icegov2012 proceedings

Figure 3. Facilities & Services Enjoyed by Respondents
There was no correlation found between respondents’ education,
age, marital status, family characteristics, and facilities at home
and their lack of cell phone ownership.
4.1.1 Sources of Income
The survey sought primary, secondary, and tertiary sources of
income from each respondent. Table 1 lists the income sources
into the following categories: (i) business of selling services, (ii)
business of selling products, (iii) employment, (iv) helper in nonemployee
role for someone else’s business, (v) unemployed, (vi)
retired, and (vii) miscellaneous.
Table 1. Source of Income
# Types of Income Primary Secondary Tertiary
Sources N= 312 N= 181 N =84
1 Business of
selling services
44% 44% 35%
2 Business of
selling products
24% 27% 43%
3 Employee 14% 13% 13%
4 Helper in Nonemployee
Role
2% 4% 5%
5 Unemployed 13% 12% 4%
6 Retired 2% 0% 0%
7 Miscellaneous 1% 0% 0%
The business of selling services emerged as the topmost income
source in primary and secondary category, whereas the business
of selling products was the topmost tertiary source of income for
respondents. Respondents offered the following services: house
cleaning, dishwashing, cloth washing, cooking and catering, babysitting,
dropping children to schools, massaging, teaching,
tailoring, singing, training women for handicraft, renting photo
frames to hospitals, singing, match-making, portering, and
nursing. The business of selling products included a variety of
products, such as vegetables, fruits, sweetmeats, traditional
snacks, spices, dry fish, tea, meals, fish, bangles, pearl ornaments,
hair-bands, dress material/clothing, flowers, fabric paintings,
birthday party decorations, ribbons for typewriters, calendars,
rubber stamps, brooms, and sticks for ice-cream candies.
The different forms of employment for the women were as
follows: compounder at a dispensary, care-taker of mentally
retarded children, assistant in a photo studio, sales-girl, student
assistant, office staff in placement office, nurse, assistant in
transportation business, assistant at telephone booth, hotel staff,
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construction worker, government employee, bottle company
worker, delivery girl by a courier company, assistant to an
accountant, assistant to caterers, farm workers, server in
weddings, floor mill operator, and assistant at a computer
institute. Another type of income source for women was serving
as helpers in others’ businesses. This included helping in
husbands’ businesses, fathers’ businesses, uncles’ businesses, and
sons’ businesses. The unemployed women were: students, job
seekers, housewives whose husbands did not allow them to work,
physically handicapped women, caretakers of their big families,
daughter-in-laws refrained by their in-laws to work, illiterate, and
less educated women.
4.2 Key Barriers to Cell Phone Adoption
Respondents reported three key barriers that kept them away from
owning cell phones. Table 2 shows low income or insufficient
income as the most significant barrier and second most significant
barrier to adopting cell phones. Miscellaneous financial reasons
were reported as the third most significant barrier that prevented
respondents from owning cell phones. The miscellaneous
financial reasons were as follows: scarce money to eat food on a
daily basis, insufficient money to repair a leaking roof, low
savings for children’s schooling, uncertainty and unpredictability
of daily wages, no raise in income and salary, seasonal
employment, unemployment, lack of permanent job, remittance of
money to relatives in native places, insufficient savings to buy a
cell phone, lack of guidance for operating cell phones, loss in
business, very small profit margin in business, meager pension,
savings lost in son’s accident, medical expenses, and a lot of
accrued debt due to mother’s sickness and daughter’s wedding.
The miscellaneous non-financial reasons that served as barriers to
cell phones included government policies, socio-cultural
backwardness, illiteracy, less education, dependency on relatives,
retirement, disabled husband, resistance by husband and in-laws
to use cell phones, lack of freedom to make decisions, availability
of office phones to make personal calls, lack of electricity to
charge cell phones, lack of knowledge for operating cell phones,
ease of access to public phone booths, old age, husband’s
addiction to alcohol, possible mishandling and misuse of cell
phones by children, and extreme difference of opinions among
family members for using cell phones.
Table 2. Barriers to Cell Phone Adoption
# Types of Barriers First
Key
Barrier
N=325
1 Entire Financial Burden
on Respondent Alone
2%
2 Low/Insufficient Income 30%
Second
Key
Barrier
N=304
Third
Key
Barrier
N=208
2% 0%
27% 10%
3 Inflation 14% 14% 14%
4 a. Large Family b. More
# of Dependents than
Bread-winners
5 Lack of Need for Using
6
Cell Phones
Borrow Cell Phones
from Others
4% 8% 10%
4%
3%
4% 3%
4% 2%