In a society driven by technology, it is hard to imagine a place where one would have to wait seven years, not to mention invest a good share of his or her income, to have a land phone line installed in one’s home.

Prior to the emergence of wireless technology, however, this was the case for many underdeveloped countries such as Morocco. Hsain Ilahiane, associate professor of anthropology, has spent the last four years conducting research on the social and economic impact that mobile technologies have had in these areas.

“I saw the biggest smiles,” he said. “These people were using a phone for the first time in their lives, and the fact that it was a cell phone made it even more exciting.”

Ilahiane, who was awarded a multi-year grant from Intel Corporation, said cell-phone usage has grown at an amazing rate, jumping from just more than 300,000 mobile phone owners in 1999 to nearly 13 million in 2005.

His research was carried out in three parts: Interviewing government officials, experts and private industries; studying the marketing patterns of the informal city sectors; and working with skilled urban laborers.

The skilled laborers, such as farmers, plumbers and carpenters, use mobile phones primarily as tools to intensify local bonds and generate more business.

“Cell phones have enabled these workers to take it to the next level,” he said. “It depends on their initial network size, but phones allow them to externalize themselves.”

For example, Moroccan farmers are now able to gather information about markets in other cities. This empowers them to make decisions about land use based on supply and demand, which in turn has raised their income by 23.7 percent. Skilled workers as a whole have increased their income by 105 percent.

Ilahiane’s findings show how government attempts have been made through an initiative known as the e-Maroc strategy to incorporate technology and reduce poverty. The informal sector still has a lot of money, however, employing more than 50 percent of Moroccan workers.

Intel hopes to use this information to leverage the informal activity into a more formal setting, as the corporation hired Ilahiane as a visiting senior social scientist in its People and Practices Research Area for one year, beginning in July.

Intel will also meet with Iowa State’s Sustainable Rural Livelihoods Program next week to collaborate on a project to develop telecenters in Uganda that were built using foreign aid from non-governmental organizations that ran out of funding.

“I’m not satisfied with microfunding,” Ilahiane said. “It has its place in development, but in order to create sustainable institutions we need to build off of existing local knowledge.”

During the next year, Ilahiane said he hopes to travel back to Uganda and Morocco in addition to visiting Kuwait, Egypt, India and Brazil.

After completing his term with Intel, Ilahiane plans to bring his experiences back to the classroom at Iowa State.

“His research is very valuable in extending the cultural knowledge base,” said Ann Jones, lecturer in anthropology, citing an example of a student who localized Ilahiane’s research on a rural level. “Not only is it valuable, but we’re in a technological world now – students find it interesting.”

In addition to sharing his research through classes, Ilahiane said he hopes his connections with Intel will be beneficial in the future in providing internship and job opportunities for students.