Farmerline is a social software company with the mission to transform millions of farmers into successful entrepreneurs. Farmerline connects farmers to markets, finance, weather forecast, new farming tips, inputs dealers and equipment services. Farmerline has an information service that sends SMS and voice messages on weather forecasts, market prices, new farming techniques, agrochemical applications, and finance directly to the mobile phones of farmers in local languages. Through their mobile phones, farmers can also connect to global markets and buy farm inpunts and services. Farmers using...
Harvesting is a Silicon Valley based growing startup driving financial inclusion for farmers. Harvesting uses cutting edge remote sensing & machine learning based approach to help large financial institutions lend small farm holders. Harvesting is now looking for a full time remote sensing scientist to join its growing team and drive its mission. Requirements: Degree in physical geography/Geomatics or allied fields Must have done extensive research on cropland monitoring, crop yield models, crop type detection in Semi-arid regions, which is published in reputed publication Must have...
The World Bank Group, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and the Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures (CPMI), with support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation launched a new global programme to advance research in digital finance and accelerate digital financial inclusion in developing countries: the Financial Inclusion Global Initiative. The program is composed of two different but complementary work streams: operational and knowledge. The operational work stream supports governments in improving access to financial services and digital financial inclusion...
Esoko, the platform that sends market prices and agricultural tips to farmers will soon retire its brand. After having begun with professional tips sent to farmers through SMS, the Esoko team started to explore innovations on mobile finance for smallholder farmers. In November 2016, Esoko developed a mobile commerce platform that allows farmers to save and borrow toward the purchase of inputs and to sell their crops. Two very different products were now developed, and the team started to face the first challenges. "Our limited management resources were being stretched thin and neither...
The US Embassy in Nepal organized a ‘Farm to Table’ event on August 29th to identify opportunities to maximize the market potential of Nepal’s agricultural sector. The conference brought together agro-entrepreneurs, buyers, suppliers, financial service providers, and farmers from Nepal and the United States. The main discussion of this round-table was based on finding innovative ways to improve efficiency and maximize productivity in Nepali agriculture. One of the main recommendations was to improve value chains by investing in ICTs connecting farmers to knowledge, market information and...
Esoko is a communication tool created with a view to building connection between businesses, projects, NGOs, governments and smallholder farmers. Esoko started as a price information service but the team soon realized that farmers needed much more than market information and added weather alerts, crop advice, and linking buyers with sellers. Various research finds such services can improve incomes for farmers by roughly 10%. Watch this introductory video on Esoko: Credits: Esoko Over the years, Esoko developed two products: Tulaa and Insyt . Tulaa is a mobile money solution that allows...
Ari.farm is a new agricultural app based in Stockholm and designed to bring nomadic Somali livestock farmers into the digital economy. The concept on which the project evolves is called “crowd-farming,” similar to crowd-funding but adapted to agriculture, consisting in connecting farmers and investors through a digital platform. The Ari.farm mobile application permits users to purchase and invest in livestock in Somalia with the help of a smartphone. Users can buy animals such as goats, sheep, cows or camels which are then raised and cared for by the nomadic farmers. Profits are then shared...
The GSMA mAgri Programme forges partnerships between mobile operators, technology providers and agricultural organisations. Although it has enourmous potential, Mexico seems to have been left out by ICT for agriculture initiatives. This article presents seven reasons for which Mexican agriculture should invest in ICT related projects to lift farmers out of poverty and into the 21st century. 1. The needs of Mexican farmers are huge 3.9 million farmers out of 5.3 million in Mexico earn of less than USD 1,000 per year. 61 per cent of Mexican farmers live in poverty. The reasons for this...
The Youth for Africa and SDGs YAS ! Portal is an online portal created by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) to support the development and growth of youth entrepreneurship in Africa. The portal aims to help entrepreneurs by providing them advice on enterprise development, serve as an African hub for support services concerning African youth entrepreneurship and run challenges and award financing to youth to develop SDG related business ideas. UNDP is seeking advice and help through an online challenge to develop the online portal and keeping it sustainable. The challenge is open...
Over 90% of sub-Saharan Africa’s 48 million smallholder farmers lack access to formal credit. Although agriculture accounts for around 65% of employment and 32% of gross domestic product, less than 6% of commercial loan recipients are smallholder farmers. The problem is on both sides: on the one hand, farmers cannot purchase quality inputs to improve their production, on the other hand, financial institutions cannot provide loans without an accurate assessment of the farmers’ financial viability. Farmers are therefore left with little access to credit, and financial institutions with a hole...
