Geekcorps Mali’s LMI Blog

Welcome to the Geekcorps Mali Last Mile Initiative (LMI) project blog. We have a great project underway and we’d like to share what we’re up to with you.

The project itself is called CyberMobili – at least that’s what we’re calling it at the moment – and it has some real merit. In case you were wondering, “mobili” means car in Bambara, the predominant local language here in Mali.

In short, what we plan to do is create a series of kiosks in very rural villages to offer much needed services like voice messaging, photocopying, market information and prices from surrounding villages, and myriad other services we’ll describe in later posts. One of the most striking aspects of the project, however, is where we’ve chosen to test out this project. The villages we’ve chosen don’t have access to the telephone networks, electricity grid, regular roadways, or other standard infrastructure. In fact, the sites we’ve chosen to work with are quite literally off the beaten path.

We have a solid team working tirelessly to bring it all together and we’ve already begun to make some progress. Two weeks ago we began synthesizing all the project elements into a more coherent design. Last week we focused our attentions on which sites around the country were the best fit for our model, including a field visit to our current favorite hub sites in the southwestern part of the country, Ouelessebougou and Faraba .

This week we’re tightening up some of the elements of the CyberMobili (CM) project. We have a big week next week. We’re sending one of our Geeks out to begin the first detailed site assessment of the smaller satellite villages we plan to service by motorcycle. We know the sites (called Faraba, Miagandia, Bougoula, Kognaba, and Dalabala) look solid from all the data we’ve collected. Now we need to see what the real cases are in the field.

Check back late next week for pictures of the villages. We’ll try and have some up by Friday the 24^th. We hope you’ll visit often and even contribute your thoughts. We’re always trying to find ways to work out better solutions and your feedback could prove valuable. We’ll also be adding plenty of other great content in the weeks to come.

We hope you enjoy.