Mobile phones have a significant influence in remote places and cities in Africa, even though their penetration is recent, unlike in other continents.
Since its introduction in the 2000s in Africa, it has become more rampant and has had a significant effect on the population’s daily lives. Before the advent of mobile phones, communications were both problematic and expensive.
Africans use their mobile phones mainly for communication and making mobile transactions. Some others use it to fill up their spare time, while others have it handy in emergencies.
Let’s look at why mobile phones are the most in use medium of communication in Africa.
1. Effectiveness and Time
Mobile phones provide a convenience that every user enjoys. While on the go, you can save a lot of time while communicating with anyone across the globe.
Social media and other platforms allow the users to multi-task. You can send voice notes, make video calls, and send pictures and documents simultaneously.
Most African users are pre-paid subscribers, and this very idea is the breakthrough of the use of mobile phones for communication.
Users of mobile phones, who are more often than not persons with irregular income, can afford to subscribe and communicate according to their reach.
2. Steady Connection
Whether the time of the day or part of the world you want to reach out to, your mobile phone allows you to connect to people constantly.
The ease at which you can send messages, receive calls, chat on social media, among other functions with a single tool, makes Africans stick to and enjoy their mobile phones.
3. Social Media Applications
The availability of a lot of social networking sites and apps glues Africans to their mobile phones. These mediums like Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, Instagram, and more, allow people to make friends from all parts of the world.
Africans, among others, can easily make and keep memories and sustain relationships that were not so in the past.
4. Accessibility to Vast Resources
With your cell phone, you can access a limitless amount of information no matter the subject area, such as education, agriculture, and entertainment.
For instance, you can be in Ghana, study, and attain a degree from a University in Europe. The thousands of resources can be helpful in all areas of your endeavor.
5. Mobile Transactions
Most Africans own one or two businesses, and it can be risky to carry bulk cash around. The introduction of mobile phones through mobile transfers has been helpful to companies.
People can sell and buy goods while they make online payments. Mobile transactions are convenient and have been helpful while African countries try to solve problems of insecurity.
Africans use mobile banking platforms to pay their bills, make purchases, and even send money to relatives abroad.
6. Catastrophe Management
In recent years, mobile phones have aided the spread and report of catastrophes across the world. People easily communicate and send support to these areas while they watch events unfold.
It is also possible to receive warnings before disasters occur, giving people time to get ready and even go away. Facebook, for instance, has a safety check that allows you to indicate that you are safe in the course of disasters.
The swiftness at which relief materials get to the survivors and how survivors locate their loved ones has improved – all thanks to mobile phones.
7. News Broadcasting
Any mobile phones owner is a potential news reporter. Someone in Uganda can easily report and broadcast live events that can be seen anywhere in the world.
A smartphone allows users to capture and video any newsworthy event even in their remote villages in Africa and make it seen globally.
8. Social Change
Mobile phones encourage social changes and revolutions as people can effortlessly come together to hold up a universal cause.
Just in 2011, for instance, insurgents in Libya and Egypt made massive revolutions with their mobile phones aided by social media.
In Libya, networking on social media was the reason for subduing Moammar Gadhafi. In Egypt, however, the downfall of Hosni Mubarak was because of the use of mobile phones.
9. Medical Care
Since the advent of mobile phones in Africa, the healthcare system has improved. People get quality medical care even in remote areas.
In Uganda, health practitioners use mobile phones to manage the outbreak of typhoid. Healthcare workers collect data, provide guidelines for treatment, among other information they spread across to the public.
Mobile phone breaks the gap between classes of people as it provides information that can be accessed by the rich and the poor to take care of their health.
10. Business Strategy
Mobile phones have a significant influence on the way that companies carry out their businesses. Now, business persons in Africa smile home with a lot of money, accomplishing more with less stress.
Their customer list now expands to people they have had physical contact with and others they only met online in different countries.
With digital marketing and e-commerce platforms, people can grow their businesses and buy whatever they need with ease.
How is a mobile phone helpful in communication?
The mobile phone has been a helpful medium of communication because it all people to interact easily from any distance. With a mobile phone, one can easily send or receive calls, text messages, and emails.
Why are smartphones more effective in communication?
Smartphones provide an instant and effective means by which people communicate with others around the world without breaking the bank.
With internet access, one can use any Smartphone to send or receive information from friends and family no matter their location; shop online and have the goods at the doorpost, do online baking without having to visit the bank, and so much more.
Is the phone a medium of communication?
Ultimately, yes, the phone is a crucial means of communication in today’s world. It quickens the way people make calls, send and receive messages.
How are cell phones used in Africa?
Youths and adults alike in Africa use mobile phones for various things ranging from social media chatting, being in touch with loved ones, financial services, listening to the radio, shopping online, and lots more.
Conclusion
Mobile phones have reformed communication in both awful and good ways. It is, however, the responsibility of us, the users, to decide how we use it.
Africans can now communicate to anyone at any time in any part of the world. All thanks to mobile phones, and most persons depend on them to keep up their social life.
