Embossed on a wall of a house in the Ashanti Regional Capital Kumasi is a Ghana Post GPS address which reads AK-561-8616
The first part AK-561represents a post code; the remaining four digits, the unique address.
Romantically imbedded in these codes generated by the Ghana Post GPS Digital Addressing system launched in the year 2017 was an intimate desire to harmonize property addresses and to make the finding of locations and giving of directions a lot easier.
Persons and institutions anticipated were going to immediately benefit from the addressing system were financial institutions; delivery companies; emergency services and government agencies.
Beyond the embossment on walls, an enterprise which cost each residential facility fifty cedis and commercial facilities hundred cedis; questions still linger whether the addressing system has served its optimal purpose and whether the uptake and use of the system is satisfactory.
Bernard Kwesi Arthur is Sales Manager for Dexglo Trade and Logistics, a delivery and curia service company in the Oforikrom Municipality of the Ashanti Region.
His duty is cut out: Receiving orders, picking up packages and delivering them at specific locations.
As heavy as his work depends on directions and locations; he says the Ghana Post GPS address is not an option citing challenges about accuracy and navigation.
“The Ghana Post GPS addresses came in but we still rely on Google Maps because it is very easy and simple to use when you have your internet on. One thing I like about it is that after searching for a location, you can trust the direction it gives you,”
“With the Ghana Post GPS address, you can be easily misled if you don’t have a fair idea of where you are going. Early this morning, a client was to make an order. I tried to use the person’s Ghana Post GPS address and it pointed me to Anloga Junction. I live around so I just saw that no, come on! This is not what I am looking for,” he recounted.
Bernard is not alone. Finding specific Locations, is everything to Ride hailing cab drivers. The Ghana Post GPS app has linked its service to Yango and Uber.
Yet; the drivers hardly find any passenger making orders with the Ghana Post Digital Addresses. Kelvin a young cab driver says the use of landmarks and the google location to find their way around works easier.
He told reporter Ivan Heathcote – Fumador, “I have personally not received any request with the Ghana Post GPS. For most requests I get, its usually from the popular landmarks we know on the google maps. That’s what most people use to request. I will never use the Ghana Post address because I don’t think it is seriously working,” he pointed out.
In the central business district of Kumasi, the bold inscription of MultiCredit Savings and Loans Limited one of Ghana’s oldest Microfinance Institutions hangs in front of its headquarters.
For an institution that gives loans to Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (SME) usually in the informal sector; finding debtors for collection is key.
Operations manager Samuel Ansu Addai Kyeremeh raises issues about accuracy of the Ghana Post GPS addresses; a problem he says compels loan officers to still visit the locations of debtors to take extra location details as a matter of due diligence.
“We have challenges especially to do with accuracy but it’s a helpful system especially when it is difficult to get home addresses of clients who have either forgotten theirs or live in homes that have no block and plot numbers on them.”
“During the assessment process for different loans, there is a lot of meticulous work. You have to go and see where they are. So that makes up for it,” he indicated.
The Ghana Post GPS addresses were also anticipated to help emergency services to swiftly and accurately respond to distress calls.
Indeed, on the Ghana Post GPS app; all emergency services including fire, police and the ambulance service could be contacted directly.
Ultimate FM’s checks with the Ghana National Fire Service however discloses that there is yet to be a technological tie-in which communicates locations to the service.
Ashanti Regional Communications officer for the Fire Command DO3 Peter Addai says his service still uses land marks and other known methods to locate fire scenes.
The danger he fears is that delayed response time could be costly if not fatal.
“For us at the fire service, response time is critical. Our control rooms and tenders have not been fitted with GPS systems yet. They call on our emergency lines, give us the locations using known landmarks and aside that we have our own means of locating fire scenes by tracing smoke when we get to the area,” he described.
Citizens’ Buy In
Ghanaians are vociferous in demanding the propriety and cost of Physical Public Infrastructure like roads, hospitals etc. which cost the government millions of dollars to construct
The citizenry has however been passive about Digital Public Infrastructure like the Ghana Post GPS addressing system which cost the country some 2.5 million dollars to procure.
For most Ghanaians whose taxes were used to pay for this addressing system; the Ghana Post GPS addresses are only for filling forms at the National Identification Authority, the revenue authority, business registration and other statutory agencies.
“For me personally, it is only for formalities. That is filling of documents or something. I think the system has not served its purpose enough because a good number of the public is not literate,” Ebenezer Darl shared.
Even though the app can use both the google maps and its own navigation system called ‘Fameko’ which translates take me there in the Akan language; rarely are the addresses used for giving locations.
“I still use the old way of giving direction… the mango tree, the ‘wakye’ seller, as land marks. It is even difficult to keep my address in mind because perhaps it is too long,” Ronald Osei Poku admitted.
Digital Public Infrastructure
The Ghana Post GPS app cost the government and by extension the tax payer; some 2.5 million dollars; enough to provide ten regions in Ghana at least ten six-unit classroom blocks.
Globally, governments are beginning to avert their attention to these state funded digital platforms which draw millions of dollars from the state’s coffers.
The concept christened Digital Public infrastructure assesses such investments on cost, whether it offers a society wide solution, its ability to share usable data with other institutions; its accessibility; security, inclusivity and how it enables easy identification and digital financial transactions.
Digital Solutions Expert and trainer with Whizzy Innovations hub, Akwasi Boateng Ossei, explain that the Ghana Post GPS address might struggle to meet the DPI criteria because of both a functional and marketing deficiency which plagues most digital solutions.
He elucidated, “The failings of such a system is not peculiar to the Ghana Post GPS Addressing system. Usually when people build tech products they are focused on the technical functionality of it and not the marketing side that leads to adaptation of the product. It’s important because at the end of the day when you build it, people have to adopt it and make it part of their everyday lives. I think that side was not really properly worked on in terms of the strategy and so the adaptation has been slow.”
Akwasi Boateng similarly pointed to several complaints about the functionality of the app which he believes if not addressed could continue to affect the popularity of the system.
“Few people have technical issues about how the app generates different codes in different corners of the same house. Some people also think the code generated is a bit too long to remember.”
He emphasized that the digital addressing system also had the propensity to suffer the same fate of several other apps that have failed to gain wide adoption because of network and data connectivity challenges.
“Generally, anything internet based is going to be very slow in adaptation in Ghana because data is an issue. It’s one thing I feel they didn’t take a look at. Even the banks are looking at other means to get their services to people without the internet because the cost and reliability of data are all problematic,” Akwasi added.
Officers of Vokacom; the company which designed the addressing system has declined any comment. The only insight it has given is; the app is in phases but has been truncated by frustrating bureaucracies from government.
But while this waits, emergency services, the financial services and curia services remain open to any localized solution that helps them find their clients and persons in distress with exactitude.
With a new administration taking over governance in Ghana; it is unclear the fate of the 2.5 MILLION DOLLAR Ghana Post GPS address system; especially when the administration while in opposition described the investment as a rip off; duplication of already existing GPS platforms and an abandonment of a street naming and property addressing project which was ongoing before the launch of the Ghana Post GPS address.
This report was produced under the Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) Africa Journalism Fellowship Program of the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA) and CoDevelop.
