One of the more interesting aspects of this initiative is how it could pave the way for an entirely new genre of ICT-based humanitarian projects. All manner of sensing devices could be placed across the mobile network, detecting everything from a rise in water levels that could lead to flooding, to an excess of smoke particles in the air that could indicate extensive bush fires. Other sensors could detect movement of distribution of wildlife or the density or health of vegetation, or areas of deforestation or desertification. We could leverage the two key advantages that mobile base stations give us, their ubiquity across many settled areas and the fact that they're wirelessly connected to each other.

Imagine if this data was collected and then geo-tagged, and then made freely available to anyone who may want to make use of it? Of course, advances in technology bring their fair share of new challenges. Poachers, for example, would love to be able to monitor and track elephant movements. But for the NGO community at large, access to real-time environmental data -- a trend that we're perhaps seeing the birth of with Africa's mobile-powered weather monitoring stations -- could take us into entirely new and exciting territory.