Audio postcard: An old garage becomes FRI’s technology “Hangar”

My name is Bart, Captain Sullivan. I’m the radio and ICT (information and communication technology) manager for Farm Radio International.

The Hangar came about because we ran out of space in the office that we are currently working in. This garage, which was used to park the office car, was just sitting there, and we kept looking at the building and saying, “Yeah, maybe we could do something with that.”

It got to the point that Farm Radio staff were growing and growing. I took a walk one day into the garage and had a look around and said, “If we just replace a few things here and replace these rotten beams that are falling down and the battered metal roof….”

So we just took all that stuff off and replaced it with some new things. We kept the original design, and we decided it looked a little bit like an airplane hangar, the way the roof rafters and everything fit in there.

We like that the idea of the The Hangar is where you store planes that are going out for flight. This is what it is for us at Farm Radio. We have ICT innovations like mobile phones and online technologies that can help make good old radio more interactive. And so the Hangar is where those ideas will be born and brought out into flight.

About the author
Bartholomew Sullivan is Farm Radio International’s Radio and ICT specialist. Based in Arusha, Tanzania, Bart works with radio stations throughout Africa to train broadcasters and develop innovative new technology solutions that can enhance the power of radio to serve rural listeners.  Combining his academic background in computer science and rural extension studies with his passion for radio and disc jockeying, Bart combines three separate domains to help build upon a tried and tested development communication technology in Africa — radio.