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BBC’s An African Journey with Jonathan Dimbleby (Part 2)

Jonathan Dimbleby’s enlightening 7000 mile journey across Africa has now moved on from Ghana, Nigeria and Mali to East Africa’s rift valley. Those who liked the first episode will find the second episode enthralling, engaging and more educative.

Starting in Ethiopia, where he was the first journalist to report on the 1973 famine, Dimbleby discovers that the country has made great strides in building early warning systems and food distribution networks to ensure the country never again goes through the horrifying 1973 famine. Using traditional and modern technology food producing areas in the country can now depend less on erratic rains.

Perhaps the most inspirational piece of this episode was a feature on SoleRebels, a company that provides jobs for 40 workers, cashing in on the need for recycled and eco products in the West. SoleRebel based in Addis Ababa, sells its products online through Amazon and a host of other online outlets. It is a pioneer which gives a tantalising taste and insight into the future of small scale African enterprises once internet connectivity across the continent takes hold.

In Kenya, Dimbleby discovers how mobile phones are revolutionising small businesses in Kibera (Kenya’s largest slum) and elsewhere. As Maasai Chief, Sammy K Tarukas brazenly put it “When I go to town I can communicate with my ladies, my wife”. Leaving the Chief’s ladies to one side, as important as I am sure they are to him, it goes without saying that the benefits of mobile phone proliferation has been immense especially in helping the Maasai exchange messages about where they could take their livestock to feed and locate water sources. As one of the Maasais stated in his rural abode, “Here we have no hospital or dispensary or any other clinic around, so when someone is bitten by a snake – you can telephone a Doctor; to get a motorbike here”.

Dimbleby, travelled onwards to Tanzania on a new highway built to connect East Africa and described the country as “peaceful, stable and widely regarded as a success story in Africa”. Street kids in Dar El Salam practicing with their recycled instruments provided some entertainment. In a fish market in Dar El salaam Dimbleby commented that “I see people facing new challenges but working as hard as they can to put food on their family’s table; it really is a fantastic experience”.

This was a rather engrossing episode that lived up to expectations.

Featuring mobile phone use in Kenya was a master stroke as arguably nothing else comes close to the impact of mobile phone use on African economies. That mobile phone use (mainly due to a non-existent land line infrastructure) is penetrating into rural areas and growing phenomenally across Africa is “old news”. According to the UN a couple of years ago “Mobile subscriptions in Africa rose from 54m to almost 350m between 2003 and 2008, the quickest growth in the world”.

The episode delved deeper, however, by touching on the real emerging story which revolves around the sophisticated use of mobile phone technology in Africa. Companies like M-PENSA (reputed to have over 7 million subscribers) have made it possible and common for Kenyans to send money via their phone (this is not yet common in the West). Other uses include access to the internet and by default the myriad of social networking sites that Africans are now linked into. Forward looking companies like Nokia as this recent post by WhiteAfrican.com illustrates are moving on from providing basic handsets to smart handsets that, will meet the technological needs of a more technological savvy user who wants a phone that does a lot more than make and receive calls. It was also, heartening to learn that Ethiopia, with a reputed annual economic growth rate of 8% and with its strong connections to the origins of coffee, now has a rather sophisticated electronic exchange system that handles 70% of the country’s coffee sales. Farmers now have to wait for only 24 hours after their produce is traded to get paid whilst international exchanges are updated instantly with trade prices.

This episode did show that “there’s much more besides famines, wars and safari parks” to Africa. In the final episode, to be shown soon, Jonathan Dimbleby travels from the Congo to Durban, South Africa. Watch this episode here.

Related Article: Part 1 of An African Journey with Jonathan Dimbleby

Nii Thompson