The Impact of Mobile Phone Coverage Expansion on Market Participation: Panel Data Evidence from Uganda

Report

A working-level paper by Megumi Muto and Mine Yamano, published in the Institute for Development Finance’s research report series (No. 37, August 2008). Using panel data on 856 households in 94 Ugandan communities surveyed in 2003 and 2005, a period in which mobile coverage grew from 41 to 87 of the communities, it finds that the share of farmers selling bananas rose from 50 to 69 per cent in communities more than 20 miles from district centres after coverage expanded. For maize, a less perishable crop, the expansion had no effect on market participation.