TWEAPEASE, Ghana — At 5:30 a.m. the roosters crow, a signal for the Martey girls to begin their morning chores in this cocoa farming community tucked inside the forests of the Asunafo North region of central Ghana.
Alima Martey exits her bedroom and delicately places her smartphone against a powder-blue porch column before she sweeps the area clean. Her phone stays in the same position until bedtime because “this is one of the few places where there’s phone connection in our entire village,” said the 23-year-old.
Tweapease was completely wired with electricity in 2014 under the Cocoa Life project, funded by chocolate maker Mondelēz International. Mobile connectivity still remains scarce. Leaving her phone on the front porch was the only way Martey could receive calls from family in other villages or to be notified of mobile transfers that she may have received.