With free Wikipedia access already available in a number of North American and Middle East countries, a group of learners in South Africa is lobbying the mobile operators in the country to provide them with free access to the open source online encyclopedia.

Drawing attention to the fact that free Wikipedia access is provided by the mobile operators in Kenya and Uganda, the learners' group - from Sinenjongo High School in Joe Slovo Park outside Cape Town - are lobbying mobile operators like Vodacom, MTN and Cell C to bring the service to South Africa.

Since South Africa, like most of the other emerging markets, has a lot more people using phones than desktop computers, the learners group pointed out that it is difficult to study and research for school projects, since library services are not readily available.

Urging the mobile operators to provide free Wikipedia access in South Africa, the students said in its letter that there is no library in their school; and they not only have to walk a long distance to the local library, but also have to wait in a queue because Internet facility is available on only one or two computers.

Further making a case for Wikipedia Zero - free Wikipedia for cellphones - in South Africa, the learners' group said in the letter: "Ninety percent of us have cellphones but it is expensive for us to buy airtime so if we could get free access to Wikipedia it would make a huge difference to us."