Voice-based Citizen Journalism

Community radio stations in Africa are an essential, and often only, source of information for people living in rural regions. They serve as hubs of information, news-relaying, and knowledge-sharing in the community. However, due to poor infrastructure and the extended coverage of radio, the interaction between radio stations and their listeners, as well as with journalists in the field, is very difficult, generating delays and challenges in the delivery of timely information.

The recent increase in the mobile penetration rate in rural areas is now offering new opportunities to involve all members of the community in the life of their community radio, and increase the quality of the service as well as the value of the radio. The aim of this project is to exploit this new potential, and enable all members of the community, including those from the diaspora, to access and contribute to news and information on the radio. This project is based on new, innovative voice technologies that enable people with the simplest phone to access Web-based information, independently of their reading skills, their language or their education level. It also enables community radio stations to access and broadcast live content stored on the Web, without requiring computers or Internet connectivity.
 
This project is a joint initiative from the Web Foundation (Geneva, Switzerland), Vu University (Amsterdam, Netherlands), and Sahel Eco (Bamako, Mali).  

In more detail, the central goal of the project is to build a mobile-accessible voice news platform that enables:

1. Journalists to deliver and retrieve news from remote areas. Due to the possibility of access via low-end mobile phones, the platform will enable and integrate citizen journalism from the general public also from remote rural areas, since it allows people with local news or local knowledge to quickly deliver, retrieve and share information. As the platform is fully voice-service-based, it does not even require literacy - which further extends the potential circle of civil journalism.
2. Community radio stations to access and manage news delivered by journalists and citizens, and broadcast without being limited by physical distance or connectivity of news and information providers.
3. Individuals and organisations in rural areas to have access and contribute to news via more channels, through community radio stations, or by directly calling the voice news platform itself.
4. Enhanced opportunities for sharing knowledge across different geographically-distant rural communities concerning domains of shared interest (e.g. agricultural innovation knowledge with respect to farmer-managed natural regreening in the Sahel countries, an important area of current local and international collaboration).
5. Extended possibilities for interested people outside the rural localities (including family members working elsewhere, more broadly the diaspora) to have access and contribute to this news through the Web facilities provided by the voice news platform.

The project will have two major outcomes:

• a mobile-accessible Web service platform for voice news that is open-source available for anyone, has been validated in the field and will be replicable in any region of the world.
• an associated voice news service operating in Mali to validate the platform.

Contact

Name: Stephan Boyera
Email: boyera(at)webfoundation.org
Phone: +33 (0)6 73 84 87 27
Webpage : www.webfoundation.org