2016 ICT4D Conference

Mobile technologies are greatly improving the quality and timeliness of services delivered by agricultural extension workers to farmers while at the same time increasing accountability and making reporting more efficient. However, as compared to other "m" fields, such as healthcare (mHealth), there has been relatively less attention to "mAgriculture", e.g., with fewer dedicated conferences and less funding.

In this presentation, Dimagi Field Manager Nele Groosman will present the wide range of ways that the CommCare mobile platform has been used in agriculture. Although originally designed for community health workers, CommCare has been deployed for four major sub-sectors of agriculture: Agricultural Extension Advisory, Value-chain Logistics, Cooperative Management and Support, and Financial Services. These use cases cover many points in the agricultural supply chain, to help agricultural programs increase efficiency and improve the livelihoods of stakeholders in of those involved in rural agriculture.

Nele will describe the process of designing and developing applications for agricultural initiatives. Participants will learn about different potential application of mobile technology to support agricultural development, as well as the challenges and considerations that come with designing and piloting ICT tools in low-resource rural settings. Dimagi has implemented 55 agricultural projects in 19 countries to date.