Ejem Agwu A, Okeke Somtochukwu V, Ojeka-John Rachael O, Adekeye Emmanuel T
Department of Mass Communication, Faculty of Business and Social Sciences, Landmark University, Omu-Aran, Nigeria.
Department of Mass Communication, Faculty of Arts, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Nigeria.
Jamba. 2025 Apr 4;17(1):1753. doi: 10.4102/jamba.v17i1.1753. eCollection 2025.
This article reviewed bodies of existing local and international literature to provide multi-level insights into Africa's readiness to standardise the adoption of social media and associated technologies in managing the numerous climate-related disasters in Africa, including storms, floods and droughts. Social media is making serious inroads in disaster management globally, except in Africa, with countries such as the United States of America, Japan, Haiti, Australia and so on, effectively deploying social media technologies in different cycles of disaster management, particularly since 2010. To encourage disaster management stakeholders in Africa to mainstream the involvement of social media in disaster management, this study examined Africa's prospects using force-field analysis that assessed the social, financial, policy, technological and other factors that inspire or restrain the effective and comprehensive adoption of social media technologies in disaster management. The force-field analysis demonstrated that disaster management stakeholders in Africa have all the tools and conditions to adopt social media technologies in climate-related disaster management on the continent.
Driving forces such as the steady Internet access and penetration in Africa, fast-growing social media penetration and adoption of mobile technology, Africa having four of the top 10 countries that spend the most time on social media globally, growing investments in Internet infrastructure and communalistic nature of African societies, among others, are pointers of Africa's readiness to mainstream social media technologies in climate change-related disaster management.
本文回顾了现有的本地和国际文献，以便从多个层面深入了解非洲在将社交媒体及相关技术标准化应用于应对非洲众多与气候相关的灾害（包括风暴、洪水和干旱）方面的准备情况。社交媒体正在全球范围内的灾害管理中取得重大进展，但非洲除外，自2010年以来，美国、日本、海地、澳大利亚等国家已在灾害管理的不同阶段有效部署了社交媒体技术。为鼓励非洲的灾害管理利益相关者将社交媒体的参与纳入灾害管理的主流，本研究采用力场分析评估了激励或限制在灾害管理中有效和全面采用社交媒体技术的社会、金融、政策、技术及其他因素，以此审视非洲的前景。力场分析表明，非洲的灾害管理利益相关者拥有在非洲大陆与气候相关的灾害管理中采用社交媒体技术所需的所有工具和条件。
诸如非洲稳定的互联网接入和普及率、快速增长的社交媒体普及率以及移动技术的采用、非洲有四个国家跻身全球在社交媒体上花费时间最多的前十个国家之列、对互联网基础设施的投资不断增加以及非洲社会的集体主义性质等驱动力，表明非洲已准备好将社交媒体技术纳入与气候变化相关的灾害管理的主流。
