Thank you! We have enjoyed your participation and hope you will continue to discuss and share with the e-Agriculture Community on future topics.

We will keep this forum open for posts for a few more days. Then it will be archived, and a summary report will be prepared. The summary “policy brief” should be available in July.

Regards to all,

Michael

From

Thanks for sharing these insights Michael.

Are there examples where regulators have successfully removed regulatory barriers to allow nonbanks (such as MNOs) to become active in mobile money services?

Thank you for these inputs. Interesting points in every case. As I understand you point to the need for standards and specifications for individual digital identities, as well as standards for the processes around rural financial services.

In addition to these needs, have any existing regulations been identified that prevent rural financial services from reaching their full potential?

Eija, another lead that might be helpful if you are still in Uganda is the Mobile Monday Kampala Chapter. They meet periodically. The last meeting seems to have been in February when they discussed “How can ICT help farmers”. Unfortunately, there does not seem to be a summary of that event online yet.

You can contact them through Daniel Stern, e-mail address: [email protected]

I hope your mission is going well!

From

Hi Eija. Are you familiar with Mercy Corp’s work in Uganda? They are integrating financial services along with other information services delivered to smallholder farmers via mobile phone. It sounds like just the sort of initiative your colleague are looking for. They’ve written about it just last week here: http://www.e-agriculture.org/blog/mercy-corps%E2%80%99-agri-fin-mobile-program-goes-live-indonesia-uganda-and-zimbabwe

Wri

Thanks for sharing the cost information and video about Prep-eez. Very interesting for this discussion.

Anita, you said that “Value Chain actors can facilitate access to higher cost technology by leasing it to farmers to ensure higher quality standards (e.g. Parmalat leases cold storage equipment to its dairy farmers in Nicaragua).”

Do you – or does anyone else – know of examples where a value chain actor is leasing an ICT tool to farmers or other producers? This would be very interesting.

Write abo

It is absolutely essential to be aware of, and seek to address, the disparity in ICT access/use based on gender.

Here in the e-Agriculture Community we have worked with CTA, APC/Genardis, and others on the topic. In addition to what Anita has kindly shared, more information on gender, agriculture and ICT can be found at http://www.e-agriculture.org/gender-icts-and-rural-livelihoods

Fr

Thank you for the introduction and for participating in the forum! Please also tell any colleagues that you think are interested in this subject.