Nokia Life Tools,

Nokia Life Tools

Changing course, Frances heads east to western India and the state of Maharashtra. There she meets two locals using their phones for very different purposes: to farm, and to improve job prospects for themselves and their children. While there, she finds that an old - and evidently latent - passion reignites…

Fifteen years ago I fell in love with India. Though still one of the planet’s poorest countries, containing the densest concentration of impoverished people in the world, the sheer resilience and tenacity of the people, and the astonishing colour of the country lingers with you and haunts your dreams long after a visit.

These days the country is hitting the world headlines for its impressive economic growth. With a healthy average rate of 5.8%, its GDP is billed to overtake the US’s before half the century is out. Following the introduction of liberalising and far-reaching economic reform in the late 1980s and early 1990s, India has grown to become the twelfth-largest economic power in the world. But one of the government’s key priorities now is to reform its agricultural sector.

Keen to see for myself an example of these new initiatives in action, I set off early one morning in the company of Nokia’s Jawahar Kanjilal into the agricultural heartlands of Maharashtra.

Along the road, pairs of oxen lifted beautiful heads to gaze in our direction. In the fields, flashes of fuchsia and saffron leapt out against the Monsoon-green of the sorghum and maize. Women labourers in beautiful saris squatted in neat rows as they tucked seedlings into the dark soil.

We were on our way to meet Datatarey Bhonge, proud owner of a fistful of acres and a pair of oxen, which he uses to cultivate crops of onion and ground peanuts.

Upon arrival, Datatarey took me for a tour of his farm then explained how Life Tools is helping him as a crop producer. On his mobile phone he can receive the latest market prices for his crops, as well as weather forecasts and governmental advice on modern agricultural techniques including the use of pesticides and fertilisers.

‘No more cheating by middle men!’ he declares with a triumphant chuckle, before revealing proudly his recent profits.

‘Six thousand rupees?,’ I ask in amazement.

Such a figure (around UK£75 or US$150) is a small fortune for a small-time farmer such as Datatarey in a country where the nation’s average wage is still just US$1 a day. When I leave, he thanks me for coming to visit him though I’d kept him from his crops all of the afternoon.

My next port of call is to meet a local bank clerk and his family using Life Tools to learn English. Mahesh thinks the language will help him do his job better and improve his job prospects. For his children, it will benefit their education and future careers, he explains. As we sip tea and tuck into delicious samosas in the Shete household, the children practice some of their newly-learnt phrases:

‘The robber who broke in and stole the money has gone to jail’, Samarkh reads out in a clear voice.

As we laugh, Mahesh shakes his son’s hand proudly. It strikes me that in a country where education is so limited - or even unavailable (some 38% of the population is illiterate) - such educational technology as Life Tools potentially has a major contribution to make.

Relatively cheap to buy and easy to operate, it allows people like Datatarey and Mahesh to seize the initiative, take control of their own destiny, and to invest in the future of themselves and their families.

It was good to see that India’s irrepressible spirit and entrepreneurship, as well as the grace, hospitality and generosity of the people was exactly as I had remembered it…

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