Recently I have come across some resources about the broad-based impact of access to ICTs on the welfare of people in Uganda. The materials below demonstrate not so much the use and development of mobile (or electronic) market services, but they demonstrate the general point about the impact of communication on businesses and individual livelihoods in Uganda. So, do have a look at the video! It shows the users of the telecentres in Nakaseke and Kasambya. Nakaseke is a larger and economically more active community with a busy marketplace, while Kasambya is a rural location. The video shows Margaret Nawoga, a farmer who grows plantain, coffee and vegetables and uses the telecentre for access to cultivation literature. The video also shows the proprietor of a small harware and bicycle repair business who uses the fax, photocopying and telephone facilities in the Nakaseke telecentre in order to arrange the purchase and delivery of spare bicycle parts. The video has been available since Feb 2007 so the information is hardly up-to-date. Do you have information about Uganda along similar lines? Please, do share it.

Demonstrating the same general point in a much more rigorous way is an article by Megumi Muto. It analyses the effect of the expansion of mobile phone networks in Uganda on market participation.  The work uses survey data collected in 2003 and 2005 from 856 households in 94 communities. The study compares the effects of the increased access to mobile networks on the marketing of maize and of bananas.  Megumi Muto establishes that the proportion of banana farmers who sell their produce, rather than consume it themselves, raised from 50% in 2003 to 69% in 2005. By contrast, the marketing of maize as opposed to its subsistance use did not change over the same period. The difference in the impact of mobile phone network expansion on the marketing of maize and banana is explained by the perishable nature of the banana products. As mobile phone coverage increased from 2003 to 2005, the sensitivity of the price of bananas to information was reduced, thereby reducing the price differential between farm-gate and market prices for bananas. Below is a map showing the progress of mobile phone coverage in Uganda between 2003 and 2005.