Week 2 - Question 2 (the final discussion!) 26 Nov. 2008

Hi Michael I think governments should realize the potential of the private sector; they should try to bring the ICT4D in to the agenda of the private sector, especially for the companies who deal with ICT. Applying technology in the development can be a part of the business and private sector can make profits while serving the nation/uplifting the living standards of rural poor. Sameera.

As an economist and a student of agricultural market efficiencies, I believe the future is to use ICTs [here mainly mobile telephony] to reduce information search costs in the agriculture value chain and to link the decision to grow with that of to sell. We at LIRNEasia did some preliminary work to understand the cost of information search for a group of small scale vegetable farmers in a district of Sri Lanka; from the point of making the decision to grow X or Y and selling the crop at the wholesale market. [Obviously the chain then moves along from there; adding value and final product at the retail level but we did not look at that.]. A draft report is available at [url]http://lirneasia.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/transactioncosts.pdf [/url] We found that information search costs [here a part of transaction costs] was 11% of the total costs. Think about it; it is very high [it could be much higher in really rural areas]. Digging deeper we found that the distribution of these costs were skewed towards the decision to grow X or Y and to the decision to sell the resulting crop. Now is when the story becomes really interesting. What we now have is a process that is open-ended. What I mean is that the decision to grow X or Y is independent of the decision to sell the resulting crop. Ok, there is always informal discussion based on previous season's prices or expected demand and so on; but by and large the two decisions are independent. So the farmer decides to grow X, grows X and when the crop is harvested sells X. So where does the mobile phone or other ICT become important? In the most widely used form; to find prices. Whether real-time or otherwise; whether from 1 market or 5 nearby markets, the farmer will get information on prices. Now suppose, prices are low because many farmers decided to grow X; while our farmer will get a slightly better price than the farmer who did not get this price information, he is still in a bad way because he decided to grow X. This is where I believe mobile phone based ICT applications [from the simplest SMS format] will come in to make the biggest impact in creating efficiencies in agricultural markets by transforming this open-ended decision making to one that is closed. I call it a closed-loop value chain. Here, the decision to grow X is linked to the decision to sell X. To generalize it, it is like you undertaking a consultancy job knowing you have an agreement with someone to purchase it; to be more specific, it is like out-grower farmers growing gherkins knowing that the MacDonald's will purchase the pickles. Of course I know there are going to be many hurdles to cross, particularly in rural developing countries spread across Asia and Africa, but I believe at the end of the day, farmers will see there is intrinsic value in closing the loop at a micro [or household] level; i.e. to get an agreement to sell what you decide to grow. This was not possible until now, but with the growing usage of mobile phones, it is becoming more and more plausible. I see a trickle of more forward thinking farmers adopting this and the trickle becoming bigger. There are a lot more verticals and horizontals that I have not spoken about here, but, this essentially will be the structure. There are many initiative that we could improve and scale up to make this happen... And I agree with Sameera, there are enough incentives for private sector operators to get in to this "business", but we need a start. Who knows, I may be completely off track, but, this is how I see the future of mobile phones and ICT applications in agriculture; helping create efficiencies in agricultural markets. [/img][/url]

I think the future is graduating from the information & advisory platform of the SMS into a transaction platform. Where in the farmers can use the info that is provided into a meaninfull transaction, which helps them realize the prices etc. I feel M-transactions is going to be a critical component. This would invovle creating a CUG ( closed user group) , a network of all the stake holders like, warehouse, transaport, buyers, logistic providers, traders etc. So that the entire transaction is concluded seemless. this i think would be essential specially given the difficulty of non avaliablity of proper roads in the indian scenario. Some effort in this direction is already under way in India. cheers

There should be ambiguity that future development will not be possible without ICT. An the mobile telephony can provide impetus to this development. I envision a major role of mobile telephony for agri. especially in the rulral areas and in this regard i fully support the ideas of Closed User groups, as suggested by ravishankar and desilva.

I'd like to repond to Michael's question using one of the more simpler methods in anticipatory research or future studies, i.e., scenario construction. To me the best case scenario for the use of mobile telephony in the rural areas is one wherein user-generated multimedia content on local and indigenous knowledge is shared and reused among user networks or communities through their mobile devices. A mobile device that captures audio-video of processing aren chips in Central Java is also used to upload the content to a YouTube site to be downloaded by rural housewives in East Java. The same device is used to download market information such as the current demand for processed aren chips in Singapore and current wholesale prices. The same mobile device is used to contact buyers and schedule transport from Surabaya to Jakarta and ultimately to Singapore. All of these mobile telephony services coming at rock bottom prices similar to how SMS costs nowadays.

We need good stories about successful innovations made in a way which can be replicated without too many hurdles by non-state actors and which have a demonstrable positive impact on agricultural, food and livelihood systems. This stories should be collected and presented in a attractive and easy-to find way (internet). Theses stories then will motivate and stimulate new positive developments and initiatives. I guess it needs a certain coordination amongst like-minded organizations and programs working on that. This should happen in a network and non-hierarchical and non-bureaucratic way.

Well true,it is the requirement for the civil society.If the governments wants to encourage the private it is up to them.But do not tax the agriculturist,as in Asia,and Africa[where i worked] The agricultural produce is not giving renumarative costs to the producer.The marketing support system by governments is nill and void.Exploitation of the agriculturist from all sides of society is uniform. hence if 6.8 billion people[half of them are in Asia] are to be fed the availabulity of call centers and Mobile phones are very essential tools to be made available by the civil society,and the Governments. s.suryanarayana Hyderabad India 919848434866

Alexander, A scenario wherein user-generated multimedia content on local and indigenous knowledge is shared and reused among user networks or communities through their mobile devices is indeed most promising because it corners the traditional overwhelming supply driven approach of agricultural information. In remote areas in Africa the access to such multimedia content is probably not for tomorrow. But in the meantime farmers experiment with similar very creative multi media approaches. An example is the project Collecting & Exchange of Local Agricultural Content (CELAC) in Uganda. The project enables farmers to voice record their own innovative techniques. They disseminate their experiences with radio/CD players during group sessions. See: Video interview during the MobileActive 2008 World Summit (Johannesburg, South Africa) with Mary NAKIRYA, Program coordinator BROSDI, Busoga Open Source & Development Initiative, ICT enabled rural development. CELAC - Uganda. [url]http://farastaff.blogspot.com/2008/11/interview-during-mobileactive-200…]

[quote=harsha de silva] As an economist and a student of agricultural market efficiencies, I believe the future is to use ICTs [here mainly mobile telephony] to reduce information search costs in the agriculture value chain and to link the decision to grow with that of to sell. We at LIRNEasia did some preliminary work to understand the cost of information search for a group of small scale vegetable farmers in a district of Sri Lanka; from the point of making the decision to grow X or Y and selling the crop at the wholesale market. [Obviously the chain then moves along from there; adding value and final product at the retail level but we did not look at that.]. A draft report is available at [url]http://lirneasia.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/transactioncosts.pdf[/u…] We found that information search costs [here a part of transaction costs] was 11% of the total costs. Think about it; it is very high [it could be much higher in really rural areas]. Digging deeper we found that the distribution of these costs were skewed towards the decision to grow X or Y and to the decision to sell the resulting crop. [/quote] Harsha: Did you look at the economics of information about care / treatment of crops? The cost / availability of information about a crop must surely have an impact on the risk associated with the X vs. Y choice.

My biggest concern is that the technology solutions should be led by people's needs on the ground. As long as technology design is left in the hands of the multinationals, they will design tools and services that generate profit for the multinational, and provide some value to individual users who can afford them (i.e. those with money & power already). The novel solutions that have been discussed here involve innovation on-site, responding to local conditions and priorities, and engaging communities in designing new information handling practices. If we want to see more of this, then we need to develop the capacity of local community based organisations and NGOs to design, adapt and innovate with the new communications technologies (and practices) for themselves.

Thanks for the very lively discussion.I am ZAINUL from Bangladesh.Working as a scientist in NARS. My suggestions for mobile telephony for the future are: 1.Introducing cheaper but larger mobile phone sets particularly for rural farm people considering their levels of education and background.Larger texts and images may help increase the understanding of the contents. 2.Developing and administering contents in various formats (as texts,picture and voice forms)so that the receivers of the messages can get messages repeatedly in an integrated manner for proper understanding. 3.Local agricultural scientists/technologists should be available nearby to make the contents understandable and applicable in the field situation. 4.Farmers' Field Schools (FFS)or Farmers' Clubs are to be integrated with the mobile telephony for discussion of technolgy and information. 5. FM Radio station or Television station may be integrated with the mobile telephony service points to provide locally applicable technologies and information. 6.Laptop or PC or other forms of video devices may be used at the FFS to supplement the mobile based messages/contents. 7.The IT companies must consider the rural clients specially and develop devices to serve their diversified purposes on the basis of targeted Research and Development instead of sporadic and chance use by the rural peoples.Present models of mobile phone sets have been designed for entertainment with song,video games and other appilactions in addition to exchance of conversations. Thanks for the opportunity for sharing my views.

[quote=Alexander G. Flor]I'd like to repond to Michael's question using one of the more simpler methods in anticipatory research or future studies, i.e., scenario construction. To me the best case scenario for the use of mobile telephony in the rural areas is one wherein user-generated multimedia content on local and indigenous knowledge is shared and reused among user networks or communities through their mobile devices. A mobile device that captures audio-video of processing aren chips in Central Java is also used to upload the content to a YouTube site to be downloaded by rural housewives in East Java. The same device is used to download market information such as the current demand for processed aren chips in Singapore and current wholesale prices. The same mobile device is used to contact buyers and schedule transport from Surabaya to Jakarta and ultimately to Singapore. All of these mobile telephony services coming at rock bottom prices similar to how SMS costs nowadays.[/quote] This is an inspiring vision, but I think we should be realistic about the challenge of such complex information handling practices. Most particularly, the search cost of finding and selecting the relevant information from the rich plethora of content that is out there. There is a big difference between information being available and information being findable. Often, we rely on personal recommendations, or perhaps on-line 'recommendation communities' to help us guide our attention towards things of value. For this reason, I think our vision needs to think about how mobile telephony is integrated with existing networks, organisations, and information handling practices. In the meantime, you may find the results of the storybank project: www.cs.swan.ac.uk/storybank/ of interest. They have been experimenting with story sharing on mobile phones within one village.

There are news from USA and Europe that mobile telephone waves upset the capacity of the honey bee workers to come back to hives after foraging. so there is extensive colony collapse disorder which is sweeping away bee industry. without pollination what agriculture we can perform??????? Albert Einstein said that without honey bees human beings can exist in this earth only for four more years!!!! pl. check about the veracity of these reports and enter int o a conclusion. if at all mobile telephony is going to help agriculture, it should help in purchasing inputs and selling out put primarily. farmers should have the numbers of Vigilance and anti corruption bureau and on detecting adulterated inputs or asking for bribe or any such matter, farmers should be empowered to contact the officer for immediate action. will this be possible without empowering the farmers?????? by just mobile telephony alone>????

We have had good success on running an audio blog based on CTI applications among farmers in Northern India ( Kanpur-Lucknow belt) as a horizontal knowledge network for sharing problems and solutions. This application called Kissanblog can be experienced at www.dealindia.org . In this area where literacy and language are problems, mobile phones can provide many lateral solutions. We are now experimenting with the new 'voice sms service' launched by local operators to create an intermediate layer for threads and forums. But the problems of automatic tagging and serach applications for audio files are yet to be solved. Now our student volunteers transscribe briefly the Q&As and we allow the taxonomy to emerge. What are the latest applications/solutions tried out elsewhere or in other reserach labs for similar projects?

Hi Mr. Ravishankar just mentioned about M-transactions, yes it has a good potential, but it making a real impact on the ground level is not yet happened in bigger scales, [please correct me if I am wrong with proof.] I think the people are not ready yet to make their payment through their mobile phones though it is very efficient. Two aspects; Governments should make correct policies and legal framework to facilitate M-transactions. Also Bank, Companies, and other institutions make that popular among the ordinary people and build faith on it. Examples from Sri Lanka A M-transaction mechanism introduced by Dialog Telekom (a Mobile Operator) in Sri Lanka is yet to be successful. But same company has introduced a loyalty programme called "Star Points" which seems to be happening well. You can earn and redeem Star Points whenever you shop at any Star Partner Merchant outlet located country wide. I think initiatives like this will make people ready for a world with M-transactions. Sameera.

Dear Colleagues The challenge of our global society is to have a sustainable productive world in which ALL may be participants on a reasonable footing. ICT is one of the great success stories about productivity ... with an improvement over the past 50 years of perhaps multi-million fold. But even though there is this huge technical productivity improvement, its use as a tool to do things of value is rather modest ... one might even say pathetic. My hope is that we can start using the power of ICT to make information accessible ... and get useful information where it is needed. A priority, it seems to me, is to help agriculture be more productive ... and education to be more productive ... and health to be more productive. More people need to know things that are useful and help to improve productivity. More people also need to be engaged in removing constraints on progress ... on improving productivity. Using ICT to distribute information about the bad things in society might be a good starting point ... fraud, corruption, misrepresentation can all be reduced with better use of information. This is what Community Accountancy (CA) will help to do ... good things get on the record and earn praise. Bad things get on the record and people can respond accordingly. Mobile telephony ... SMS messages ... are potentially a great way of collecting organized pieces of data very cost effectively ... but the key is the framework for storing these data points and using them to inform society. This is what accountancy has done for the corporation ... now we want to have it do something similar ... better ... for society.

While advances in technology,or using sms,for produce and farming are welcome. We know that in China number of lives are saved using sms,while there were floods,and earthquake.The one item is use of pestcides,apart from the day the canal waters reach the area of the farmer.The weather conditions,the requirement and availablity of water and other information helps a lot to the farming sector. We from the irrigation sector as engineers understand the requirements during crop season,and the length of the season. Thanks s.suryanarayana Hyderabad

I personally believe that we are coming to an end of an era where the telephone has been seen as only a audio communication tool. Digital components for these small computers are getting cheaper and more powerful by the day, and at the same time the networks are getting faster. Today you can get 7.2Mbps bandwidth to your mobile device with a prepaid sim card, how do we utilize that? The framework is here for our e-agriculture but we do need to identify/develop its applications. I believe this is were "our" focus must be, because I don't think it will happen by itself... Digital regards, Joakim Lagerqvist

sharing knowledge with voice,or in FM,radio[attached to mobile] is also good

[quote=harsha de silva] The future is to use ICTs [here mainly mobile telephony] to reduce information search costs in the agriculture value chain and to link the decision to grow with that of to sell. [/quote] Harsha - Your study is the type of analysis which can move us forward. The farmer looks for his/her economic interest or benefit (see also Aker,2008 ) also in his/her information searchers. The donors want this evidence to be reflected in progress reports. The final objective is reducing total transaction costs to increase the incentives for small-holder farmers to participate in commercial agriculture as opposed to being stuck in subsistence farming. The breakdown of stages of information needs and searches is clarifying. The farmer has information needs and searches for information related to 6 stages: 1. Deciding 2. Seeding 3. Preparing and Planting 4. Growing 5.Harvesting, packing and storing 6.Selling. Your remarkable finding is that - for a group of small-holder farmers in Sri Lanka growing tomatoes, onions, brinjals and chilies - the information search costs amount to 11.0 percent of the total costs incurred by the farmers in the six stage process. Your figure which I reproduce here is an eye opener: [img]http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_BN_Idjmg_Hs/SS1HA5GLZvI/AAAAAAAABlI/icK74v32q…] [quote]"When the total information search costs in different stages of the agricultural value chain is considered, we find that the highest percentage of cost of information is incurred during the growth stage, followed by the decision stage and selling stage."[/quote] [quote]"In terms of proportion of cost of information in each stage in the agricultural value chain, the decision stage comes first with the cost of information search to total cost ratio being 3:1, followed by growing stage with a ratio of 1:4 and the selling stage with a ratio of 1:5."[/quote] But the intrigue comes for me in your statement: [quote]"The reason for the unusually high percentage of information search costs during the growing stage [53%] we found is caused by the idiosyncratic government procedure on fertilizer subsidy to farmers in that area. We expect the growing stage to be less pertinent in countries without such inefficient fertilizer subsidy policies and hence it is not analyzed further". [/quote] The absence of effective marketing chains is precisely a plague in Africa. It directly relatives the impact information and the use of mobile phone therein can have. A marketing chain can be seen as a multi-stakeholder network that is highly integrated and shares a common perspective or goal: to deliver a product as cheaply and efficiently as possible to the consumer. Increasing the efficiency of the whole chain - the purpose of providing agricultural information - is in the interest of all stakeholders, whether they are farmers, processors transporters, retailers or others. Threat of competition leads chain partners to be highly aware of the "competitive position' of their chain vis-à-vis others. This awareness leads to "chain thinking'. Creating such "chain awareness' is a big challenge in Africa. Two examples suffice. a) In [u]Benin[/u], a large number of unproductive people "eats' from the export earnings of the cotton produced by small farmers. Benin refuses to sell effective but cheaper pesticides that are available and that could reduce farmers' pesticide cost substantially, simply because that would cut the salesmen's profit. b) In [u]Ghana[/u] the Cocoa Marketing Board is directly involved in pesticide production. They have so far not cooperated in the certification of organic cocoa, which would undermine the rationale for mass spraying of synthetic chemicals. Mobile phone alerts can be used as advocacy tools here as mobile conferencing does. A lady farmer in [u]Uganda[/u] refused to tell the other farmers what she learned from a cheese making workshop she attended in [u]Italy[/u] (!). The extension worker found the information on internet and gave some technical cheese making training with mobile phone conferencing follow up. The "chain awareness': "Only large quantities of cheese justify a truck of cheese to Kampala" made the lady join the rest of the group. Let me quote you again: [quote]There are a lot more verticals and horizontals[/quote] PS. I posted your study on the [url=http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_BN_Idjmg_Hs/SS1HA5GLZvI/AAAAAAAABlI/icK74v32q… Secretariat blog[/url]

andy, yes we considered the cost of information search during the 'growth' stage; more than treatment it was care, fertilizer per se. there is an interesting account of it in our paper. but we have some more findings on mobile phones and treatment [not in the usual way of taking a picture of a leaf and sending it to the expert] in the context of produce traceability. a presentation on it is at http://www.lirneasia.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/de-silva_traceabili… cheers harsha

Dr. Jayanta Chatterjee, [quote=Jayanta Chatterjee]What are the latest applications/solutions tried out elsewhere or in other reserach labs for similar projects?[/quote] This sounds somewhat similar to what IBM is working on with [url=http://domino.research.ibm.com/comm/research_people.nsf/pages/arun_kuma… World Wide Telecom Web[/url]. Their vision is to have tagging, threads and so on but I'm not sure how much of it has been implemented. We had attempted to look at ICT interventions in agriculture in a systematic way and came up with a tree of sorts to categorize select example projects. Here's a snippet of it linked to the full image if you are interested: [url=http://www.grameenfoundation.applab.org/section/farmer-income-issue-tree] [img]http://www.grameenfoundation.applab.org/uploads/treesnippet.jpg[/img][/…] It only focuses on income generation which definitely paints an incomplete picture but I feel it does gives a good sense of what has been done so far. I believe that the future of ICT for rural regions is figuring out how to scale these exiting examples. I agree with what many of you have said about the private sector. If we can collectively get corporations to pick up on some of these ideas (eChoupal style), things will move very quickly. Héléne Martin [url=www.applab.org]www.applab.org[/url]

Apologies for the double post -- I shouldn't have hit refresh and now can't delete it! I'll take this opportunity to acknowledge that "getting the private sector to pick up on these ideas," as I said, is no trivial matter. As a number of you have noted, profit-driven multinationals are unlikely to be particularly interested in rural communities. That being said, what we've found in working with MTN in Uganda is that they are very receptive to providing resources to experiment with ideas that could expand their market share. The Village Phone replication across Africa really demonstrates this -- telecoms probably wouldn't have ventured in that direction themselves but they have been receptive to business model suggestions and partnerships. Héléne Martin [url=www.applab.org]www.applab.org[/url]

francois thanks for the comments and posting our paper on the FARA secretariat blog. [in fact a colleague just sent me a mail on it; how quick information flows now-a-days among the connected!] i must give more thought to your 'chain thinking' argument, it is a very logical construct and i am sure something that can be explored more in the current context, be it in africa or asia. cheers harsha

I already regret our discussions are coming to a close on Friday. One way forward is to share research papers on this issue. We are finalizing this week the [url=http://www.fara-africa.org/media/uploads/File/Announcements/Innovative%…] FARA Inventory on Innovative Farmer Advisory Services[/url]. (54 pages) This inventory was the result of an online consultation with the FARA [url=http://www.fara-africa.org/networking-support-projects/rails/]Regional Agricultural Information & Learning System (RAILS)[/url] held during the month of October + desk study. We are still receiving comments from IICD, CTA and IDRC which we will integrate in the final version. We will send on Friday 28/11 a summary of this inventory for the [url=http://www.ist-africa.org/home/]IST Africa call for papers and workshops[/url] (May 2009 Uganda conference). The presentation of the findings of the inventory will be integrated as one of the presentations in the AFRIFITA workshop at the IST conference. Information Technology in Agriculture, Food and Environment (AFRIFITA). Sure Africa can learn a lot from the Indian, Sri Lankan, and other experiences! We should convince the organisers of IST Africa about this.

At Akvo.org we are starting with a very practical future. We will be using SMS/MMS messages as part of our reporting platform from field projects. This will be implemented during the spring on our platform. We are envisaging to have verifiable photographs, videos, messages, GPS coordinates, timestamps, in future more sophisticated implementations, that will allow a number of interesting things: - Has a particular type of insect pest arrived in an area? Can be verified from a photograph. - Has a donated irrigation system been installed? - Has an irrigation system broken? How has it broken? Specialists can analyse photographs. - Has a large scale government supported rain water harvesting programme maintenance programme been successful? Provide support in pictures and locations. There are of course many other type of questions which can be answered by verifiable photographs and locations etc. With widespread use of these type of applications, they can also have "dual use". Verified human rights abuses, invasions, riots, by picture, location and timestamp, could be a very powerful tool. Best regards Thomas Bjelkeman-Pettersson http://akvo.org/

I agree with Joakim Lagerqvist "that we are coming to an end of an era where the telephone has been seen as only a audio communication tool." The mobile phone will become an all purpose tool or as [url=http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/jan_chipchase_on_our_mobile_phones.h… Jan Chipchase says ones identity[/url]. Technological wise the African Carrier MTN seeks to have $10 Phone and [url=http://www.redherring.com/Home/25543]"MTN's engineers also will be looking for higher-end smartphones that it can retail for about $40."[/url] One trend will be hopefully more disruptive innovation around mobile phones especially in Africa. If it is hardware or software, the creativity and ingenuity is happening - through adapting or hacking, new means and uses are developed right where they are needed. Open operation systems allow to create various needed features for the local context in the respective language. Hopefully users can built, arrange and adapt application like they can do already on the web nowadays (mashups, widgets, etc.). Another trend will around the local context, where increasing mobile features such as videos, photos, sooner or later GPS or sensors allow to analyse and document the environment. The mobile becomes a research tool to give its user the capacity to collect and share information. Open information repositories will be build. A fascinating example is the openstreetmap initiative (http://www.openstreetmap.org/) For example compare it with Google maps on Baghdad and Kabul. One outcome is increasing transparency. Mobile phones can be key for collectivity contributing to new information systems and receiving all sorts of information. The mobile as a publishing and broadcasting tool. Text, audio and video is already possible - its contributions can support own communication channels and coincide with existing forms of citizen journalism. Check Voices for Africa as an example with over 400 reporters. (http://voicesofafrica.africanews.com/) Here we already witness overlappings with other information and communication technologies such as radio. Surely, some form of data exchange has to work for that, which still inhibits several challenges. But that form of information exchange will happen, whatever technology is behind it. Tools for information exchange solely relying on SMS prove this is possible for all phones. [url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKB8HQB0w7s]Or it works with voice response software as the impressing Freedomfone Application shows. [/url] But we shall always ask whether mobile phones are the appropriate tool. There many others out there, which might fit better the need. Ken Banks says it nice in his article: [url=http://www.pcworld.com/article/154274/mobile_finance_indigenous_ingenio… Finance: Indigenous, Ingenious or Both?[/url] [quote]Should technology solutions aimed at the developing world, and mobile solutions in particular, seek to build on and enhance indigenous, traditional activities -- economic or otherwise -- or, where necessary, is it okay just to replace and lose them? That isn't the only question, either. How does the introduction of emerging mobile services shift the balance of power in traditional African societies? Will women, for example, remain as economically active participants in the new mobile-powered world, or will men take more control? Do mobiles narrow or widen gender inequalities? Is technology exacerbating the gap between the haves and have-nots, or is it truly proving as transformational as we all believe or hope?[/quote] [quote][/quote]

Hi Since Saripalli Suryanarayana raised the concern about ICT in disaster management; Most of the rural farmers in developing countries are in the areas which are prone to disasters - natural or man-made. Here in Sri Lanka I am handling a project namely Disaster Emergency Warning Network (DEWN) which is being done in collaboration with the Disaster Management Centre of Sri Lanka (Government Institution). Irrigation Department (among others) is one source of information that provides info related to possible floods and overflow of reservoirs to farmers/people in disaster prone areas. We use simple SMS as well as Cell Broadcasting (CB) to disseminate disaster information to the people. Sameera.

Hi! Everybody! Interesting postings, interesting discussion, exciting sharing! My vision is to have strong 'Public Private Partnerships' at national and international level to bringing in the benefits of mobile telephony for agricultural improvement.. The reason for this is- agriculture being a state subject/ subject of national importance lot of govt machinery is involved. In the mobile sector many private companies are playing major role either in providing services or products. A good 'PPP' Model consisting of "People - (Strong NGO representation) - Public (Govt institutions) - Private (Private Companies) can really benefit the e-agriculture through mobile phone services" For Product manufacturing and networking (Private companies may be involved) For documentation of data, providing data on agriculture - weather, markets, crops, package of practices etc.etc (Govt may be involved) For identifying the farmers organizing training programmes, follow up and obtaining feed back, providing farmers point of view for upgradation NGOs may be involved. Some of the inputs that are essential for strengthening farmers position in agriculture sector include timely information on weather forecasts and calamities, better and spontaneous agricultural practices, better marketing exposure and pricing, reduction of agricultural risks and enhanced incomes, better awareness and information, improved networking and communication, facility of online trading and e-commerce, better representation at various forums, authorities and platform, etc. Mobile telephony can be used for envisioning many of the above aspects. Janaki

There is need for rural electrification through the use of solar power to enable these disadvantaged communities be able to have their cell phones charged. Much as farmers want to access SMS market information, their phones tend to run out of power due to lack of electricity. So technology should be developed to come up with solar chargers unlike the ones that are available now which need electricity power. [/u]

The future looks brighter for mobile telephony and technologies because all factors point to the fact that mobile telephony and its technologies have provided relatively cheap and accessible alternates for communication and information exchange to the vulnerable of our societies. I would also say all stakeholders i.e World bodies (eg. FAO, UN…etc), Governments and in particular those of developing countries will have to see mobile telephony and its technologies as a relatively cheap alternative to educate and help alleviate poverty and thus provide support to Universities, Research institution and private sector to help develop application that are tallied to solving problems that face the under privileged of our societies who mostly are farmers. Already applications have been developed for mobile banking, drug authentication, remote vehicle control and tracking, electronic money transfer via mobile phones and just today Nokia press release has stated a new smart home platform to offer consumers new ways to control their homes with mobile device. This it states will open new era for networked home services and solution. The platform also will allow third parties to integrate their own smart solutions and services. I believe that these products will provide services which will cut across all aspects of social, economic and political landscape. Thank you

I am late to this discussion. Travelling in Ethiopia reminds me (us) of the very real challenges of connectivity. I sat around waiting for downloads even in the fastest of internet cafes, and my UK phone would not work, and much of my travelling time there was no mobile signal. However despite this reminder of some of the realities, I remain optimistic about the contribution of phones to agriculture. I notice in my quick read of the comments that people seem to be focusing on market data - I see something more. I envision this in three main ways:- :arrow: the location of the phone can be known - this will enable targetted messaging. In the same way Google now offers me a resurant around the corner when I am on Gmail, so to we can begin to see how governments, agencies and private sector will be able to target their messaging according to location. An encouragement to vaccinate all camels in a certain region could easily be sent in the local language (initially perhaps be text, but as smart phones kick in this will either be by very cheap VOIP or could be enhanced media). I am aware that evidence of messaging through radios suggests that it can give yield increases similar to the presence of an agricultural extensionist - and I see no reason why targetted messaging through phones couldnt achieve even greater yields. I also see that location specific messaging could solve the problem mentioned above about information overload. :arrow: similarly, the locational aspect could collect data - farmers requests for information from an information service could be analysed and provide information for key decision making. In the same way that Google now informs the US govt about suspected disease outbreaks due to peoples search patterns, so too search enquiries about what to do with bird flu on a mobile could be logged and located indicating where the outbreaks are. :arrow: thirdly I do see the role of phones for transactions. Not just market negotiations, but the Mpesa proposition in Kenya can be used for payment and enables record keeping and management which enhances the livelihoods. I like this report http://www.blinkx.com/video/mpesa-mov/p-dy0CY4RNzIKoUidKDvFA Well I realise this was a short discussion but thanks to the organisers Simon

hi I want to do a couple of posts on this issue, focusing on different areas. I'm going to cheat and look at a three to five year timescale. It's tricky I know, to predict that far ahead, but it has the advantage that I am as likely to be as right as people who know a lot more than me. In that frame, it's hard to separate out drivers for change in the usage of mobile phones in rural areas from those that impact general trends in the development of phones and their usage. Clearly, issues such as poor infrastructure and limited access are more important constraints in areas less densely populated. However, in that longer timescale isn't it likely that they will become less important - after all, think where we were five years ago in terms of connectivity and access. In terms of the "push", as it were, the changes that will be presented to users, the continuing, inexorable drive to convergence, convergence of functionality onto devices, of media and channels onto those devices as well as of the providers of commercial media and content will driive change more profoundly, I suggest, than many development initiatives. It will mean there is more of an economic opportunity for the private sector to invest in infrastructure, for example, as well as to develop handsets that carry this content to differently connected - and educated - populations. And the traffic won't necessarily be only one way, I think. The example already quoted of the development of free call-me services for populations that were relying on miscalls to convey messages (carrying advertising) illustrates that the private sector will engage in this area and the commercial return needn't necessarily be huge. However, I agree with Simon that even more fundamental is the convergence of commercial services, such as the m-money referred to earlier here. Phones and their services already means that they are identity-connectors, as Christian quotes, but this integration means a huge part of personal traffic will come together onto the same channels and devices. Providers of services and development agencies will therefore need to choose, I suggest, between investing in applications that will be instantly available and usable - largely text or USSD based, at the moment - and those that will come into their own in the medium term, as access and device functionality develops. At the same time, the control, ownership and therefore cost of those channels that will have become an even more important issue than now. Copyright and other content ownership issues also become enormously more complex in converged media. Who in the agricultural sector is focusing attention on these longer-term issues?

Hi, Thinking on how to improve the use of technology in developing countries has traditionally focused on "technology transfer", where technology developed and used in the west is adapted for use (or dumped!) in a developing country. The mobile phone itself is a good example of this - friends in Africa have the same handsets as friends in UK. However, I think the next generation of mobile phone applications are going to buck this trend. When looking for information (or data), friends in the UK will almost always use a computer on the internet. But the internet doesn't work in the same way in Africa, which is where mobile handsets will come in. Because people in the west tend not to use mobiles to access "serious" information, there is little incentive for companies to develop the kinds of useful applications we've been talking about. So we're not going to be able to transfer applications from US / EU to Africa. Instead, we will need to support local software companies to develop local solutions tailored to local conditions. There are some really good examples of locally developed applications, and some really talented people out there. I gather that some of the ICT incubator programmes have not been as successful as hoped. Are there other things that can be done? Nigel (Gamos)

The future for application of Ict or more soecifically mobile based application is very promising.But one word of caution.It can be achieved unless we put all our hands together .The domain expert and the technology expert should work together.A comprehensive approach to informattion needs and information management should be worked out and consortium approach at the implementation level ishould be at place.We have seen piloting but no upscaling has been done .This is a worrying factor.The future depends on upscaling and acceptability than on piloting and forgetting. All we can make it a success by learning from each others' mistake and innovate at every time of mistake.

I wanted to build upon what Andy Dearden and Nigel Scott have said in their posts. I fully believe that technology design and development must be more driven by people's needs on the ground. However, one of the reasons that some ICT4D projects have failed is that NGOs, who do not possess the capacity to develop technology solutions, have tried to do so unsuccessfully. Furthermore, once the project is over, there is no further support left for users of the technology, and sustainability becomes a huge question. Working for a small African software company, I have seen the benefit of building the capacity of local developers and programmers. This growth leads to more highly skilled, dynamic individuals who in turn can continue to innovate and drive local solutions to meet the needs of people in the places where they live. However, it is typically difficult to attract the private sector to invest in such ventures in Africa because these entrepreneurs are primarily risk averse. This is where I see the public sector and NGOs playing a huge role—by fast tracking these private enterprise initiatives and partnering with local business so that the solution can be sustainable after the time period of any given project.

[quote=ravishankar m]This would involve creating a CUG ( closed user group) , a network of all the stake holders like, warehouse, transport, buyers, logistic providers, traders etc.[/quote] ravishankar, if I well understand your point, you think that creating "communities" of people involved in the same activity, with a clear common objective, would help the process to proceed to the reaching the aim. I'm actually involved in the creation of Communities of Practice online and I'm deep supporter of this model. :) Having a strong linkage with other people, being on the same part of the barricade in doing something, can help a lot in my opinion in sharing knowledge inside the group on how to do that thing and doing things better. The model I'm referring to is used mainly on the Internet because of specific features of the Web but I think could be replicated in different ways also using mobile phones. One of the key point is the creation of a two-ways communication flow inside a group of people and being able to stimulate a positive interaction. And here my provocative question: do we really want to stimulate such a communication among people? Are we ready to listen and not only to talk? Are we able to do it?

[quote=krishna mishra]The future depends on upscaling and acceptability than on piloting and forgetting. [/quote] Challenges for upscale: 1 - Innovative information initiatives invite farmers to use and share their traditional knowledge using modern ICT. Rural community and scientists have come together for weather forecasting, blending frontier science and traditional knowledge which influence the decision-making process. But when plenty of farmers are reached by a particular farmer information provider the service may become controversial if no consensus was reached prior to the upscale about the content with a large community of agricultural and rural actors. 2 - A second challenge for the upscale of (the presently mainly pilot) ICT and mobile phone projects will be the necessary alliance with a mobile phone company. Several mobile phone providers compete for this "last frontier market". Also politicians challenge the major mobile phone providers: "Your competitor reaches the rural population with mobile credit services, how do you intend to service the farmers?" 3 - A third challenge is to make sure the information platforms are inter-operational. In an upscale each of the platforms on which farmers' information is delivered has various advantages and limitations, and is often an inadequate solution when used on its own. It is observed here that to provide an effective solution many platforms need to be carefully integrated in such a way as to harness the benefits of individual platforms while avoiding their limitations. In other words, an effective solution must contain all these individual platforms organised carefully so that each falls in its place to fulfill a set objective. The solution then becomes an information matrix whose elements are the individual platforms and whose composition is done on the basis of the set objectives. For the farmers' information service the elements of the information matrix include the following: (a) SMS (text) Platform; (b) Voice platform; (c) Web-portal; (d) Call centre; (e) Extension workers; (f) Libraries; (g) Researchers. 4 - As pointed out by Laura Drewett: A last challenge is that [quote]it is typically difficult to attract the private sector to invest in such ventures in Africa because these entrepreneurs are primarily risk averse. This is where the public sector and NGOs can play a huge role by fast tracking these private enterprise initiatives and partnering with local business so that the solution can be sustainable after the time period of any given project. [/quote]

The rural masses or peasant farmers increasingly need to access timely and critical informatioin on inputs for their crops, livestock farming and markets for the produce. But how can this be fascilitated? - A deal can be stroke between the various stakeholders involved (farmer organisations, NGOs, produce or trader groups, etc) and the mobile telephone network providers to sell low cost state of the art mobile phones with high multimedia qualities to their members payable within a fixed period. This will provide widespread ownership of mobile phones for a start. - Then free call time for members can be negotiated for a few minutes per day or per week. Group free calls can also be instituted. Bonuses can even be allocated for regular callers to encourage the regular use of the mobile phones to search, collect and transmit critical information they need - In a similar manner, the use of SMS messages that are free of charge and toll-free numbers can be negotiated with the mobile operators for farmers to submit information or request information to and from available information databanks. In my humble opinion, if the above can be implemented by the various stakeholders at their various levels, then the access to timely and relevant information by our rural farmers needed for increased productivity, improved crop yields, improved livestock management practices and for easy marketing of their produce will gradually be a reality. In turn, the cost of production will be reduce and the adoption of new technological packages proposed by agricultural research in our various regions will be greatly enhanced.

Just few lines to end my participation, for now, to this online Forum. I think this has been a very interesting discussion, not only for the postings themselves, but mainly for the large number and value of people involved, experiences described and points of view reflected in these two weeks. I feel like saying a big thanks to every participant form the five continents and to the e-Agriculture hosts who launched this initiative and sustained it. I really hope to stay in touch and keep on exchanging with all of you in the future, perpetrating in this productive and pleasing exercise to share and debate about our experiences. To conclude my intervention, I used [url=http://www.wordle.net/]wordle[/url], an online tool, to try to represent the complexity and the value of our last discussion in this thread. Clicking on the image below you can see the graphical result of this exercise. [url=http://www.wordle.net/gallery/wrdl/347966/prova_1][img]http://www.wordl…] Thanks everyone, it has been a pleasure :) Cheers Luca (FAO)