolidated such resources in their quest for healthcare. Health insurance and the growth of telecommunications and advertising present new opportunities and challenges for young peoples health-seeking practices. We argue that policy should take young peoples medical realities as a starting point for interventions to facilitate safe and effective health-seeking.

Health impacts of pedestrian head-loading: A review of the evidence with particular reference to women and children in sub-Saharan Africa

Across sub-Saharan Africa, women and children play major roles as pedestrian load-transporters, in the widespread absence of basic sanitation services, electricity and affordable/reliable motorised transport. The majority of loads, including water and firewood for domestic purposes, are carried on the head. Load-carrying has implications not only for school attendance and performance, womens time budgets and gender relations, but arguably also for health and well-being. We report findings from a comprehensive review of relevant literature, undertaken June-September 2012, focussing particularly on biomechanics, maternal health, and the psycho-social impacts of load-carrying; we also draw from our own research. Key knowledge gaps and areas for future research are highlighted.

Taking the long view : temporal considerations in the ethics of children's research activity and knowledge production.

Children are increasingly engaged in the research process as generators of knowledge, but little is known about the impacts on childrens lives, especially in the longer term. As part of a study on childrens mobility in Ghana, Malawi and South Africa, 70 child researchers received training to conduct peer research in their own communities. Evaluations at the time of the project suggested largely positive impacts on the child researchers: increased confidence, acquisition of useful skills and expanded social networks; however, in some cases, these were tempered with concerns about the effect on schoolwork. In the follow-up interviews 2 years later, several young Ghanaian researchers reported tangible benefits from the research activity for academic work and seeking employment, while negative impacts were largely forgotten. This study highlights the unforeseeable consequences of research participation on childrens lives as they unfold in unpredictable ways and underscores the temporal nature of childrens engagement in research.

Who bears the cost of ‘informal mhealth’? Health-workers’ mobile phone practices and associated political-moral economies of care in Ghana and Malawi

Africa’s recent communications ‘revolution’ has generated optimism that using mobile phones for health (mhealth) can help bridge healthcare gaps, particularly for rural, hard-to-reach populations. However, while scale-up of mhealth pilots remains limited, health-workers across the continent possess mobile phones. This article draws on interviews from Ghana and Malawi to ask whether/how health-workers are using their phones informally and with what consequences. Health-workers were found to use personal mobile phones for a wide range of purposes: obtaining help in emergencies; communicating with patients/colleagues; facilitating community-based care, patient monitoring and medication adherence; obtaining clinical advice/information and managing logistics. However, the costs were being borne by the health-workers themselves, particularly by those at the lower echelons, in rural communities, often on minimal stipends/salaries, who are required to ‘care’ even at substantial personal cost. Although there is significant potential for ‘informal mhealth’ to improve (rural) healthcare, there is a risk that the associated moral and political economies of care will reinforce existing socioeconomic and geographic inequalities.

Beyond the School and Working Day: Building Connections Through Play, Leisure, Worship and Other Social Contact

This chapter explores the everyday mobility of pre-pubescent children and older teenagers outside of school and work arenas. Life beyond formal education and work is crucial not only to young people’s health, well-being and happiness of and in the moment, but will contribute to shaping their identity in the long term, not least through the construction of social networks (and associated creation of social capital). Rural and urban recreational activities are compared across diverse sites. Discussion then moves beyond physical mobility to the implications of increasing access to mobile phones as a new element that can leapfrog and thus mediate distance, with potentially significant impacts on social contact patterns. A final section reflects on mobility associated with participation in religious worship and related activities. Gender issues (and associated permissions and restrictions) form a persistent theme through the chapter.

Introduction: Children, Young People and the ‘Mobilities Turn’ in Sub-Saharan Africa

This introductory chapter describes the research gap that existed regarding young people’s everyday mobilities and immobilities in sub-Saharan Africa prior to the field studies on which this book is based. It introduces key issues and concepts that are central to ensuing discussions on this theme, setting the work within the context of the ‘new mobilities paradigm’, the politics of mobility and the conceptual and methodological significance of walking for this study. The crucial importance of age, gender and relationality as shapers of young people’s agency is highlighted in subsequent sections. The chapter concludes with a note on authorship, since the book builds from field research on young people’s mobility in a number of different projects (mostly conducted in urban and rural sites in Nigeria, Ghana, Malawi and South Africa but also informed by wider field experiences elsewhere in the continent).