Mobile phones and tablets will be used by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) for real-time data collection purposes in Zambia and Malawi.

Dubbed 'Rapid Mobile Phone-based' (RAMP) surveys, the technology is expected to help collect data remotely.

Enumerators enter the field and collect data on mobile phones and tablets. The IFRC has said that the collected data is then fed back to a server that allows real time viewing of the data being collected.

The IFRC further said that errors in collecting data using this method are also quickly detected because there are no mountains of papers to contend with.

Over the past week, the Netherlands Red Cross Society, with support from IFRC Southern Africa regional office, has been training enumerators on the use of tablets and mobile phones for data collection, according to a statement.

The survey is expected to help the Zambia Red Cross Society to understand the community they are working in by investigating the sanitation challenges and HIV risks the community faces.

Reinout Van Santen -- who is the planning, monitoring and evaluation officer with the Netherlands Red Cross Society -- said that over the past few weeks, he has been training enumerators in Zambia and Malawi on the use of the technology.

"RAMP is going to change the way we collect data for National Red Cross Societies around the world. Many people are wary about this type of technology, worried that people in the communities we serve cannot use it. In practice, I find that with some basic training, we have people from all background being able to use the technology in the field," he said.