Bribespot is a mobile app for Android that allows people to submit reports of corruption and bribes. People can also submit reports on a website and instances are plotted on a map using Google maps API.
In March 2011, Artas Bartas and a team of people from Estonia, Finland, and Lithuania developed the app at Garage48, an event where participants try to pitch and develop an app within 48 hours. Bartas is familiar with issues of corruption; prior to Bribespot, he worked for the UN development program coordinating anti-corruption projects. And, unfortunately, there is demand for an app like Bribespot.
The app has been downloaded 600 times. On the site, about 700 total reports have been submitted and visualized, from around the world.
Apps For Development: Lessons From mPowering data sheet 3195 Views
Non-profit organization mPowering is developing customized mobile apps to help reach the ultra poor -- people living on less than $2 a day -- and connect them with funding opportunities and programs in the developed world.
Reaching individuals and supplying resources in remote regions has huge challenges. The goal of mPowering is to leverage existing mobile infrastructure to open up channels of access. The organization has ongoing programs in Nepal and India which provide incentives to poor individuals for reporting to school or work, via mobile application. The organization is also working to create a mobile donor app to further connect the poor with funding opportunities.
Before a mobile app can be developed and deployed, the mPowering team conducts field research and partners with local institutions. We spoke with Kamael Ann Sugrim, Co-founder and CEO of mPowering, to find out how an app is developed.
Programs in Nepal and India
The mPowering organization is a year old and currently has two programs underway which utilize mobile apps. In Bhaktapur, Nepal, women earn points for reporting to work, and the points can be redeemed for food, clothing, and medicine.
In Orissa, India, 175 children in the village of Juanga earn points for attending school and can redeem the points for food, clothing, and medicine. Teachers have been supplied with donated Android phones with the mPowering application. Through the app, they can “scan” children in for attendance.
The World Bank announced today the winners of its first-ever Apps for Development competition. The contest launched last October as part of the Open Data Initiative and invited developers and development professionals to create mobile applications to help solve world problems apply their skills toward the Millenium Development Goals. A total of 107 applications were submitted form 36 countries across every continent.
Honorable mention, for example, went to Treepet from Mexico, that teaches people about the realities of worldwide deforestation via a game in which you plant a seed, nourish and water it, and try to restore an ecosystem. One of the winning apps helps the Bank directly: StatPlanet World Bank from Australia uses the 3000-plus indicators available from the World Bank database in interactive maps and graphs.
