Grameen Foundation has received two grants worth over $4.7 million from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to support technology initiatives aimed at improving healthcare delivery in Ghana and providing information to poor farmers in Uganda. The former will support the development of mobile applications to enable healthcare workers to enhance the quality of healthcare delivery and increase the range of services available. Among other things, the grant will allow nurses to collect and transmit data more efficiently by mobile phone, which in turn will allow them to spend more time providing primary care services to patients, as well as giving the country’s health service more up-to-date and accurate information. The second grant will help build a network of Community Knowledge Workers who will provide information to smallholder farmers in Uganda. Building on its experience in establishing the country’s successful Village Phone initiative, Grameen Foundation will recruit and train Village Phone Operators, agricultural extension agents and others living and working in rural communities for the network. The Knowledge Workers will use mobile phones to give agricultural information to farmers, link them to markets and other key resources, and collect information about communities’ needs.

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http://www.grameenfoundation.org