Mobile technology for agriculture

Information and communication technologies are a major driver of socio-economic development in emerging countries, particularly in rural areas. By providing innovative services tailored to the needs of the local population – in the fields of health, education, administration, agriculture or financial services – they have a significant transformative power in making daily lives easier.

With 63% of the Sub-Saharan Africa’s population still not reaching food security level, increasing agricultural productivity is a critical challenge that ICTs can contribute to address. By better informing farmers, they help them to improve their practices and make them less dependent of weather or pest hazards. Mobile agriculture services empower farmers, as they allow them to sell their goods at the best price and regain control over the value chain of their products.

Overall, connected agriculture is estimated to represent a potential of $48 billion additional revenues for farmers (“Connected Agriculture”, Vodafone/Accenture/Oxfam, 2011).

In Orange's view, mobile agriculture services can thus help farmers to make a living in the countryside, motivate youth to work in agriculture, and thus indirectly reduce social, sanitary and economic problems linked to massive migration from rural to urban areas.

Meet us at the 2015 European Development Days to learn more about Orange's mobile for agriculture projects in Sub-Saharan Africa -

in the meatime, check out the Labaroun Kassoua service in Niger:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ICMOmwnWQTo !

On 4 June 2015 at 12:30, we will be moderating a panel debate on mobile technology for agriculture at the EDD's: https://eudevdays.eu/topics/oranges-proposal-lab-project-mobile-agriculture-2.

Please join us! 

Further reading:

http://www.iicd.org/files/ICT%20and%20agricultural%20livelihoods.pdf
http://www.cta.int/en/article/2015-02-25/open-data-for-smallholder-farmers-n-strong-potential-but-little-impact.html
http://www.gsma.com/mobilefordevelopment/mfarmer-case-studies