Precision Agriculture for

Development
DIGITAL OUTREACH & EXTENSION:
Experiences from South Asia and Africa

IICA, April 7, 2021

Heiner Baumann, Co-Founder and MD
Claudia Carbajal, Regional Director LatAm
Today’s Presentation

1. Big Picture
• PAD at a Glance
• Global Challenge
• Evidence on Impact

2. Examples from our work

• Odisha, India
• Kenya
• Punjab, Pakistan

3. Take-aways
• Insights/Key Success Factors
• COVID
PAD at a glance

● Global non-profit organization serving 3.8

million farmers across 9 countries
(aim: 100 million)

● We reduce information poverty by providing

actionable, customized information through
mobile phones

● Focus on yields, net incomes and

environmental sustainability

● We partner with governments, NGOs and

businesses
2021 - Expanding Operations to Latin America
AWARDED IN DISCUSSIONS

Colombia I Ecuador Brazil Colombia II

Implementation Consulting

● Rare ● IADB ● Ministry of Agriculture, ● Ministry of Agriculture

● TNC ● ProAmazonia Livestock, and Supply and Rural Development
● UK Pact ● IICA ● IICA
Why?

● 70% of world’s poor are

smallholder farmers

● 20% of Latin America’s rural

population live in extreme
poverty (IICA).

● Global food demand continues

to grow

● Climate change,
soil and water constraints,
protection of ecosystems
Information and productive technologies
exist but farmers lack access…
...and adoption is often low

Traditional extension limitations

● Expense and accountability issues

● Reach and trust issues (6%, 70% in India)
● Information flow mostly one-way
● Limited evidence of impact, cost effectiveness
● Difficult to execute in crises (e.g., COVID, conflict)
Solution: Providing customized ag advice over
mobile phones - PAD’s model
Farmer profile information Agricultural data

● Location ● Soil type

● Agro-ecological zone ● Rainfall
● Socio-demographics ● Market prices
● Crop variety ● Pest/disease outbreaks
● Water management

Customized content

● Input recommendations
● Management advice
● Market information
● Weather-related content
● Decision support tools
Solution: Adjusting our services to farmers’ devices
~75%
Feature phone
SMS: Regular written messages timed
to crop calendar
Voice: Regular push calls timed to crop
calendar
Interactive Voice Response (IVR):
Users pull content from automated
menu options
Q&A Hotline: Users pose questions that
are answered by agronomic experts
Decision Support & Productivity Tools:
Input optimization; Pest Management;
Seed selection
~25%
Smartphone Characteristics
Mobile apps: WhatsApp, Telegram, Mobile 2-way communication
opportunity for advanced content
(video, photos, etc.)
Available on demand
Learning platforms: Self-directed,
interactive content for smartphone
users
Customized
Automated Farmer Profiling
Timed to crop calendar
Cost effective
Global growth in digital ag platforms
- but do they work?
Impact of digital agricultural advisory services
from rigorous evaluations

● 4% average yield gains

(including non-adopters)
At $2 per farmer per year (at scale),
● 22% average increase in recommended digital extension can reach 100+ times
farming practices
more farmers than in-person extension
● Evidence on adoption of inputs programs given the same budget.
● 10:1 benefit-cost ratio

Large variation in impact estimates across studies

Source: “Realizing the potential of digital development: The case of agricultural advice.” Science, December 2019.
Today’s Presentation

1. Big Picture
• PAD at a Glance
• Global Challenge
• Evidence on Impact

2. Examples from our work

• Odisha, India
• Kenya
• Punjab, Pakistan

3. Take-aways
• Insights/Key Success Factors
• COVID
Odisha, India: Ama Krushi
A two-way IVR+ helpline available to 1M+ farmers

Features System

Build - Operate - Transfer program w/ Weekly advisory message on crop

Govt of Odisha: 2018 - 2021 Push Calls management practices

Started with rice, now providing content

on > 20 crops, kitchen gardens, livestock Farmers can record a question;
Q&A answered by experts within 24 hours
and fisheries

On average, farmers rate the quality of Farmers can easily access their
content 4.3 out of 5 Personal Inbox personal history of Q&A
(where 5 is excellent)

Feedback mechanism where farmers

Research: constant experimentation with Ratings can rate content (on a scale of 1-5)
A/B testing and large-scale impact
evaluation being implemented in 2021 Features for the technological service are determined in
collaboration with partners
Odisha, India: Ama Krushi
Staged process for engaging with farmers

Improve Service

Farmer profiling Continuous

Training on how to Preparation of Weekly push calls
and registration analysis,
use the service customized content
onto the service
Feedback Surveys

~5-6 minute survey on Live demos by field staff; Advisory designed Answering of
land size, irrigation, Training over the phone; using farmer profiles
farmer queries Random sample of
demography, info needs Peer training and local crop
conditions farmers weekly
polled to assess
Farmers questions service satisfaction
answered and
documented in <24
hours
Odisha, India: Ama Krushi
Improving the offer to engage and empower more women

Challenges Solutions

Limited agricultural Offer advice for areas where ● Kitchen gardens

1 decision-making power women do possess decision ● Horticultural crops
regarding staple and cash crops making power ● (Livestock/fisheries)

6.4% Disproportionately limited Partner with

20.1%
Women 2 access to mobile phones grassroots NGOs Women
(Early 2019) (Early 2021)

47% of new users

Low levels of mobile phone
3 literacy, text literacy and
numeracy relative to men
in last 6 months
● Community Radio are female
Disseminate info in ways that do
not rely heavily on tech/text literacy ● Live Call Center
● Peer to peer
Kenya: MoA-INFO
Two-way SMS platform with 550,000 users

● Partnership with Ministry of

Agriculture and Safaricom,
Welcome to
launched in July 2018
MoA-INFO! To
learn about Fall
Armyworm (FAW) ● MoA-INFO developed initially to
and better farming
practices, reply provide information about Fall
FARM at any time.
Armyworm pest management

● Developed into digital advisory

platform providing actionable and
customized farming advice on 11
crops; Dairy in development

● Provided free! Info available in

English & Swahili
Kenya: MoA-INFO SMS platform
What’s on the platform?
1. Registration survey
● Interactive message sequence giving initial advice on Fall Armyworm (FAW)
and collecting user location down to the ward level
2. Menu
● Farming advice on 11 crops and FAW
3. FAW monitoring tool
● Encourages farmers to measure the rate of FAW infestation in their field
● Provides advice based on reported infestation rate
4. Cropping Series (pushed every week)
● Available for all 11 crops customized to location
● Users opt-in to receive series for 2 crops of their choice
● Messages timed to the planting cycle stage
5. Decision Support Tools
● Seed Selector Tool: customized seed varieties recommendations (rec) for
maize & beans
● Fertilizer Tool: quantities rec. based on farm size, location, & budget
● Pesticide Selector Tool: suitable products based on local availability, and
symptoms identified
Kenya: MoA-INFO SMS platform
Knowledge and adoption of best practices

● Survey with 214 randomly selected MoA-INFO maize farmers

● Highlights user knowledge, adoption, and reasons for non-adoption of priority recommendations for maize farming

Practice Knowledge Adoption Reason for non-adoption or

Awareness of best practices Implementation of practices sub-optimal Adoption

Manure/Compost Use 76% 48% Unavailability (72%)

Planting Fertilizer Quantity 58% 57% Financial constraints (91%)

Maize Thinning 73% 30% Information Constraint (62%)

Kenya: MoA-INFO SMS platform
Using A/B tests to increase engagement with a pest monitoring tool

Way forward: send message B at midday

Punjab, Pakistan: Zinc Biofortified Wheat
Blitz Promotion of zinc biofortified wheat to 103,000 farmers
through Robocalls and SMS

Project description Adoption Increase Farmer Motivation

● Partnership with HarvestPlus and Reasons for adopting

Govt of Punjab
Yield up 82%
● Goal: Increase adoption of Akbar-19
Rust resistance 56%
and Zincol-16 wheat varieties to +566%
address malnutrition and increase
Disease resistance 62%
farmer incomes

Health benefits 23%

● 968,000 Robocalls over 17 days

Other 8%
● 1,300,000 SMS over 13 days

● 4,400 incoming Helpline calls over

nine days

Preliminary analysis
Today’s Presentation

1. Big Picture
• PAD at a Glance
• Global Challenge
• Evidence on Impact

2. Examples from our work

• Odisha, India
• Kenya
• Punjab, Pakistan

3. Take-aways
• Insights/Key Success Factors
• COVID
PAD is adapting its approach in several ways to
respond to COVID-19

1. Understand and respond very rapidly (real time) to new and

changing needs of farmers and PAD implementing partners.
a. Adapt and leverage established live 2-way
communication at scale
b. Rapid changes to service delivery and service
sophistication

2. Addition of digital services to existing traditional extension

systems

3. Responding to COVID-related disruptions to agriculture

(markets for inputs, outputs, labor, food, finance, etc.)

4. Responding to COVID-related disruptions in other sectors

(e.g., education)
Insights / Key Success Factors
General Insights/KSF PAD’s Specific Approach

Customer-centric and data-driven approach is critical Use of behavioral sciences to design services; Use of
experiments to test, iterate and improve

Scaling rapidly through partnerships 96%

Unit costs drive scale - which in turn drives unit cost
with govts, NGOs and private firms

Stickiness of service - think about the end game, from Build, operate, transfer; motivation and capacity of
start partner organizations

Pivot around changes in government, Covid, etc.;

Ability to adapt is key
flexible people, flexible processes

Leverage what you have - create value for sector Sharing of data and learnings transparently as public
goods
Empowering farmers with
high quality information at
their fingertips.

www.precisionag.org
hbaumann@precisionag.org
ccarbajal@precisionag.org