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Press release: Tulaa closes seed round of investment
Four out of five African families depend on agriculture for their livelihoods, but lack of access to quality inputs, affordable finance and reliable markets keep many of them trapped in a cycle of poverty. To solve these problems, Tulaa leverages mobile technology and artificial intelligence to enable farmers to purchase inputs on credit and to market their crops efficiently at harvest time.
- Source
- Press release
- Categories
- Agriculture
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Mali and International Fund for Agricultural Development ink deal to connect farmers to rural financing
By providing a range of financial products, including savings, credit and micro-insurance, the project will enable smallholder farmers to invest in the necessary infrastructure and equipment that will help them produce, store, process and better market their products.
- Categories
- Agriculture
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Making Agritech Work for Smallholders: What Tech Companies Can Learn from Development Organizations
Agritech proponents argue that technology is the key to helping the world's 500 million smallholder farmers. Yet despite countless ‘ICT for development’ companies and projects, these solutions often fall short of their intended impacts. This raises an important question: Can the methodologies that have proven successful for many tech startups work for the complex, interrelated challenges faced by smallholders? Wouter Vink of GreenFingers argues that there's a better approach.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Social Enterprise, Technology
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Before the Handshake: How to Make Corporate-Social Enterprise Partnerships Work
At first glance, value chain partnerships between corporations and small enterprises in developing markets appear to benefit both parties: Corporations gain financially while creating social and economic benefits for low-income communities. On closer inspection, however, these partnerships' results can vary. The Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership and Intellecap have learned lessons from serving as intermediaries in these relationships. James Jenkin and Lindsay Clinton address the most common questions from organizations hoping to build similar partnerships.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Social Enterprise
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Cutting Edge Agriculture: How Artificial Intelligence, Satellites and Big Data are Transforming Farmers’ Access to Finance
There are many reasons for the $450 billion global agricultural finance gap. But much of the challenge stems from lenders' inability to monitor farmers' output, estimate their income and assess their risk of default, says Ruchit G Garg of Harvesting Inc. He explores how artificial intelligence and satellites are addressing that data imbalance, helping lenders reach many of the world’s 500 million smallholder farmers for the first time.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Technology, Telecommunications
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Why Coffee Farmers are Poor – And How an Innovative Ownership Model Can Help
Joseph Nkandu grew up on a coffee farm in Uganda and knows firsthand how farmers struggle to earn a living. While agriculture dominates Africa's economy, value chains largely exclude farmers from much of the retail value of their produce - a system that keeps many coffee farmers from generating savings and reinvesting to improve their yields. Nkandu founded the National Union of Coffee Agribusinesses and Farm Enterprises, where he advocates a "farmer ownership model." That model, he writes, is ready to scale.
- Categories
- Agriculture
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Will AI be a bane or boon for global development?
From tracking cattle to bespoke weather forecasts, AI technology is helping smallholders across Asia and Africa. But it is by no means clear yet whether it will be a game changer in eliminating global poverty.
- Categories
- Technology
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Sun, Water, Data: How to Truly Grow Africa’s Agricultural Transformation
Technologies such as blockchain, the Internet of Things and machine learning are expected to enable a new era of agricultural prosperity in Africa. But many of Africa’s millions of smallholder farmers experience difficulties because they lack access to quality data. Dr. Gilbert Saggia of SAP East Africa asks how the continent should adopt new technologies across the agricultural value chain to help its farmers meet the demands of a population that is expected to grow by 1.3 billion people by 2050.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Technology
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