| dc.description.abstract | This study explores the ways in which women entrepreneurs in Kenya can harness the competitive advantages of ICTs to grow and sustain their businesses. The study focuses on the extent to which women entrepreneurs in Butere Constituency in Kakamega County utilize the information services provided through the mobile phone to transact their business activities. The findings in this study are therefore crucial to the body of knowledge on programmes that seek to uplift women's lives through the deployment of appropriate ICTs. This is informed by the realization that the current policies and ICT sector practices have not been significantly oriented towards the use of mobile phones in women entrepreneurship.
Literature from various sources (both print and electronic) was reviewed to provide the requisite background information and entering behavior into the actual aspects of the study. The scrutiny of the literature and analysis of the quantitative and qualitative data obtained during the study arrived at answers to the following research questions:
· What are the information needs of women entrepreneurs in rural Kenya?
· How are women entrepreneurs and women self-help groups using mobile phones in their micro enterprises?
· How has this changed the way women do business and what are the implications of the changes?
· What are the challenges and barriers facing women's access to/use of the mobile phone in their quest to achieve sustainable micro enterprises?
· How can the mobile phone be enhanced as a tool to meet the information needs of the women entrepreneurs and women self-help groups? Questionnaires were administered to 36 women entrepreneurs sampled and a multi-stage sampling technique was used to draw samples from each of the 8 Locations in Butere Constituency. The population was divided into clusters at the Location administrative level and in each cluster, samples were drawn using both probability and non-probability sampling. Women entrepreneurs were identified and selected through a combination of both purposive and snow ball technique.
The findings of the investigation revealed that mobile phones have the potential to increase the participation of women in mainstream economic activities by providing timely and relevant information services that meet the information needs of the women entrepreneurs. The mobile phone provides a useful means of communication that allows women from diverse backgrounds to communicate easily for both business and social purposes. Accordingly, policy makers at the local and national levels in Kenya need to probe further the potential of using the mobile phone and other similar ICTs to empower small scale business women at the grassroots levels.
The results of this study further demonstrate that, in spite the envisaged potential of the mobile phone in business growth, the communication needs of the women are not currently adequately met. The main challenges identified are high costs of the mobile phone handsets, inadequate mobile network coverage and a dearth of local content as part of the service provided through the mobile phones. Information strategies specifically recommended by this study for business women include providing a collection of materials on a wide range of information, specifically in their local language and at a neo-literate reading level, a manual directory of local services made easily available to them, and a female manager for the information center.
The mobile phone platform can then be integrated in the centre activities to provide these information services to the women in the communities on their mobile phones without necessarily having them to travel to the information centers. Those promoting and making policies for mobile phones must understand that these new technologies create problems as well as solutions. These problems must be recognized if they are to be addressed and one of the recommended approaches is to involve the women, through their leaders, in all decision making processes especially on issues affecting them in the communities Among other things, this will require much greater gender awareness in policies and projects which, fortunately, the newly promulgated Constitution of Kenya has given adequate gender considerations.
There are a number of organizations and consortia in various countries that focus on open source mobile applications of soda development 'The Kenya government, in partnership with mobile phone operators and other leT stakeholders, should introduce a program that will foster the development of open source mobile applications concomitant to the diverse socio-economic information needs of rural communities. The applications should also be tailored to meet the business information needs of women entrepreneurs in rural communities.
The leT sector is recognized as one of the flagship projects in the foundations of the socio-economic transformation necessary for the realization of the vision 2030 in Kenya. The mobile phone has emerged as a powerful tool for women empowered as evidenced in this study. It is therefore recommended that, when implementing the leT strategy in the Vision 2030, due consideration should be given to the role of the mobile phone as an leT platform for intermediate and long term development of women enterprises. This is the surest way to alleviate poverty because women represent the family unit and empowering a woman is developing the society since the woman has traditionally epitomized the family welfare. | en_US |
