FrontlineSMS at 7: Rite FM, Ghana

FrontlineSMS is coming up to 7 years old in October 2012 - seven years ago, our Founder Ken Banks made the first, prototype version available for download. We're celebrating this milestone by highlighting the people we work for - our wonderful users. That's you, folks. See a slideshow of our users showing off their work here.

To kick us off, our FrontlineSMS:Radio Project Manager, Amy O'Donnell, highlights one of the many radio stations using FrontlineSMS - Rite FM, in Ghana. You'll hear more from our team, including Ken, in the next four weeks, as we highlight more of the incredible work done by people using FrontlineSMS around the world.

Amy writes:

RiteFm: We Promote Agric & Social Development in celebration of FrontlineSMS 7th birthday... send in your photo with what you use FrontlineSMS for.

Rite 90.1 FM is a radio station in Ghana which focuses on agriculture and social development to inform and educate local farmers. They take the lead from their audience, using SMS, and make sure their shows are responsive and relevant to their community. This use case, for me, also shows how SMS participation empowers communities to seek information vital to their livelihoods.

The catchment area of Rite FM is diverse, with both rural and urban populations in the Eastern Region each having  their own unique challenges, so it's important to make sure programming is participatory and responds to local needs. This is why presenters, including Ike Obufio (photo above) use FrontlineSMS to encourage listeners to share their farming experiences via SMS. The audience are invited to text in their opinion to polls on the major causes of food insecurity or add their voices to debates on industrialized farming techniques and genetically modified foods.

Using SMS allows Rite FM to dramatically increase the number of people who can contribute -  there is high mobile penetration in Ghana and because SMS is digital there's virtually no limit to the number of votes in a poll, for example. One of the presenters, Asamoah, believes offering options in communication channels is very powerful. He says; “If you stick to only phone-in, you can’t progress. You can’t reach out to everybody."  SMS also adds flexibility to incorporate free-form comments fluidly -  as he points out: “Even when I’ve not gone on air, I can respond to you.”

You can get involved too:

Starting today, we're collecting photos of our users telling the world how they use FrontlineSMS. If you want to get in on the act, take a photo of yourself or your team holding a piece of paper or a whiteboard telling the world what you do with FrontlineSMS. For example: 'I monitor elections', 'I safeguard children' or 'I make art'. You can see a slideshow of the photos we've had so far on our Flickr page.

It doesn't matter what language it's in as long as it's legible and if possible you should be able to see from the photo where it was taken, so, if you can, get out of the office!

You can: - post to Twitter or Instagram with the hashtag #FrontlineSMSat7 - email the picture and we'll post them - post the picture on our Ning network and we'll post them - post them on Flickr or any other web service and let us know where they are

FrontlineSMS:Radio adds an Exciting Tool to the Mix at Rite FM, Ghana

As we continue to follow the progress of radio stations taking part in the trial of FrontlineSMS:Radio, Tully McLoughlin offers an update from a radio station from Ghana called Rite FM. Through Farm Radio International, who help African radio broadcasters to produce better farmer-focused radio, Tully has been working closely with Rite FM as they have explored the use of FrontlineSMS:Radio in a trial phase. The new software is a customized version of our free and open-source software tailored for radio presenters and station managers.  Rite FM are also taking part in the Africa’s Voices project as part of academic research from the Centre of Governance and Human Rights at Cambridge University, UK to explore how radio stations are using ICTs to engage listeners in discussions on development and governance issues. Here, Tully shares how SMS is a crucial part of the listeners' toolkit and "may be the only way they will contribute."

Guest Post By Tully McLoughlin

By 6:30 in the morning Owuraku Asamoah is seated comfortably at the black microphone in the Rite FM studio in Ghana, headphones on, twin computer monitors glowing, a laptop by his side displaying his Facebook page, his cell phone gripped firmly in one hand. “And this is how we’ll start today’s edition of the Morning Ride, being produced by Nii Alarbi,” he begins. “Believe in your hearts that something wonderful is about to happen.”

Rite FM broadcasts on 90.1 FM and online at www.ritefmonline.org from the bustling, 20,000-resident town of Somanya in the Eastern Region of Ghana. It occupies a unique niche of the radio space here – a commercial station for agriculture and social development. It is not simply an outlet for agricultural extension, nor do its programs present the standard rigmarole of music, politics, and religion. The catchment area, which includes portions of the urban Greater Accra region and large swaths of rural area in the Eastern and Volta regions, symbolizes that dual-demographic challenge.

I’m volunteering my time at Rite FM. I met the director of the station through their close partnership with Farm Radio International, an NGO with whom I work. Farm Radio was started in the late 1970s by a Canadian agricultural broadcaster who saw the need for better farmer-focused radio in Africa. The organization has been supporting commercial, public, and community stations on the continent since then, and in 2007 undertook the 42-month “African Farm Radio Research Initiative” with the support of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Rite FM was one of five Ghanaian stations in the project.

My phone buzzes on the table by my bed, waking me up. “Tully. Owuraku wants you to talk about the Africa’s Voices project on the Morning Show in one minute.” That’s Kofi Baah, called Granpaa, the show’s producer. It’s July 20th, 7 am. Asamoah is devoting today’s show to a discussion of food security in Ghana, inspired by this month’s question for the project. The Africa’s Voices project is being undertaken jointly by the teams at FrontlineSMS:Radio and the Centre of Governance and Human Rights at Cambridge University UK, and Asamoah is taking the opportunity to cover the issue.

The question asks: “According to you, which is the bigger threat to food security in your area?” The options are: climate change, land access, market access, and food prices. I explain that by texting in their opinion they stand to win a remote-control, solar-powered, two-in-one lantern radio. A perfect way for farmers, in the field and off the grid, to tune in, the station’s director had told me the day before.

Asamoah takes calls and guides the conversation as it drifts from a debate on industrialized farming techniques to genetically modified foods. He is a pro at making the programming interactive. Beyond his demeanor, he has a number of tools at his disposal. There are two phone-in lines; an additional four lines on the Freedom Fone, an Interactive Voice Response tool; and an all-network SMS short code provided by the SIIMA system of SMS GH, a SMS-solutions company in Ghana. In addition, Rite FM operates its own website. And of course there is the battery of social outlets: a Facebook and user profile (ritefm), and a twitter feed (@rite901fm), and various satellite websites for other Rite FM projects. Now, the introduction of FrontlineSMS:Radio as part of the trial adds another exciting tool to the mix.

The advantage of this arsenal is that listeners participate and hosts facilitate in the way they’re most comfortable. Callers pepper the Morning Show, which runs from 6:30 to 9am, and The Drive, which runs from 2 to 5:30pm. But for shorter programs like Time With the CEO, profiling senior executives of agricultural businesses to showcase models of success and affluence along the agricultural value chain, and Women in Agriculture, focusing on the role of women as wives, mothers, traders, and entrepreneurs, the host may not be seeking a spread of opinions.

SMS, and to some extent Facebook or Twitter, give the host the flexibility to incorporate certain comments fluidly. That means, Asamoah points out, “Even when I’ve not gone on air, I can respond to you.” For listeners, says Nii Alarbi, a reporter and broadcaster for the Rite FM news team, SMS may be the only way they will contribute. “It’s not everybody who will like to call in for other listeners to hear his or her voice.” On a good day, a producer might expect to receive 10 or so texts in a show.

Even when the number of outlets to interact with listeners feels overwhelming, Asamoah sees that running in the opposite direction isn’t an option. “If you stick to only phone-in, you can’t progress. You can’t reach out to everybody.” Alarbi, who also hosts Herbs & Spices and the Agricultural Forum, says the day he does a show without taking any input, he will think, “Maybe I did it to my satisfaction, but I left my listeners behind.”

To find out more about Cambridge University's Centre of Governance and Human Rights "Africa's Voices" project click here and to learn about other projects using SMS with radio, visit FrontlineSMS:Radio's website.

SMS registration for Maker Faire Africa

Attendees of next month's Maker Faire Africa will be able to register their attendance by text message, thanks to a clever hack by  Henry Barnor and Henry Addo, two Ghanaian developers. In the true spirit of Maker Faire, the two Henry's have built the system using a phone with a Zain SIM card connected to a laptop running FrontlineSMS. When the software receives an SMS it sends the data via HTTP to a python web application running on Google’s App Engine infrastructure, where it's processed and a registration code sent out to the originating handset. It's another great use of the software and kudos goes out to the guys behind it. You can read their full post here.

Maker Faire Africa (MFA), a celebration of African ingenuity, innovation and invention, will take place between August 14th and 16th at the Ghana-India Kofi Annan Centre of Excellence in ICT in Ghana's capital, Accra. Wish I could be there.  :(