Mr Omwansa

Mr. Omwansa’s paper focused on the use of M-PESA and other money transfers technologies across Africa in light of their socioeconomic impact. The summit was organized by MobileActive.org and Sangonet. Other panelists who facilitated the discussions on the impact of M-Transactions in developing countries and the way forward were lead researcher Jonnathan Donner of Microsoft Research, Brian Richardson, CEO Wizzit and Alex Comninos of Research ICT Africa!

Besides analyzing the peculiar ways in which M-Transactions are used in Kenya and other countries, Mr. Omwansa discussed how he envisions partnerships and collaborations between the regulators, mobile network operators, financial institutions and non-governmental organizations would create enormous opportunities for improving access to financial services in the developing countries. Mr Omwansa observed that many applications based on mobile technologies will be developed and deployed in the next few years.

Among the highlights of the discussions included a need to make regulatory adjustments to facilitate faster growth of the mobile transactions industry, a need for relevant stakeholders to work together to lower the cost of mobile phones and cost of communicating as well as need by application developers to tap more into opportunities of developing mobile applications for education, research, financial service, commerce, and health among other sectors.

The summit was attended by more than 350 participants from over 40 countries across all the continents. The event was funded by IDRC (International development research centre), Vodafone Foundation, United Nations Foundation, Ford Foundation, Knight Foundation, Vodacom, South Africa department of communication, Microsoft among others.