03/02/2012
A local project in northern Ethiopia, supported by FAO, is illustrating how the introduction of new fruit trees can improve food security and economic opportunities for small farmers. New fruits, such as apples and apricots, have been very well accepted, and demand has immediately begun to increase...
19/01/2012
With the support of the Department of Primary Industries, an innovative project was recently undertaken in Victoria, Australia exploring the development of smartphone applications and their possible acceptance in agriculture. The resulting report addresses some of the challenges and opportunities...
18/01/2012
The eTransform Africa report, produced by the World Bank and the African Development Bank, addresses the potential of ICTs (particularly mobile phones) to change business models in key sectors for Africa. The transformation of various sectors is discussed, including agriculture, climate...
17/01/2012
ABSTRACT
This paper explores the use of mobile Geographic Information System (GIS) computing in its application in water point management. Applications based on mobile GIS are the best way to provide appropriate solutions for rural populations such as breeders in Senegal. In fact, the...
11/01/2012
The Society For Education and Research Development (India) in cooperation with HumanIT (Karlstad University, Sweden) invite you to the 3rd International Conference on M4D - Mobile Communication for Development, following the inaugural conference in Karlstad, Sweden in 2008 and second conference in...
10/01/2012
Initiated in 2006 by OneWorld in collaboration with British Telecom and Cisco Systems, LifeLines today is an agri-information service, serving rural communities in 53 districts across 4 states of India with information services in Agriculture and Education.
"The LifeLines service...
03/01/2012
Mutual learning, observation and community memory: networked communication tools for farmers in Bagamoyo, Tanzania.
Sauti ya wakulima, "The voice of the farmers", is a farmers group in Tanzania launched in early 2011, a Community of Practice against the digital divide. Farmers use...
27/12/2011
Source: USAID- Tyrone Hall
Tyrone Hall's article in the Global Broadband and Innovations (GBI) Portal of USAID's ICT4Develpment section, highlights the "Five Most Fascinating Ag Apps of 2011", which are:
iCow: "This app is a mobile phone cow calendar; it prompts farmers...
27/12/2011
Reflections on Mobile Agriculture Services: Blog Series
The mFarmer Initiative, a partnership between GSMA, USAID and Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) in collaboration with e-Agriculture, initiated an online discussion late November to early December 2011.
The 2-week forum which was...
21/12/2011
The USAID FACET Project (Fostering Agriculture Competitiveness Employing Information Communication Technologies) project has created a series of Briefing Papers designed to help USAID missions and their implementing partners in sub-Saharan Africa use information and communications technology (ICT...
15/12/2011
Nano Ganesh is a product that enables farmers to use mobile phones to check for electricity and monitor and control irrigation pumps to water their crops in remote locations.
Developed by Santosh Ostwal in 1996, and continually improved over the years since, the product starting gaining significant...
12/12/2011
Apposit LLC, a mobile technology company in Ethiopia, recently joined forces with the ICT for development (ICT4D) consortium Connect4Change. They will be working together to support the design and implementation of mobile services for more than 150 Ethiopian farmer marketing organizations.
Read the...
03/12/2011
"Mobile telephony has had a positive impact on many countries in Latin America and the Caribbean by contributing to rural development. However, there are certain limitations to address in order for this technology to be accessible to more individuals in rural communities, in...
03/12/2011
"The quickest way to get out of poverty right now is to have one mobile telephone" Muhammad Yunus, Nobel Peace Laureate, Founder and Director of the Grameen Bank, Bangladesh
This Policy Brief is based on the input of e-Agriculture Community members who participated in the online...
15/11/2011
With the launch of their Africa Mobile Observatory 2011 report, GSMA recently announced that Africa is now the second largest mobile market by connections, as well as the fastest growing mobile market worldwide. It is predicted that the number of mobile subscribers in Africa will reach 735 million...
11/11/2011
Sauti ya wakulima, "The voice of the farmers" in Kiswahili, is a collaborative, multimedia knowledge base created by farmers from the Chambezi region of the Bagamoyo District in Tanzania. By using smartphones, farmers gather audiovisual evidence of their practices, and publish images and...
08/11/2011
Kenneth Masuki, scientist at the World Agroforestry studied the impact of mobile phones for agricultural information dissemination in the south western Uganda. His analysis tend to confirm the positive impact of phones for farmers’ access to market and building of social capital. The data...
04/11/2011
Given the substantial increase in the use of mobile phones in recent years, and the potential impact of this phenomenon on people in the developing world, it certainly warrants significant attention in the field of international development. In response to a relative lack of scholarly attention to...
03/11/2011
A brief profile outlining SlimTrader's MoBiashara platform, which is enabling farmers in Nigeria to purchase inputs directly via their phones, including how it works, the implementer/funder, the technology used, fees, primary markets, users, business model, and impact.
02/11/2011
Esoko is a platform that provides market information to farmers, such as price alerts, buy and sell offers, and stock counts. The idea behind this system is that it can be a very refined and specialized tool, but most users can interact with it in a very simple way (just using their mobile devices...
31/10/2011
The mFarmer Initiative, recently launched by GSMA and supported by USAID and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, was developed to increase the productivity and incomes of millions of poor farmers through the use of mobile phone service networks.
This webinar will introduce you to the...
31/10/2011
Our ability to meet the increasing global demand for food is being threatened by factors such as rising input costs, severe weather events, and water shortages. The agriculture sector is increasingly turning to technology to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of smallholder farming.
The...
28/10/2011
The USAID FACET Project (Fostering Agriculture Competitiveness Employing Information Communication Technologies) project has created a series of Briefing Papers designed to help USAID missions and their implementing partners in sub-Saharan Africa use information and communications technology (ICT...
26/10/2011
In Kenya smallholders farmers sell on average 3 to 5 liters of milk per day when a family should sell at least 15 liters to pass the poverty line. Green Dreams TECH Ltd developed iCow, a SMS and voice based mobile platform application originally created in order to help farmers to manage...
24/10/2011
A study of the impact of mobile phones on fisherman in Kerala based on a survey conducted between 1997 and 2001 Jensen (2007), clearly demonstrates the tremendous potential of ICTs in the food market. The paper shows that the introduction of mobile phones in Kerala results in shift in the local...
21/10/2011
Ifejika and al (2009) studied the impact of mobile phones for fishmongers in Western Nigeria’s Kainji Lake Basin. The study shows the important use of mobile in the circulation of information through fishers, customers but also to control prices. Indeed, more than half of the fishmongers...
12/10/2011
"A brief profile outlining Nokia Life Tools, which is currently being used to provide agricultural information to farmers across China, India, Indonesia and Nigeria. This profile includes information on how it works, the implementer/funder, the technology used, fees, primary markets, users,...
12/10/2011
"A brief profile outlining DataDyne's Mobile Information Platform (MIP), which is being used by farmer cooperatives in Chile to provide their members with localized agricultural information via SMS, including how it works, the implementer/funder, the technology used, fees, primary...
12/10/2011
"A brief profile outlining IKSL's green SIM card and Helpline, which are being used to provide farmers with free access to agricultural information in India, including how it works, the implementer/funder, the technology used, fees, primary markets, users, business model, and impact....
27/09/2011
By: Appolinaire Tagne
Agriculture is the back bone of the economy of many developing countries, and these activities have a direct impact on their Gross National Product (GNP); with the distribution of roles in society in the western region of Cameroon, women are highly involved in the production...
01/09/2011
New mobile applications can mobilize local knowledge, reduce the time/cost of acquiring valuable information, and empower farmers.
A partnership including Sustainable Harvest and Exprima Media is developing apps for product tracking, cooperative management, and farmer learning, in collaboration...
01/09/2011
Source: ICTUpdate
By: Patrice Annequin-Marketing and market information specialist at IFDC.
"Technology increases a farmer’s ability to reach potential buyers, but it does not guarantee that the farmer will get a good deal"
How can technology help farmers find new markets?...
10/08/2011
A mobile learning toolkit that contains an overview of mobile learning, 15 mobile learning methods and a selection of tools that can be used to facilitate these methods has been developed at ITC-ILO. Each method includes a general step-by-step guide plus a customisation to the MyCOOP training...
05/08/2011
OpenBTS is an open-source Unix application that uses the Universal Software Radio Peripheral (USRP) to present a GSM air interface ("Um") to standard GSM handset and uses the Asterisk® software PBX to connect calls. The combination of the ubiquitous GSM air interface with VoIP...
02/08/2011
Introducing the Mobile Media Toolkit, the newest project from MobileActive.org that is all about Making Media Mobile.
The Mobile Media Toolkit helps you make sense of the growing role of mobile tech in media. The Toolkit provides how-to guides, mobile tools, and case studies on how mobile phones...
01/08/2011
This large-scale study was published in February 2010 by the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations. Authors Sanjay Gandhi, Gaurav Tripathi, and Dr. Surabhi Mittal interviewed 200 small scale farmers to highlight the best uses of mobiles to support agricultural productivity...
01/08/2011
This two-part series released by Mobile Active in May 2011 looks at the benefits and potential dangers that mobiles bring to women in the developing world. Examples and context includes women in rural communities, and women with agricultural or agriculture-related livelihoods.
Part One of the...
23/06/2011
Farmers in the area around Tominian in Mali use cell phones and radio adverts to sell non-timber products from local trees, and supplement their income from agriculture.
Source: ICTUpdate. By: Tony Hill
"Tree Aid has been working with a local NGO, Sahel Eco, since 2005. The two organisations...
22/06/2011
"Mobile Platform Aims to Boost African Commerce"
Source: Mobiledia. By: Doug Rule
"A new streamlined e-commerce platform aims to connect African consumers with merchants using only their cell phones, another way mobile is being used to help improve African lives...
21/06/2011
Maureen Agena shares her experiences from her recent assignment in support of the development of a gender responsive National Land Policy, facilitating women’s economic empowerment and rural employment for women, men and youth in Uganda; under the FAO project OSRO/UGA/004/UNJ "...
20/06/2011
Una problemática multidimensional que debe ser abordada de forma multidimensional.
Resumen personal de la reunión interactiva de facilitación "Promesas de las comunicación móvil: ¿Cuál es el impacto socio-económico en las comunidades...
20/06/2011
Women and youth's socio-economic empowerment. Experiences from an ICT activist in Uganda
I am an ICT for Development practitioner who is actively engaged in promoting the issues of women and youth socio-economic empowerment through the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs...
16/06/2011
The mFarmer Initiative Challenge Fund exists to support the deployment of agricultural information and advisory services at scale via the mobile channel to small-holder farmers who earn less than $2 dollars a day. These mobile agricultural solutions can bridge the information gap and increase the...
16/06/2011
Source: Becky Blab's Blog
This blog post provides "a snapshot of the 'm4d' situation in India, and point you to further resources should you want to find out more about the exciting potential of mobile for development"; for instance, among some initiatives in mobile agriculture...
14/06/2011
The 4th Global Forum on Innovation & Technology Entrepreneurship, organized by infoDev, the World Bank, and partners, May 30 - June 3, 2011 in Helsinki, Finland focused on mobile applications, agri-business and clean technologies. A panel session was organized to focus specifically on "...
12/06/2011
Los Frutichicos, una apuesta joven por el desarrollo del sector frutícola colombiano
El Frutisitio de los frutichicos que trabajan en el frutiproyecto... parece un juego de palabras pero en realidad se trata de un proyecto de investigación muy concreto, hecho por un grupo de j...
12/06/2011
The role of ICTs in increasing the attractiveness of agriculture for young people
Unattractiveness of agriculture
When choosing their field of study today, most youngsters tend to choose medical science, computer, management, engineering, finance and accounting, law etc. It is very...
10/06/2011
A multidimensional issue that must be faced in a multidimensional way.
A personal summary of the Interactive Facilitation Meeting "The promise of mobile communication: What is the socio-economic impact on rural communities?" held at the WSIS Forum 2011 (see details below).
...
03/06/2011
Mobiles4Dev: A UNICEF commissioned reasearch project to understand the global mobile telephony landscape for development
Source: Commonwealth Telecommunications Organisation (CTO)
The Mobiles4Dev project was a research study commissioned by UNICEF to help the organisation and other...
31/05/2011
A high level panel on Mobiles in Agriculture will be held today (31 May) from 14.00hr to 15.30hr at the InfoDev Global Forum in Helsinki, Finland.
This expert workshop will focus on the use of mobile technology in agriculture and the management of forestry resources. The themes are drawn from the...
09/05/2011
A case study in a rural area of Puno (Peru) shows how mobile phones are used and incorporated in everyday life activities. These include both agricultural and livestock activities and participation in weekly fairs.
Everybody has a mobile phone: this is what several individuals interviewed in...
09/05/2011
The transformative power of mobile telephones has everyone abuzz with excitement, not least of which includes the e-Agriculture community. And rightly so! As urban markets in developing countries are becoming increasingly saturated and tariff wars have almost cannibalized the sector in some...
06/05/2011
The role of mobile technology in development is now undeniable. Supporting sound economic growth, while reducing socio-economic disparity is essential. This month the e-Agriculture Community begins with a series of special blogs on the subject of mobile telephony in development:
Manish Pandey,...
12/04/2011
The Institute of Management Studies (Ghaziabad, India) in cooperation with HumanIT (Karlstad University, Sweden) is organizing the 3rd International Conference on Mobile Communication for Development (M4D2012), following the inaugural conference in Karlstad, Sweden in 2008 and 2nd conference in...
08/04/2011
Hosted on the WSIS Platform of Communities by UNESCO, this debate focuses on the impact of mobile phones in development, and will address the question:
Do mobiles have more value in social development or in economic development?
Your contribution is invited to this debate. Which do you think...
31/03/2011
The Program: "CocoaLink - Connecting Cocoa Communities"
Core Program Partners: World Cocoa Foundation, Ghana Cocoa Board and The Hershey Company
Sources: World Cocoa Foundation, The Hershey's Newsroom
Photo: World Cocoa Foundation ...
29/03/2011
Source: SciDev.Net
Article: "Phone cartoons bring know-how to poor farmers"
By: Emeka Johnkingsley. March, 2011
Image by: Scientific Animations Without Borders
The article highlights a new project from Scientific Animations Without Borders, to deliver animated cartoons which bring...
21/03/2011
Un Piloto Móvil Exitoso para el Mercado Electrónico del Agua (MEDA), Chile
El Mercado Electrónico del Agua (MEDA) es un proyecto diseñado para apoyar a pequeños agricultores chilenos con derechos para el uso de agua para regar sus cultivos, efectuar ventas y...
21/02/2011
The report draws on the experiences of projects using mobile phone-based information and communication technologies (ICT) applications in a number of situations, including mobile monitoring and evaluation, m-banking, community development, literacy, anti-corruption, agricultural extension and...
16/02/2011
The enthusiasm for the latest ultimate (mobile) device, revolutionary app, or sms-based market information system seems to imply it's that simple. I only wish it were.
So concludes Ugo Vallauri in his thought provoking new blog for the e-Agriculture Community.
Ugo writes a thoughtful,...
10/12/2010
MobileActive Video:
Ugo Vallauri, David Newman and Jonathan Campaigne discuss small farm productivity issues which are key to economic growth and poverty reduction.
They discuss how farmers are not effectively linked to the larger industry and therefore how mobiles phones can be used to help with...
23/02/2010
The 2nd Edition of this Policy Brief is now available (PDF) in English, Spanish and French.
"Mobile telephony has had a positive impact on many countries in Latin America and the Caribbean by contributing to rural development. However, there are certain limitations to...
03/02/2010
United Nations Foundation
Vodafone Group Foundation
"An estimated 3.5 billion mobile phones are now in use around the world—more people now have one than don’t. This remarkable revolution—widespread access to the most ubiquitous communication device in human history—has...
08/06/2009
Summary Report
This summary report presents key findings from a research report produced by the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organisation (CTO). Funded by Ericsson, the project called on the CTO to describe and analyse the current and future mobile content (m-content) requirements of end-users...
19/04/2009
Published by: Chabossou, A., Stork, C., Stork, M., Zahonogo. Z.
ABSTRACT
This paper uses data from nationally representative household survey conducted in 17 African countries to analyse mobile adoption and usage.
This paper shows that countries differ in their levels of ICT adoption and...
07/04/2009
The Policy Brief from the English language Forum on Mobile Telephony in Rural Areas.
The document is available in three languages:
English: http://www.e-agriculture.org/sites/default/files/uploads/media/e-agr_PB_Telephony_en_web.pdf
Spanish: http://www.e-agriculture.org/...
31/03/2009
The 2nd Edition of this Policy Brief is now available (PDF) in English, Spanish and French.
"The quickest way to get out of poverty right now is to have one mobile telephone." Muhammad Yunus, Nobel Peace Laureate, Founder and Director of the Grameen Bank, Bangladesh
This Policy...
12/01/2009
Mobile phones are useful tools for collecting data in the field. As a result, there is an abundance of mobile data collection applications and projects.
Unlike bulk messaging and general information services that are targeting the general public as recipients of standardized messaging,...
08/01/2009
Ms. Anna-Maria Walter had the opportunity to speak with Mr. Christian Kreutz, Subject Matter Expert from the Virtual Forum "Mobile Telephony in Rural Areas" held on e-Agriculture.org in November 2008. Christian, a consultant, shared his experiences with Anna-Maria, and his vision for...
23/12/2008
The Application Laboratory (AppLab) enables people to use phones and other mobile devices as powerful tools to improve their lives and livelihoods. With over 3.3 billion mobile phones in the world, two-thirds of which are in developing economies, there is tremendous potential for...
23/12/2008
Mobile phones and development: The future in new hands?
Articles on various topics, including:
Micro-entrepreneurs in Nigeria
Mobile ladies in Bangladesh
Unequal gender relations in Zambia
Beyond the three billion mark
Mobile banking
Poor households in Jamaica
23/12/2008
MobileActive.org is a community of people and organizations using mobile phones for social impact. We are committed to increasing the effectiveness of NGOs around the world who recognize that the 3.5 billion mobile phones provide unprecedented opportunities for organizing, communications, and...
23/12/2008
This study looks at mobile phone usage among farmers in Morocco. The following research questions are considered:
Does cellular phone use affect farmers' revenues?
Does cellular phone use affect agricultural production strategies?
Does cellular phone use in farming result in agricultural...
23/12/2008
The idea of Mobile4Dev is to use cell phones and any other mobile devices to support development projects related to knowledge management and knowledge sharing.
Visit the Talk-Share-Learn "Mobile for development" page to learn more: http://talksharelearn.wordpress.com/mobile4dev/...
23/12/2008
Paper: The use of mobile phones by microentrepreneurs in Kigali, Rwanda: Changes to social and business networks
Author: Jonathan Donner, The Earth Institute at Columbia University
Dates: 7-8 October 2005
A survey of mobile phone users in Kigali, Rwanda suggests that mobiles are allowing...
23/12/2008
Many developing country governments and developing agencies are focusing on extending telecommunications services into rural areas, as they seek to alleviate poverty, encourage economic and social growth, and overcome a perceived ‘digital divide’. However, relatively little is known...
23/12/2008
TED Talks: Nokia researcher Jan Chipchase's investigation into the ways we interact with technology has led him from the villages of Uganda to the insides of our pockets. He's made some unexpected discoveries along the way.
23/12/2008
FrontlineSMS is free software that turns a laptop and a mobile phone into a central communications hub. Once installed, the program enables users to send and receive text messages with large groups of people through mobile phones. What you communicate is up to you, making FrontlineSMS useful in...
23/12/2008
EPROM (Entrepreneurial Programming and Research on Mobiles) is part of the Program for Developmental Entrepreneurship. Although today’s mobile phones are designed to meet Western needs, subscribers in developing countries now represent the majority of mobile phone users worldwide. The...
23/12/2008
This paper, produced by the World Bank Group's Global ICT (GICT) department, examines the role of mobile telephones in sustainable poverty reduction among the rural economically poor. It discusses the role of information in rural poverty, explores whether mobile phones are the appropriate delivery...
15/10/2008
Due partly to costly information, price dispersion across markets is common in developed and developing countries. Between 2001 and 2006, cell phone service was phased in throughout Niger, providing an alternative and cheaper search technology to grain traders and other market actors. We construct...
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