Q: Dear Progressive Detective: I’m worried about radiation from the cellphone tower that was just installed on my building’s roof. What can I do about it?

A: Everyone and their grandma is on a cellphone these days, and because we believe nothing should impede us from updating everybody on everything, cellular service companies are rushing to expand and improve the reliability of their network coverage.

Canada is currently home to around 8,000 cellphone towers, or base stations. The best estimates peg about a third of those on buildings. Health risks from the radio frequency (RF) electromagnetic radiation the equipment emits are contested and consensus seems to sway with each new published scientific study. That hasn’t stopped Health Canada from playing it safe. Right now, radiation limits are 50 times below the rate believed by Health Canada to pose health risks.

Still, we get you might want to play it even safer. Because each province and territory has its own tenancy regulation, what you can do depends on where you live. Mira Gamsa, spokesperson for Ontario’s Landlord and Tenant Board, says, like most jurisdictions, the province’s legislation doesn’t address cellphone towers. If a landlord can’t quell your worries, you can file an application with the board stating the tower is interfering with your “reasonable enjoyment” of the unit.

Come armed with information from Health Canada—which cites studies concluding RF can cause body temperature to rise—and the World Health Organization, which recognizes a condition called “electromagnetic hypersensitivity.” Those affected suffer myriad symptoms, all from exposure to electromagnetic fields. Scary, but it might not help you. Since Gamsa’s never heard of any such complaints, she wouldn’t speculate on what ruling the adjudicator would, or could, make.

You can also try Industry Canada, which regulates the establishment of new sites and requires companies go through a public consultation process with local land-use authorities before getting approval. You’ll get a chance to voice your opinion there, but it may be for naught: Industry Canada doesn’t give municipalities authority to create their own RF-exposure limits. So if you’re sitting in your apartment and your body heat’s rising, it may be time to start rallying your neighbours. Or start looking for a new place to live.

Women in the Dadaab, Kenya refugee camp receiving training to work with Samasource, a web company that outsources computer jobs to women, youth, refugees, and internally displaced people living in poverty. Photo courtesy Samasource.

This coming week I will be covering the 6th UNESCO Youth Forum in Paris. In preparation for the event, youth delegates have been participating in an online forum and discussing a variety of issues which affect youth during this global economic (and social) crisis.

Naturally, one of my preferred topics is along the lines of information and communication technology (ICT) and social media. As I discussed last week, ICT and social media, slowly, but surely, are allowing people to reverse the dominance of Western information. As tools are developed to allow active translation of English websites into even the most obscure dialects, those with basic education are tapping a source of previous privileged wealth.

Social and economic investment via ICT (such as the internet and mobile phones) is another key purpose. However, while the Internet is bringing us together, there remains the contentious “digital divide.” As Sylvia Namukasa, a UNESCO youth delegate from Uganda comments, “In Uganda, ICT only favors the urban youth who can access computers, unlike their rural counterparts, many of whom have never had a chance to look at a computer.”

We need to actively work against this disparity. Instead of pouring our hard-earned savings into charities, which continue to laud free goods on people who have no need or want for them, Canadian youth, in particular, should consider investing in their technologically able and inventive counterparts.

Across the ocean, people in the “developing world” are turning technology into an economic revolution with life-altering effects for the poor. Technology allows “us”—Westerners saturated by the stereotypical images of starving Africa—to circumvent the popular aid mantra and go for the real deal: delivering solid work into the arms of people who need it, or assisting those in acquiring the necessary knowledge to build the structures of a functional economy.

One excellent example of just how ingenious we can be with our money is exemplified in Samasource. The organization, founded by an Indian woman living in California, delivers small bits of computer-based work to women, youth and refugees living in poverty. TMS Ruge, the Ugandan co-founder of Project Diaspora, inspired by the need to invest back in his home country, has jumped on board. He currently has a team of web developers assisting with US-based contracts. While simplifying his own work, he delivers added income to individuals without the opportunity to join the formal work sector. I can guarantee this has a deeper impact than free malaria nets or second-hand clothing, both which eventually sneak out of the household and find their way into the informal economy anyway.

Txteagle is another example of how outsourcing via ICT can be revolutionary to people in poorer countries. From translation to conducting surveys, households confined to rural areas of Kenya have the opportunity to increase their livelihoods with tasks that integrate well into their daily lives—like taking care of livestock and doing domestic work.

For those of us who are not at the point of having work to outsource, there exist organizations that develop ICT in areas generally considered unreachable. For example, in Northern Uganda, I stumbled across a humble organization called Battery Operated Systems for Community Outreach, or BOSCO. By connecting up internally displaced persons to the internet, BOSCO has initiated a new means for refugees to acquire funding for locally-initiated development projects. For example, getting the necessary resources for solar-power in a town that had only, until then, functioned by costly paraffin lamps.

Or take AppAfrica. East African tech entrepreneurs and innovators develop software that allows huge changes to those isolated in rural Uganda with only cell phone access (and yes, almost everyone has a cell phone). One example, Question Box, is a means to democratize information, which further fosters economic development. People call in with all types of questions, such as “How can we control soil erosion in our village?” or “Can a mother pass HIV on to her child?”

As I gear up for this UNESCO Youth Forum, I want to encourage young people to consider the “snowball” effect of investing in work opportunities via ICT or technology itself. One woman making a dollar or two extra a day via Txteagle can now afford to buy malaria nets (stimulating the local economy) and send her children to secondary school. Her children, in turn, will grow up in the atmosphere that we have all come to understand and which secures, in part, democracy and government accountability: hard work pays off; we are accountable to the decisions we make.

In North America, text-messaging has a reputation for being frivolous, used to spread teenaged rumours, or the recent mania over “sexting.” But in developing countries like Africa, cell phones and text messages are the primary means of communication. And, not just for gossip.

Information and communication for development or ICT4D, isn’t just another fancy development acronym. Instead, it encompasses a booming cell phone industry which can be geared towards inclusive, empowering and cost-efficient development.

Frontline SMS is one of many ingenious programs that are helping non-governmental organizations connect with rural communities on a mass-scale. Basically, you plug your cell phone into a computer, power up the software, enter your recipients’ phone numbers and, with one click of the mouse, send out hundreds of text messages to the most rural of places. Returning text messages can be organized into databases like Ushahidi’s, essentially an abridged Google Map that visually traces events like Kenya’s post-election riots.

While Frontline SMS might seem basic—at least from the tech-saturated Western perspective—this quality makes it accessible and flexible. The human rights community was the first to put the software to test in 2005. Immediately successful, Frontline SMS first helped advocacy organizations like Kubatana track communities being abused by Mugabe’s henchmen. It was also used by the Nigerian Election Reporting Project to track voting in areas deemed too dangerous for election observers.

Over the past year, the software has become popular in other sectors. Here in Kenya, Frontline SMS is now being used in health and agriculture. Nelson Ojango, a young veterinary working with the Kenya Livestock Breeders Organization, uses the software to send out mass text messages to breeders across the country. They send text messages back detailing their current stock and breeding capacities. Health Action International‘s offices in Nairobi use the software to track medicine availabilities in rural clinics across four different African countries.

While computer access and skills are still limited in developing countries, Ken Banks, the creator of Frontline SMS, is developing a version that will run on a USB stick. Stroll into any Internet café and within a few minutes you’ve reached hundreds of people, hundreds of miles away.

Around the world, it’s looking like the revolution will be texted. As we see in the streets of Tehran, mobile phone technology, and software like Frontline SMS, have the power to threaten authoritarian governments, improve health and ensure fair elections.

Like all technologies, this one has its darker uses, too. While used to track violence in Kenya post-election, text messaging was also used to spread ethnic hate. Every communication technology has the means of spreading information—for both good and evil.