Stakeholders discussing on key ICT infrastructure for agriculture solutions and services by sector

UN FAO and ITU are jointly assisting Government of Mongolia on development of “National E-agriculture Strategy”. E-agriculture strategy is critical for a “whole-government” approach in harnessing technological development in the field of information and communication technologies or ICT, rationalize and prioritize investments that gives better leverage and quick progress to solve the key challenges in the agriculture sector that needed to be overcome in order to achieve the country’s sectorial goals.

Lack of a clear national strategy in implementing e-agriculture services has given rise to many pilot projects that ended to be not sustainable. The FAO-ITU E-agriculture Strategy Guide (http://www.fao.org/3/a-i5564e.pdf) provides a framework based on which countries could develop their National E-agriculture Strategy and set of resources to facilitate country decision makers in developing a national E-agriculture strategy and to aid solutions design and implementation.  

In order to initiate the process of developing the national e-agriculture strategy of Mongolia, the first  stakeholders’ consultation workshop was organized in March 2019, in Ulaanbaatar, attended by 66 representatives from various government, non-government and private sector organizations. During the workshop, the e-agriculture strategy development process was introduced to the stakeholders and specific inputs were collected, which has been included in developing the first draft version of the strategy document.

The first draft version of the strategy document has validated by same representatives during the “Developing National E-agriculture Strategy for Mongolia” second Stakeholders’ consultation workshop conducted from 21-22 August at MOFALI conference hall, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. The 2-day workshop brought in key stakeholders to discuss, ratify and prioritize the key ICT infrastructure for agriculture solutions and services that would benefit the country. The stakeholders also conferred and developed a strategic vision for the e-agriculture in Mongolia along with strategic recommendations. As a result of the workshop, final draft of the e-agriculture strategic implementation plan discussed and vetted by the stakeholders. Identification of priority e-agriculture solutions needed to be implemented in Mongolia in 12-24 months period has been finalized.  

The next step of the project is to form a national steering committee under the chair of MOFALI, together with members from CITA, private sectors, farmers/provincial representatives and FAO country office in Mongolia. The national steering committee will ensure the draft version of the e-agriculture to be discussed before proposed to the respective ministry for endorsement as national strategy.