Outsourcing in Africa
I am a very frequent consumer of remote overseas labor. I usually buy at least a project a week, sometimes I use providers that I know from previous engagements and sometimes I use sites like rentacoder and getafreelancer to find new people.
Usually I work with people in either: pakistan, egypt and argentina. Last week I put a simple research project up for bid and awarded the project to two people, both in Nigeria. They were incredibly cheap, both claim graduate degrees and I am paying an average of $4.00 / hr for their labor. I haven’t seen the results yet because they are *both* late due to health problems.
One has a nosebleed that has lasted for several days, the other contracted malaria. It could be that they are BS’ing me (I don’t really care, I don’t pay until the work is done), but it could be that public health in africa is causing a big problem for their economy due to lost productivity.
