Greetings to all, I would like to define gender equality "as equal opportunities for all, Female and Male' Technology tastes sweet on the lips of everyone and ICT has been embraced by everyone that has the ability to mildly understand what it is all about. However involvement of the women in technology based projects has been minimal world over. To me, this is basically because of the attitudes and perceptions of the communities especially in Africa, "girls cannot understand science concepts. Science is too complex for women'. This has definitely affected the women and further decreased their confidence on how much they can contribute to the progress of technological projects since they view them as complex. Currently, there have been tremendous efforts to balance gender in development projects, however I see a scenario where women are WILLING to be eliminated from some projects due to lack of confidence and self belief on how much contribution they can offer in some of these technology based developmental projects. It should noted that in some cases, there isn't enough capacity in women and that sometimes, it's not about marginalization but striking a balance between competences in implementing a project and gender inclusion for the sake of it! I suggest the following; 1. Develop programs to vigorously sensitize and raise awareness among communities about the capabilities of the girl child and women as a whole in development of their community and later their nations. 2. Education of the girl child should be emphasized and not only for passing the girl child through school (to read and write) but also empowering them to realize that they possess equal or even better potential with their male counterparts in contributing to society. 3. Motivate women to get involved in ICT or any other technological based projects using female role models that can showcase or present their success stories in similar successful projects elsewhere.

Mobile telephones have been a dream come true for rural areas. Connectivity to the outside world especially to the urban centers has been made so easy. Unnecessary commuting to urban centers has been tremendously reduced. Mobile phones have been a great source information including forex rates, news and headlines including business news, internet surfing, multimedia like Radio and television, this has made the lives of the people in rural areas more and more enjoyable and has made the people stay in touch with the world they live in. I need to point out that mobile phones alone are not providing the optimal solution to the communication problem in the rural areas, there is need to encourage internet connectivity and building of data networks for information storage, sharing and dissemination. This will provide a break through to reduction of rural urban migration and greatly lead to sustainable development of rural areas. However, some rural areas in Uganda do not have telephone coverage, and telecom companies find it expensive to invest there due to high costs of maintenance mainly due to lack of electricity in those areas.

I would like to suggest that e-agriculture is very important for all agriculturists in the world. Let me suggest that farmers need to come together and create unions and cooperatives and build an information base. This can be implemented by building data networks or databases in which all agricultural information and statistics can be stored. This helps to monitor the trends in infrastructural differences, prices and market forces e.g Demand and supply for particular goods and products. Mobile telephony will help greatly in accessing information from partners, funders, donors and other stake holders in the business. Mobile telephony would ease information sharing and communication. Mobile telephony will not improve agriculture if it is used on an individual farmer basis but rather by an organized agricultural community or organization of farmers with background infrastructure that calls for data and information storage that would be communicated using mobile telephony.

In Uganda the Agric sector is comprised of illiterate, semi illiterate and literate people. Mobile technology is widely used by everybody that can afford a handset. Product Prices: Due to price fluctuations in agricultural products,mobile telephone service have been so useful to farmers, they can easily find out the current prices on the market which has reduced exploitation of farmers by business people. Exposure: Mobile technology has made it easy for farmers to get in touch with the market and the business world and viseversa. However, there is less mechanisation in Agriculture in Uganda besides being the leading revenue earner for the country.[/quote]

In Uganda the Agric sector is comprised of illiterate, semi illiterate and literate people. Mobile technology is widely used by everybody that can afford a handset. Product Prices: Due to price fluctuations in agricultural products,mobile telephone service have been so useful to farmers, they can easily find out the current prices on the market which has reduced exploitation of farmers by business people. Exposure: Mobile technology has made it easy for farmers to get in touch with the market and the business world and viseversa. However, there is less mechanisation in Agriculture in Uganda besides being the leading revenue earner for the country.