E-Agriculture and Smart Farmers. Mobile Phone Use for Agricultural Information

Essay , 17 Pages

Agrarian Studies

The key objective of the study is to examine the use of mobile phones by the farmers how smartly they can utilize for their agricularal development. The study is designed to achieve specific objectives, which are: Exploring the use of cell phone pertaining to access and receipt of agricultural information. Investigating the understanding the technology and participation of the farmers in receiving mobile phone based services. Examining the obstacles that the famers face in terms access and getting information related to agriculture products, process.

Bangladesh is predominantly an agrarian country. Despite several challenges, the country has achieved self-sufficiency in cereal food production. It is already evident that e-agriculture especially the expansion of mobile phone has tremendously boosted up the agricultural production in Bangladesh. Couples of vibrant mobile based agro advisory initiatives have also been evolved in last decade. The present study has been made to find out the status of the farmers in understanding and participation in access to agricultural information using mobile phone. Ten farmers were randomly selected from Dhamrai upazila of Dhaka district and Manikganj Sadar upazilla of Manikganj district. Semi-structured questionary-based survey, FGD was done.

Table of contents

Information

Abstract

1.0 Introduction

2.0 Review of Literature

3.0 Research Methods

4.0 Results and Discussions

5.0 Conclusion and Recommendations

6.0 References

Abstract

Bangladesh is predominantly an agrarian country. Despite several challenges, the country has achieved self-sufficiency in cereal food production. It is already evident that e-agriculture especially the expansion of mobile phone has tremendously boosted up the agricultural production in Bangladesh. Couples of vibrant mobile based agro advisory initiatives have also been evolved in last decade. The present study has been made to find out the status of the farmers in understanding and participation in access to agricultural information using mobile phone. Ten farmers were randomly selected from Dhamrai upazila of Dhaka district and Manikganj Sadar upazilla of Manikganj district. Semi-structured questionary-based survey, FGD was done. The study reveals that, through the mobile phone, contact with fertilizer/pesticides dealers was the top. Although the farmers sought different agro information by phone but information related with seed/fertilizers/input related was the highest. Farmers also opined that Market information was the most useful amongst others. Besides they also suffered with different problems while using mobile phones, among that internet charge ranked the uppermost. This study shows that farmers are very comfortable in accessing/receiving agricultural information through mobile phone. Although the study finds a positive impact of the mobile phone in disseminating of agricultural information, yet more detailed study is required to unveil latent potentialities and challenges.

Keywords: A griculture, Information, Mobile phone, Usage.

1.0 Introduction

Agriculture plays an important role in economic growth, enhancing food security, poverty reduction and rural development.

Agriculture has a significant contribution in accelerating economic growth, sustaining food security, reducing poverty and enhancing rural development coupling with the government’s national development plans and strategies. It is estimated that approximately 2.5 billion people of the developing world live on the income based on agriculture directly (FAO,2003). Bangladesh is a densely populated developing country in the South Asia with an area of about 147,872 Sq.km where agriculture is the mainstay of its economy. Bangladesh utilizes this sector as one of the biggest employment sectors with a 23.13 GDP’s percent contribution from agriculture (BBS, 2020). Moreover, Agricultural activities provide at least a portion of the income of approximately 87% of rural inhabitants. Fulfilling the target of food self sufficiency is one of our affirmed object. Due to the constant encouragement and investment in agricultural research, extension, mechanization and enacting pragmatic policies, our agriculture has developed steadily in recent years. As a result, despite frequent natural disasters, population growth and numerous other short comings associated, food grain production has been tripled from 9.77 to 45.34 million MT(from 1972-2020). Cropping intensity has been increased to 216%. Outstanding production has taken Bangladesh to secure 3rd in vegetables and rice production, 7th in mango production and 8th in potato production across the globe (MoA, 2020). The present progress of agriculture has led to achieve self sufficiency in cereal crop production as well as rural poverty reduction.

From different studies it has been found that, many farmers in different developing countries increased their productivity as well as facilitated their market linkage and empowered by linkage with policy makers while they were using ICTs in agriculture. The application of ICTs in agriculture is also known as ‘e-agriculture’ where ICT tools significantly enhancing the agricultural growth.

In Bangladesh context, Das et al. (2016) found that ICTs played a significant role to augment rice (Boro and B.Aman), potato, wheat, maize and pulse production.

In this era, various ICT tools more specifically mobile phone has been mingled with every sphere of our daily life. Because of the easier and widespread use of cell phone, it is considered as the best ICT means both in developed and developing nations (Furuholt and Matotay 2011).

Among all ICTs, mobile phone-based communication is mostly used in Bangladesh, According to the BTRC, the total number of mobile phone subscribers and internet subscribers has reached 176.94 Million and 123.74 Million respectively at the end of July, 2021. Besides, Due to low-cost devices Smartphone adoption rate has been increasing gradually even in the rural areas of Bangladesh. The speedy growth of mobile phone made it as the most powerful communication tool. In many cases, including agricultural practices working dimensions has been transformed. To materialize the 'Digital Bangladesh' and to provide service to the people without any hassle Ministry of Agriculture(MoA) took quite good numbers of e-agriculture endeavors in co-operation with different agencies under MoA including mobile based initiatives- Krishi Call Center-16123, KrishokBondhu Call Sheba- 3331, mobile apps namely Krishoker Janala, Krishoker Digital Thikana, Pesticide Prescriber, Rice Knowledge Bank, Online Fertilizer Recommendation Software etc. are the most admired mobile based government initiatives for agricultural information dissemination(MoA-2020). Few initiatives taken by private organizations and NGOs also exist.

About online fertilizer recommendation software,this system/initiatives was inaugurated in September 2009 as trial basis to provide quick fertilizer recommendation service to the farmers of 30 upazila through CIC of Gramin Phone(online) and mobile phone(call) of Banglalink Company. Union information and Service center was included as service provider in 2011 & this fertilizer recommendation system was extended to 200 upazila .Now it covers all the upazila of Bangladesh.This digital fertilizer recommendation service based on soil fertility database.It is a quick recommendation service. Farmers need to provide very simple information such as location of the farm/field(union,upazila,district),land type and the crop and variety he/she want to cultivate.This service can be provided to many farmers in a very short time.Computer and internet user can provide the service.Farmers could receive the service from Union information and service center.This is the one example of e-service of the govt.This service has a limitation.Farmers have to collect/received information from Union information service center. So it is needed to see the other initiatives too.This means that further research needed to provide service to the farmers using ICTs. Mobile phone based ICT initiatives are favorable to the farmers.

Now a days, agriculture itself is changing and changing the quantity and nature of farmers' information needs. In this changing context, agricultural production can only be increased sustainably if appropriate technologies are used by the farmers. In the traditional extension system one extension worker has to deliver various extension services amongst nearly 2500 farm families in Bangladesh (DAE Manual, 2018). In that context, Aker (2011) rightly pointed out that mobile phone could be the powerful communication media for the farming communities. Besides enabling the opportunity for exchanging agricultural information farmers are also facing different challenges while using these technologies.

However, despite numerous mobile based initiatives/agro advisory services are being used extensively yet what extent farmers utilized this facility for agricultural technology adoption that need to study. In addition of that, what are the constraints facing by the farmers in accessing these initiatives/agricultural information are needed to be investigated. It may help decision makers to improve these services and for further extension it to all over the country.

1.2 Problem Statement:

From the above discussion it has been found that in Bangladesh many mobile phone based ICT tools are running.But there are few investigations or studies regarding these initiatives. It is very important to understand the services/technologies by the farmers & participation in receiving the services also important for the successful running of the initiatives.Whether the initiatives are beneficial for farmers or not , needed to investigate also.So it is important to know the the overall status of these mobile phone based services in accessing agricultural information by the farmers.

Based on the literature review agricultural information dissemination to the farmers of Bangladesh using mobile phone not yet been reported much satisfactory. So further/new investigation is needed to understand the position of the farmers in accessing/receiving agricultural information through mobile phone.

1.3 Research Objectives:

The key objective of the study is to examine the use of mobile phones by the farmers how smartly they can utilize for their agricularal development. The study is designed to achieve ome specific objectives which are:

a) Exploring the use of cell phone pertaining to access and receipt of agricultural information;
b) Investigating the understanding the technology and participation of the farmers in receiving mobile phone based services.
c) Examining the obstacles that the famers face in terms access and getting information related to agriculture products, process.

1.4 Research Questions:

In view of the above discussion, the present study will be conducted to reveal the following research questions:

1. Do the mobile based agro information services/initiatives have any advantage /usefulness ?
2. Are the mobile phone based initiatives enough to understandable to the farmers?
3. How interested are farmers in receiving agricultural information through this technology?
4. What are the challenges being faced by the farmers while receiving or using these services?

1.5 Rationale of the study:

Ministry of Agriculture, Bangladesh has the mission to make agriculture profitable by increasing crop production and productivity, crop diversification, modernization of nutritious safe crop production and marketing system and ensuring nutrition and food security of the people. To achieve these, besides the traditional extension system, ICT based information dissemination services especially the mobile based services have been rolled out by the allied agencies. Although there are some investigations but frequent investigation is required to provide updated information and necessary support for policy decision.

2.0 Review of Literature

Agriculture plays an important role for socio-economic development in the developing countries. Appropriate information is necessary for the improvement in agriculture sector.With the rapid development of Information and communication Technologies, data & information can be generated, stored,analyzed and disseminated.These support farmers to improve agriculture productivity . Information services to the farmers at the different level are a promising field of research. The agricultural information dissemination service is one of the critical issue in implementing agricultural information. Zhang et al.(2016) found that with easy access to information, knowledge and experts support through ICT-based information dissemination services, farmers of china are able to improve their income and economic situation. Smart phone use in china increases farm income, off-farm income and house hold income substantially(Wanglin Ma et al.(2018). In India, only 11.4% of farm households use at least one source of ICTs to access agricultural information.Radio to be more important source of agricultural information compared to television and newspapers(Das B. 2015).This study has emphasized on capacity building of farmers to use ICTs for agricultural development. In terms of preference of getting information through various means, farmers of Kenya were found more comfortable with the computer rather TV (Paulin, 2013). The key reason behind is the higher level of education that the farmers had university degrees. It indicates level of education, accustomed to the use of technology supported by the internet contributed and enhanced the use of ICT tools including mobile phones in getting agriculture information. The study conducted by Pauline (2013) found that farmers of above 40 years of do not prefer using computer as they lack of skills in operating computer while young farmers with college or university degree, having good command and comfortabiliy, prefer in accessing and getting agriculture information.

The research conducted by Mittal and Mehar (2013) evidences that the perception of farmers of India varies in terms of usefulness of mobile phones and the serves based on this device. They found that 99 percent of Indian farmers had access to mobile phones while only 41 percent of them utilized this device for this purpose. It is argued that having a mobile phone does not guarantee to use for getting agriculture information since it requires network connection and the way of disseminating information. However, study favors that mobile has contributed in bridging the gap and connected between people and technology by substituting face-to-face interaction and saving farmer’s value time.

In Indonesia Subejo et al. (2017) found that farmers have used electronic media,such as television,radios and mobile phones to obtain agricultural information.The use of internet via a mobile phone or smartphone is relatively new among farmers in the coastal—marginal farming area who intensively engage in the cultivation of commercial horticultural crops, and the internet is mainly used to obtain market information.Information related to agricultural activities accessed through ICTs by farmers was still dominated by technological innovation pertaining to production aspects.

Now a days, mobile phones have become the popular tool for exchanging agricultural information. Furuholt and Matotay (2011) found that utilization of mobile phones were effective in different crop production cycle in Tanzania. Brugger (2011) showed that, Information is very crucial for farming. Mobile phone facilitates the dissemination of information from research and extension agencies to farmers.Das et al. (2016) reported that in West Bengal the farmers needed a wide range of information through mobile phones.

Rashid et al. (2019) examined that large section of farmers in Bangladesh found mobile phones from useful to very useful for the various crops farming. Mittal et al (2010) found evidence that mobiles are being used in ways which contribute to productivity enhancement. Kashem (2010) found that 54% of the farmers had medium use of mobile phones in receiving agricultural information while 14 & 32 percent of them had low and high use of mobile phones respectively. Manige et al. (2013) showed that mobile SMS service were indeed encouraging according to their crops grain & information needs.Farmers were able to save their time, energy & money to the extent of 80%. Jenny C. Aker, Christopher Ksoll (2015) found that for crops grown the impact is much stronger among households who owned mobile phones at baseline & how to use mobile phones was more important than actual access to phones. Meem (2018) also found that women farmers also used mobile phones for receiving agricultural information.Sadekur Raman,Enamul Haque & Saiful Islam(2020) found that rural people of Bangladesh have been mostly reported to encounter difficulties in internet browsing, higher call rate & electricity facilities in accessing agricultural information .

There are many communication channels traditionally used by the farmers in Bangladesh. However, using those channels for getting agriculture related information possibly is not enough to have a sustainable agricultural production with profit for growing population. For this there is no alternative to increase the farm productivity through the development and dissemination of appropriate technology to the farmers easily. In these regard many countries now use ICT to disseminate the developed agricultural technology & agricultural information to the farmers to increase the production. From the review of literature it has been found that among the ICT tools mobile phone is being widely used to disseminate the agricultural information in the developing countries as the farmers are also being used to mobile phone. There are few studies regarding usage of mobile phone based ICT tools in dissemination of agricultural information /adoptions are not very satisfactory. However in Bangladesh different mobile phone based initiatives are running in agricultural sector. Further research is needed to see what their current status is? Are the farmers are understandable in accessing those technologies while using mobile phone? Are they interested to use mobile phone to access in agricultural information/initiatives? Is the mobile phone useful to them to contact with extension workers or to contact with other agricultural else? In these context further research is needed to explore the usage of mobile phone in terms of usefulness, understandable and easy access to agricultural information. Thus the main objective of this study is to explore the overall conditions of usage the mobile phone in accessing/receiving agricultural information from different sources by the farmers of Bangladesh.

3.0 Research Methods

The study was conducted in Dhamrai Upazila of Dhaka District and Manikganj Sadar upazilla of Manikganj district. Due to time constraints mobile phone users’ farmers have been selected from these two Upazilas. Maps of these two upazilas have been presented in Figures 1.

These images were removed by the editorial team due to copyright reasons.

Fig 1. Administrative Map of Dhamrai Upazila of Dhaka district and Manikganj Sadar Upazila of Manikganj district.

Farmers of these two upazilas who have experienced in crop production and having at least 0.1 hectare of land as well as use mobile phone as a communication media were the population of the study. For this purpose an up to date list of farmers using mobile phone were prepared with the help of concern Upazilla Agriculture Office and Agriculture Information Service (AIS). They are the members of ICT equipped farmers club of those upazilas. This club also known as Agricultural Information and Communication Center(AICC).The total numbers of the farmers of these type using mobile phones for crop production in these two upazila were 50. About twenty percent (n=10) of the farmers were selected as sample following simple purposive sampling method.

The study adopted mixed methodology approach. Data collected through interview using questionnaires (Annexure).The interview schedule was carefully designed and prepared according to the objectives of the study. The statements and questions were set with wide version and they were made simply and easily understandable to the farmers. It contained both open and closed form questions. For detailed information from the respondents one FGD was administered. Besides, secondary resources obtained from books, journals, publications, websites of different ministries & agencies etc. were consulted and analyzed.

After collecting data, these were categorized, tabulated and analyzed through some themes and sub-themes linking to the objectives of the study. Quantitative data were presented using graphs and chart with the support of Microsoft Excel.

4.0 Results and Discussions

4.1 Basic information of the respondents:

There were only 10 male farmers of this study who were interviewed. Since the agriculture sector is dominant by male farmers, no females were included in the respondent list. Majority (60%) respondents belong the age group ranges from 30-60 years. Both the respondents from the age group of 30-40 and 50-60 belong the equal percentage which was 30% each. In terms of educational background, 90% respondents were educated amongst that 30% had their graduation level education and 30% had class 5-8 level.10% respondent can sign only.From the interview through mobile phone it was observed that all respondents were able to communicate with mobile phone. All age group farmers contacted with extension workers like Sub Assistant Agriculture Officer. FGD found that 30-60 age group contacted frequently with agriculture office. Age group 60-70 contacted with the help of other farmers in receiving different agricultural information. In terms of education, farmers of all level used mobile phone in receiving agricultural information. Even farmers who can sign only and with class 5-8 does not uncomfortable with operating mobile phones in accessing/receiving information.

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Fig 2. Basic information of the respondents

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• Author: Dr. Mohammad Rezaul Karim (Author)
• Pages: 17
• Catalog Number: V1303144
• ISBN (PDF): 9783346771841
• ISBN (Book): 9783346771858
• Language: English
• Tags: e-agriculture, smart, farmers, mobile, phone, agricultural, information