Investigating Women Entrepreneurs Usage of Mobile Technology for Accessing Market Information in Iringa, Tanzania

Abstract

Women entrepreneurs’ usage of mobile technology such a cellphone has been increasing intensely in Sub-Saharan Africa. However there is limited knowledge on the extent and precise usage of mobile phones by women entrepreneurs for accessing market information. Hence to address this gap, the goal of this paper is to investigate the usage of mobile technology for accessing market information by women entrepreneurs in Iringa, Tanzania. The study employs a mixed research approach characterized by quantitative and qualitative methods in order to obtain a holistic view on the issues, shortcomings and advantage that the usage of mobile phone for accessing market information can represent to the women entrepreneurs of the region. Interviews were conducted using semi-structured questionnaires to collect quantitative data, while in-depth interviews were used for qualitative data collection. Convergent parallel mixed method was used as a technique for summarizing objective evaluation and interpretation of findings. Results indicate that, contrary to prior research reports, mobile phones are not used as enablers by the women entrepreneurs of our study in accessing market information that is relevant to their business. Our work puts forward a plausible solution of designing a specialized virtual platform for accessing market information and expand business networks of the target user.