Originally posted on the GBI Portal – Page 27

How Indian IT companies are addressing the HIV/AIDS challenge

The information and technology (ICT) sector can play a significant role in addressing socio-economic challenges faced by people living with HIV/AIDS (PLHA).

Dr. Joseph Okpaku, President and CEO of Telecom Africa Corporation, calls for a “bold, innovative and comprehensive programme to provide skills development and online employment for HIV/AIDS patients and their families.” The network capacity of ICTs, he argues, should be leveraged to support such initiatives.

The HIV/AIDS epidemic threatens to derail India’s economic boom and demographic change, says a 2009 World Bank Study. An effective response to this challenge requires the engagement of all sectors. The report reveals that the IT sector can play an important part in efforts for HIV/AIDS prevention, reduction of stigma and discrimination, but also for the care, support and treatment of PLHA.

IT companies are using their expertise, access to skills and resources, and vast networks to address this issue. E-learning, mobile gaming and call center are some of the innovative approaches used in this regard to raise awareness, educate, and provide counseling and information services for HIV prevention, care, and support efforts. As part of their corporate social responsibilities (CSR), these companies work with NGOs to improve the livelihoods of PLHA, carry out advocacy campaign on issues of stigma and discrimination of PLHA and educate the youth across India and around the world about HIV/AIDS.

Case study 1: ZMQ Software Systems

(ZMQ's Co-Founder) Elected Ashoka Fellow

ZMQ Software Systems develops socially relevant technology and uses ICT for social benefit. Staff allocates 5-8% of their time to develop IT-based learning programs on HIV/AIDS which reaches young people through mobile games. Some of its future programs include a Mobile Care Support and Treatment to support PLHA. Furthermore, the company presently invests 12 percent of its profits on social development and HIV/AIDS prevention initiatives.

Case study 2: AppLabs

AppLabs reaches out to its employees and to disadvantaged communities through awareness generation, educational campaigns, and by encouraging its employees to volunteer their time and skills to assist partner NGOs and PLHA. The aim, in particular, is to help improve the lives of individuals and families affected by the epidemic and to address issues of stigma and discrimination.

Why focus on the IT sector?

The Indian IT sector is critical to India’s booming economy. It contributes to six percent of overall GDP, employs approximately 2 million people, and indirectly created jobs for 8-9 million people.

Secondly, the issue of HIV/AIDS is of great concern for IT companies because the industry’s workforce is in the 21-45 age cohorts, with many in their twenties. Furthermore, 65 percent of the IT companies registered with the National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) are based in states with high HIV concentrations.

Third, there is a great opportunity to encourage the private sector involvement in the fight against HIV/AIDS because IT companies are beginning to realize the extent to which they can contribute to changes in HIV/AIDS prevention and social well-being of their workforce and spheres of influence.

December 1, 2011/by actualize

Education, Family Planning, Health, HIV/AIDS, Originally posted on the GBI Portal, Youth Development

Computer-based Sex Education Program Proves Effective in HIV Prevention

A recently released paper looking at systematic approaches to program adaptation of evidence-based health promotion programs focused on the computer-based sexuality education program, The World Starts With Me (WSWM), for a case study.

WSWM, introduced in 2003 by the World Population Foundation, was developed for a priority population in Uganda and adapted for use in Indonesia this year. The program’s target population includes both school-going young people and early school leavers, generally ages 12-19, and is complemented with teacher-led activities. It utilizes a comprehensive approach that includes building IT-skills and creative expression, aiming to contribute to sexual and reproductive health as well as social and economic development.

Student using The World Starts With Me program

Photo Credit: The World Starts With Me

The program provides introductory computer skills lessons as well as 14 lessons on adolescent development, decision making and sexual and reproductive health and rights. The lessons employ effective sex education methods, including practical applications to increase knowledge, develop attitudes, and help youth recognize and cope with social influences.

The paper’s authors, all public health professionals and academics, chose WSWM as their case study because of its proven success. In 2004, the program received the Golden Nica Award by Prix Ars Electronica in the digital communities category, and UNESCO used WSWM’s digital curriculum as a guideline for implementing effective sexuality education.

A meta-analysis revealed that computer technology-based programs like WSWM have similar results to traditional human-delivered interventions in terms of HIV/AIDS prevention behavior adoption. In particular, they proved to have positive results in increased condom use and reduced sexual activity, numbers of sex partners and sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Computer-based assignments also allow programs like WSWM to be student-driven, which means teachers are less burdened to talk about sensitive sexuality issues which may be uncomfortable for students. According to the meta-analysis, given computer-based programs’ “low cost to deliver, ability to customize intervention content, and flexible dissemination channels, they hold much promise for the future of HIV prevention.”

http://www.theworldstarts.org/

This research paper reveals that ICT-based HIV-prevention programs like WSWM can be effectively adapted in other contexts, which could lead to widespread reduction in HIV rates among young people.

December 1, 2011/by actualize

Health, Humanitarian Assistance, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

Using ICTs to Address HIV/AIDS in Humanitarian Emergencies

Responding to humanitarian emergencies poses a complex set of challenges that is exacerbated in areas where high rates of HIV/AIDS exist. The number of people living with HIV/AIDS hovers around 33 million and the vast majority live in sub-Saharan Africa, bringing to the forefront the complex interactions between HIV/AIDS, food security, livelihoods, and humanitarian action. This unique set of issues leads to the question of whether ICTs can be leveraged to address HIV/AIDS challenges in humanitarian crises, and if so, which groups are already doing so.

ICTs have been a used as a means for addressing HIV/AIDS issues in humanitarian situations by global aid agencies. The United Nations (UN) has recognized the impacts on HIV/AIDS on food security and is responding by integrating HIV into humanitarian responses. A priority for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) has been to “ensure a sustained flow of information and analysis on AIDS and [HIV] needs of populations in humanitarian situations” by producing reports, web specials, audio reports, fact files, etc. on the Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN) website. For example, IRIN radio produced a weekly 10-episode radio drama on HIV and AIDS for Somalis to listen to in the crisis country. The drama started on October 15^th and can be heard on the IRIN website.

FilmAid screening film at Kenyan refugee camp

Photo credit: FilmAid

Nongovernmental organizations are also using ICTs to address HIV/AIDS in humanitarian situations. FilmAid provides knowledge and empowerment to people suffering the effects of war, poverty, displacement or disaster through informational films. The organization works with communities to create films that are appropriate to the local context and relevant to community issues. One of the issue areas that FilmAid focuses on is Health & Safety, including HIV/AIDS. The organization has created various films relating to HIV/AIDS issues, such as a series of PEPFAR films that were shown in a Dadaab refugee camp in Kenya. The PEPFAR films were developed with the communities in Dadaab and promoted the prevention of mother-to-child HIV transmission, the uptake of voluntary counseling and testing (VCT), and abstinence.

The human rights organization WITNESS has created a video that tells the story of people living with HIV/AIDS in the war-torn Eastern region of the DRC, shown below. The film advocates for the provision of free testing, increased access to medical care, and prevention outreach in an area that desperately needs it.

These cases show that ICTs can be leveraged to address HIV/AIDS issues in humanitarian emergencies on many different levels, such as information flow, education, and advocacy. There is vast potential for increased ICT to more effectively and quickly address HIV/AIDS issues in humanitarian crises.

December 1, 2011/by actualize

Democracy & Governance, Elections, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

Egyptians queue up for second-day of landmark elections in post-Mubarak era

Voters are turning out in numbers at polling stations in major cities for the first elections since President Hosni Mubarak was overthrown. So far, the electoral process has been peaceful with few reported security concerns amid fears that polling could be delayed due to the deadly protests against the interim military regime.

Some Internet activists chose to boycott elections in protest of military rule whilst others have taken up the responsibility to monitor elections using social media tools. Tardiness of judges, missing allots, and inadequate security have led to delays causing long lines at polling stations, and there has been reports of apparent violations of the election code by some political parties. However, these expected shortcomings have not dented voters’ enthusiasm.

“They’re trying to make it delayed so that we get angry and go home,” a man cried outside a still-closed polling center in the poor, mixed neighborhood of Shoubra, an hour after it was meant to open, reports Joshua Hersh of the Huffington Post. “But we’ll show them. We will stay here and we will vote.”

Another voter exclaimed, “I am so happy; this is the first true election in the history of Egypt!” The old man added, “I am doing this for my sons and my grandsons.”

According to Robert Mackey in the New York Times, bloggers posted images of long lines at polling places. Kamal El Eid, 19, posted a photograph of the vast crowd inside her polling place in the Cairo district of Heliopolis. Ranya Khalifa, who also voted in Heliopolis, tweeted that it took her six hours to get to the front of the line.

Voters crowded into a polling place in Cairo’s Heliopolis neighborhood on Monday.

Bloggers also reported on voting irregularities such as breaking electoral law: campaigning in on Election Day.

According to Hersh, twitter was filled with reports, through the hashtag #egypviolations, that party workers for the Freedom & Justice Party (FJP), the political wing of the Brotherhood, were distributing campaign guides to voters in line.

Abdel-Rahman Hussein tweeted that several parties campaigned on Election Day by sitting with laptops outside polling places in Cairo offering to help voters look up the registration numbers they needed to cast their ballots and giving out flyers promoting their candidates.

http://youtu.be/52ziVn6A-Gg

The party responded that this was merely an attempt to assist voters who supported the party but were confused about the process, rather than attempt to campaign or coerce voters, Hersh explained.

Mosa’ab Elshamy, an activist at the heart of the Tahrir Square protests in February, witnessed “no significant violations in Zamalek,” an upscale part of Cairo and added that although few people from different parties were handing leaflets, most voters were “not interest” in the literature anyway, writes Mackey.

Bloggers also expressed concerns over the complicated voting process. Issandr El Amrani, the Moroccan-American journalist behind The Arabist, a Cairo-based blog, posted close-up images of the remarkably dense and confusing ballot papers voters were handed inside a polling station in the city’s Sayeda Zeinab district. Mr. Amrani explained that voters were asked to select two candidates from a list of 122 names who could only be distinguished by a small icon chosen by the would-be office holders.

This is the first of three separate polls over coming months, which includes the current elections of 508-memnber People’s Assembly or lower house set to end on 10 January 2012. Elections of 270-strong Shura Council or upper house will begin in 29 January and end on 11 March 2012. Presidential elections are due mid-2012. It is estimated that more than 40 political parties are set to compete, fielding more than 10,000 candidates.

November 29, 2011/by actualize

Connectivity, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

A solar-powered Internet café for Chad

Of late, the North Central African nation of Chad (Tchad) has remained out of the international spotlight. Chad has also been on the periphery of the African tech scene. Libya and Sudan, neighbors to the north and east, respectively, have “stolen” much of the African news. And that is not necessarily a bad thing – life in Chad is seemingly stable. However, it is going to take more than status quo to improve the quality of life in Chad.

Last year, we found Chad’s progress toward information access rather optimistic, observing that, “published expectations for the Central African Backbone project and the apparent Libyan telecom stake in Sotel both are consistent with Chad’s national ICT policy outline created in 2007.” One year later, with only media reports on the well-funded Central African Backbone progress coming down the line, we are less hopeful that Chad will meet 2011 NICI goal of a completed 1,100km SAT-3/fibre backbone between N’Djamena and Adré and a 100% completed e-government network in N’Djamena.

At least work is underway on these initiatives. Lofty are the final goals for 2012. Will Chad boast 50,000 WiFi subscribers – roughly 5% of N’Djamena’s population – by the end of next year? An August 2011 report by Research and Markets confirms that Chad lacks still true fixed-line broadband, lacks 3G, and lacks international bandwidth. Satellite is the only means to a decent web browsing experience and is unreliable given the sporadic nature of power within the country.

All hope is not lost, however. Thanks to efforts from non-profit organizations like Chad Now, the Internet is gradually (and sustainably) reaching more Chadians. Early next year, Chad Now hopes to establish a solar-powered Internet cafe as part of a broader series of small-scale, short-term development projects. Even though broadband is not available in Chad, Cyber Cafe Chari will demonstrate the significance of computers so that Chadians are ready when the time for even greater innovation comes.

The whole endeavor is described on the hot-off-the-presses ChadNow.org. We’re especially intrigued by the option to test the Internet before paying (and the low access costs to spur local competition):

Chad Now centers the Internet cafe concept on the foundations of affordable startup, sustainable operation, cultural appropriateness, and excellent service. The model cafe, located in a low-income area of Chad’s capital N’Djamena, is comprised of four laptop computers powered by a flexible solar cell system. In addition to simple internet services, the cafe also sells computer accessories and refreshments. Free educational courses make the cafe a learning environment, and free access periods allow locals to try out the internet before paying. Once they do, they pay an hourly rate 30% below market price, a step that expands internet access equity and is made possible by the savings of solar power.”

In fact, Chad Now hopes to use this model to bring Internet access to even more Africans. Guidelines are:

launch costs not to exceed $2,000 (includes two months’ pay for two employees)
laptops running Ubuntu Linux
strategic location to bring immediate clientele
reduced access costs to increase demand and cause other cafe owners to cut costs to compete
offer computer accessories for sale
hosting of local entrepreneurs
free computing classes for local groups

The video at the top of this post explains the solar charging system (battery, wiring, solar panel, controller, power inverter) with the goal of helping others avoid a lengthy trial-and-error process.

The beauty here is how two parties can agree on the benefit of an information society. The Plan de développement des Technologies de l’Information et de la Communication au Tchad, cites ICT as a vehicle needed to achieve a climate of peace, justice and democracy. Similarly, Chad Now also seeks to empower Chadians and improve livelihoods in Chad. The timing is certainly right with the arrival of international bandwidth via the Central African Backbone.

Follow @Chad_Now on Twitter.

Read about the effort to film a documentary in N’Djamena (including the creation of Cyber Cafe Chari).

Skim Chad Now’s recent article “Solar-powered Internet Cafés for Sub-Saharan Africa” which cites $190/month cost for 128kbps dial-up access and the unreliability of VSAT during Chad’s rainy season.

November 29, 2011/by actualize

Agriculture, Health, Health, HIV/AIDS, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

CrowdOutAIDS: Engaging Youth to Develop AIDS Policy

CrowdOutAIDS, the online crowdsourcing project that engages young people in developing a UNAIDS strategy on youth and HIV, has wrapped up its fifth week. The project launched in October 2011 and will run for two months, with the final crowdsourced strategy to be produced in January.

Crowdsourcing is a technique used to quickly engage large numbers of people to generate ideas and solve complex problems. CrowdOutAIDS’ target “crowd” is young people, 3,000 of whom become infected with HIV every day and 5 million of whom currently live with the virus.

The project’s approach is to follow a four-step model:

Connect young people online
Share knowledge and prioritize issues
Find solutions
Develop collective actions on HIV

Once the fourth step is completed, the UNAIDS Secretariat will put the youth strategy into action, and the strategy could become an advocacy platform in future UNAIDS work.

Currently the project is in the second stage of sharing knowledge. Youth from all over the world have been connected through eight regional Open Forums that are in Arabic, English, Spanish, French, Russian and Chinese. The moderator of each forum starts each day with a question (such as “What is your description of a healthy relationship?”) and participants respond and interact with one another.

The first week of the project revealed some of the major problems, in the eyes of youth participants, with UN agencies’ current approaches to working with youth. Participants expressed concerns that UN initiatives of working with youth in HIV response lack strategic vision and have no clear plan, and hinder young people from participating in decision-making.

It will be interesting to see what solutions are developed after the knowledge sharing step is completed, as well as what direction the UN youth and HIV strategy takes over the next six weeks. Be sure to check out the CrowdOutAIDS website and Twitter @CrowdOutAIDS for continuous updates.

November 28, 2011/by actualize

Agriculture, Agriculture Markets, Extension Service, Mobile, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

12 Opportunities for Mobile Telecommunications in Agriculture

Photo Credit: Vodafone

In their recent report “Connected Agriculture,” Vodafone and Accenture with support from Oxfam outlined 12 opportunities that mobile telecommunication has for farmers.

The opportunities were identified as ‘the most important’ through stakeholder consultations and are grouped into four categories.

Category I: Improving Access to Financial Services through increasing access and affordability to these services tailored for agricultural purposes. The opportunities under this category include:

1. Mobile Payment Systems which offer people without access to financial services an affordable and secure way to transfer and save money using their mobile phones.

2. Micro-Insurance System that protects farmers against losses when bad weather harms their harvest, encouraging them to buy higher-quality seeds and invest in fertilizer and other inputs.

3. Micro-Lending Platforms that connect smallholders in developing countries with individuals elsewhere willing to provide finance to help the farmers to buy much-needed agricultural inputs.

Category II: Provision of Agricultural Information i.e. delivering information relevant to farmers, such as agricultural techniques, commodity prices and weather forecasts, where traditional methods of communication are limited. The opportunities under this category are:

4. Mobile Information Platforms that link farmers to receive texts with news and information that help to improve the productivity of their land and increase their incomes.

5. Farmer Helplines that connect farmers to agricultural experts who can provide quick and accurate answers to agricultural queries

Category III: Improving Data Visibility for Supply Chain Efficiency. This is done through optimizing supply chain management across the sector, and delivering efficiency improvements for transportation logistics. The opportunities here include:

6. Smart Logistics that use mobile technology to help distribution companies manage their fleets more efficiently – reducing costs for farmers and distributors, cutting fuel use and related carbon emissions and potentially preventing food losses.

7. Traceability and Tracking Systems that are use to track individual food products through the supply chain from grower to retailer.

8. Mobile Management of Supplier Networks that could use mobile phones to manage their networks of small-scale growers and help field agents collect information.

9. Mobile Management of Distribution Networks such as agricultural inputs like seeds, fertilizer and crop protection products could use mobile to gather sales and stock data, improving availability for farmers and increasing sales.

Category IV: Enhancing Access to Markets i.e. by enhancing the link between commodity exchanges, traders, buyers and sellers of agricultural produce. The opportunities for mobile telecommunications are:

10. Agricultural Trading Platforms that use mobile technologies to link smallholder farmers directly with potential buyers thereby helping them to secure the best price for their produce, as well as promoting investment in agriculture and reducing food losses.

11. Agricultural Tendering Platforms that allow mobile technologies for submitting and bidding on tenders for food distribution, processing and exporting could make the agricultural supply chain more competitive and efficient.

12. Agricultural Bartering Platforms could use mobile technologies to help agricultural workers in rural communities exchange goods and services and improve communities’ livelihoods.

Some of the benefits that could be obtained from these opportunities are monitoring resources and tracking products; unlocking productivity potential while helping to manage the impacts of increased production, such as increased water use and greenhouse gas emissions; increasing agricultural income by around US$138 billion across 26 of Vodafone’s markets in 2020; helping to meet the challenge of feeding an estimated 9.2 billion people by 2050; helping to cut carbon dioxide emissions by approximately 5 mega tonnes (Mt) in these markets; and reducing freshwater withdrawals for agricultural irrigation by 6%, with significant savings in water-stressed regions. These benefits assume there will be around 549 million mobile connections to relevant services in 2020.

November 22, 2011/by actualize

Democracy & Governance, Elections, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

Ushahidi maps Liberia’s electoral violence

Liberia’s November 8 Presidential runoff was marred by a rally turned violent as opposition supporters clashed with the riot police. The Ushahidi platform, a website developed to map reports of violence during the 2007 Presidential elections in Kenya, was once again in use to keep citizens informed on elections proceedings.

Incumbent Ellen Johnson Sirleaf won re-election clinching 90% of the November 8 run-off despite a relatively low turn out of 37%, prompted by the boycott of opposition candidate Winston Tubman from the Congress for Democratic Change (CDC) on the basis of electoral fraud.

Ushahidi provides maps on various aspects of the electoral process, including the violent protests that took place in the capital Monrovia in the lead up and after the runoff.

The rioting broke out after thousands of CDC supporters gathered outside party headquarters to urge voters to boycott polls. BBC confirms that at least one man has been killed and four others injured after shots were fired by the police.

Despite the runoff boycott, Tubman is willing to work with Johnson-Sirleaf’s government.

“I will stick with my party and maybe we can find someone in our party who can deal with the Unity Party government and Mrs Sirleaf to bring about reconciliation,” he told the BBC’s Network Africa programme.

Observers, including those from the Economic Community of West Africa States (ECOWAS), declared the election process to be credible.

“The mission wishes to state that it found no major irregularities in the voting process itself. It considers, on the whole, that the elections of 8 November met the acceptable conditions of being free, fair and transparent,” the ECOWAS observer team said in a statement.

These are the first elections organised by Liberians since the 14-year conflict ended. The previous ones were run by the large UN peacekeeping mission.

November 22, 2011/by actualize

Agriculture, Irrigation and Water, Land Management, Mobile, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

Nano Ganesh: A Mobile App for Remote Irrigation Control

Photo Credit: NanoGanesh

Nano Ganesh is an innovation that is helping smallholder farmers across two Indian states to remotely turn their irrigation pumps ‘on’ and ‘off’ using their mobile phones. In an industry dominated by ringtones and games, this is a welcome move towards technology that serves development, said Vineeta Dixit, a principal consultant at the e-Governance Division of the Department of Information Technology, Ministry of Communications and IT, India.

Nano Ganesh is a GSM Mobile based remote control system exclusively for the use with water pump sets in agricultural areas. A farmer can control the pumps from any distance; check an availability of power supply at the pump end; acknowledge the on/off status of the water pump; and in some models, get alerts through calls if there is a theft attempt of the cable or pump.

The need for Nano Ganesh arose from the routine problems faced by farmers in operating irrigation pumps. In India and other parts of the developing world, a farmer may have to travel miles to turn on a water pump, and stay on the farm until irrigation is complete before returning – at any hour of the day, often late at night or early in the morning. There are, fluctuations in power supply, difficult terrains, fear of wild and dangerous animals on the way to pumps, hazardous locations of the pumps along the river or water storage beds, shock hazards, rains etc.

The clip below summarizes information on the application:

The technology requires a mobile connection and phone, along with a mobile modem that attaches to the starter on the irrigation pump. Using the phone, an assigned code number switches the pump’s starter off and on, and a particular tone signals the off/on status of the pump and the electrical supply at the pump location.

The application which was developed by Ossian Agro Automation, has been selected for recognition as a laureate in the Economic Development category for 2011, by The Tech Awards, The Tech Museum at San Jose, CA, USA. Currently, there are over 10 000 installations across the operational states in India.

November 21, 2011/by actualize

Agriculture, Mobile, Originally posted on the GBI Portal

The Advent of Mobile Finanical Services in Agriculture

Close up of man in Africa looking at his cell phone As the global population continues to grow – it is expected to reach more than 9 billion by 2050. It will require a 70% increase in food production above current levels. Most of this increased yield will have to be achieved in less developed countries (LDCs), many of whose farmers operate on a small scale and are highly exposed to crop failure and adverse commodity price movements. This month, Vodafone, Accenture and Oxfam released a report on mAgriculture. The report titled “Connected Agriculture” assesses the potential benefits of new mobile data services such as mobile financial services, weather forecasts, and agriculture information and advice for smallholding farmers operating in marginal circumstances.

Additionally, in light of market saturation, MNOs face the task of growing average revenue per user (ARPU) and market share in rural areas. Agricultural Value Added Services (Agri VAS) present a considerable business opportunity due to the enormous potential user base in LDCs. The farming sector in these countries often suffers from chronically low productivity. Lack of information acts upon productivity and income levels like a glass ceiling. However, with increasing teledensity in the developing world – Africa is being tipped to pass one billion mobile subscriptions and become the world’s second largest mobile market by 2016, mobiles are uniquely positioned to address the information and financial needs of farmers – an intervention that can help increase their incomes, yields and economic wellbeing. Vodafone’s research indicates potential $138 billion addition to developing world farmers’ incomes by 2020

The financial and information opportunities at the base of the pyramid (BOP) in themselves hold significant untapped value for the private sector. The BOP has both intricate financial and information needs, which have the potential to be met through mobile money and information-based mobile services. Mobile Money can reduce the financial gap for farmers by giving them access to savings and insurance, which in itself reduces the impact of extreme weather and allows for greater investment in improving production.[1] Meanwhile, m-information services have the potential to open up significant markets opportunities, by relaying sales prices, GIS-based commodity demand information, as well as more basic yet essential information on agricultural best practices and reliable weather forecasts.

While there are existing agricultural information services provided via traditional channels such as radio and television, government extension services as they are usually referred to can be made much more efficient by leveraging the mobile channel. This can help improve their quality and trust amongst user communities increasing their potential for scale. In addition, by linking to them to mobile financial services, farmers will not only improve their productivity but will also be empowered to make better investment and risk management decisions (e.g. request credit for new fertilizers or other inputs they need to grow more and better crops). These benefits are also likely to extend to the wider community as increased agricultural income helps rural families afford education, healthcare and other services.

The GSMA mAgri Programme

The Development Fund’s mAgri Programme was set up in 2009 to accelerate the development, provision and adoption of mobile solutions to benefit the agriculture sector in emerging markets. In June 2011, the programme announced the second phase of their mobile agricultural programme, the introduction of the mFarmer Initiative, a partnership between GSMA, USAID and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The scope of the mFarmer Initiative is to support mobile phone operators and agricultural partners in launching commercially viable mobile information services that bridge the information gap and increase the productivity and income of rural small-holders. It aims to attract 2 million of the worlds’ poorest farmers to become users of mFarmer Services by 2013. This compliments their previous work on mobile agricultural services in India and Kenya.

The team has recently launched the Agri VAS Market Entry Toolkit which explores the opportunities for Agricultural VAS and covers emerging best practice on marketing, service design and business modelling. It is primarily addressed to Mobile Network Operators (MNOs), other service providers, and agricultural organisations that are looking to partner and launch Agri VAS.

Just as the successful provision of mobile financial services for the BOP requires innovative partnership models; Agri VAS will require similar efforts from the part of its stakeholders. While MNOs have a leading role to play, they will need the collective support and partnerships from key stakeholders in the agricultural supply chain in order to fully unlock the benefits for farmers in LDCs.

November 21, 2011/by actualize

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