Bartering airtime in Africa
Africans are experiencing astonishing, rapid growth in mobile telephony. Mobile handsets are selling even to the poorest of people because there is an enormous need for communication. For decades, people have wanted to communicate but have been prevented from doing so because fixed line connections were expensive and unreliable.
But most amazing of all is the move by Kenya's SafariCom service provider. It is offering users the chance to trade airtime with one another.
So I can buy airtime (with a scratchcard from any local shop), then send it to another account - either for free (as a gift), or in exchange for money, goods, or services.
The upshot is that the phone service has created, from nowhere, an alternative currency. A barter system that will allow people to exchange money (or value) across vast distances, with no need for banks or travel.
This is astonishing. The typical Western consumer thinks that our society is at the cutting edge of technology and its interface with society. But in Africa, people are using the same technology in radically different ways. Imagine the barter system being introduced here in the UK. Would you work, in whole or in part, for airtime? Especially if you had the opportunity to sell that airtime on to others, or exchange it for goods?
What will 'money' look like in fifty years from now? Twenty years?
These notes made during a recent broadcast of Global Business on the BBC World Service.
