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Razak's Story

Let's take a look at the Infone process from the point of view of a real person who might participate. This is Razak Issa. He owns a general store in the town of Ngabu in the district of Chikwawa in Malawi.

In many ways, Razak is at the center of his local social network. He employees a number of men and women from his village in his store and he frequently helps the poorest among these find housing on his own property. He has had contact with outside aid volunteers from the PeaceCorps and other organizations some of whom have become his friends.

Even though Razak is relatively wealthy for his village, he still experiences low connectivity with the outside world. His access to email is infrequent and he has to travel half a day to charge his cell phone, which is not always topped up.

Now imagine that an Infone volunteer visits Ngabu and convinces Razak to sign up for the service. He's won over by the chance to get free phone credits, allowing him to keep in touch with some relatives who moved away.

Once he's signed up, Razak starts to receive a steady stream of questions from infone. First, on Monday: Is the road to your village passable? The road is in pretty good shape so, Razak writes back: yes. A few minutes later, his cell carrier, Zain Malawi, notifies him that infone has transferred some credit into his account.

A few days later, another question arrives: Is there any standing water near your house? There's an old trench in the village that always fills up when it rains, so Razak writes back: yes. And again receives some credit via Zain Malawi.

And, a little later, another question: Are there more mosquitos than normal? Razak writes back: no and again receives the credit.

Now that we've seen the process from Razak's point of view, let's take a look at the part of Infone that he doesn't see. Click here to read more about the Infone process.