Crítica y diagnosis del modelo

Continued improvements in phone ownership will drive increased access to D4Ag solutions.

There are several ways to understand smallholder farmer access to mobile phones, and thereby access to D4Ag solutions. GSMA estimated unique mobile subscription penetration in Africa is 45% as of the end of 2018.373 _{Though difficult to quantify precisely,}

given that they predominately live in rural areas, the number of unique subscriptions for smallholder farmers is likely in the 38–40%

conjunction with the Internet Society), and high-speed fibre optics (Google’s Project Link). Overall, connectivity will become less of a barrier as the D4Ag market matures over the next decade. The sector will likely face a more practical issue of turning registration into actual use – a challenge that we will discuss in Chapter 5.

Continued growth in digital payments access will increase and pave the way for D4Ag enterprises to engage with

expect to see MNOs continue to invest in expanding 3G and 4G coverage. Some major telecoms in Africa have already begun to explore and in some cases begin the transition to 5G, though this growth is expected to be uneven and is still in its earliest stages. Finally, there are several companies that are racing to invest in expanding connectivity across the continent, using, among other innovative technologies, satellites (e.g., Space-X’s Starlink initiative), balloons (Google’s Project Loon), internet exchange points (Facebook, in

Figure 34 Big tech making big waves in D4Ag

IBM

IBM has partnered with a few of the most successful D4Ag enterprises across the continent, including a partnership with Twiga Foods to establish a credit system leveraging blockchain technology. The programme is set to pilot among 220 retailers in Kenya, but if successful, IBM and Twiga Foods plan to roll out the platform to agriculture SMEs across Africa. During the first weeks of the pilot, the initiative extended loans averaging KES ~3,000 (€26.5) per beneficiary, which increased the profits of each retailer by 6% on average.

IBM is also working with Hello Tractor in Nigeria to apply IBM’s Watson Decision Platform for Agriculture, blockchain, the IoT, and the IBM Cloud to Hello Tractor’s mobile app. The objective is to capture an immutable record of all transactions from the first tractor request until the farmer has ploughed the field and returned the tractor. A database of transactions could improve the efficiency and impact of Hello Tractor’s services.

Going forward, IBM even plans to leverage image recognition to determine the quality of the cultivation and to expand the service across Kenya, Mozambique, Senegal, and Tanzania. Most recently, IBM has entered into a major partnership with Yara to “build the world’s leading digital farming platform, providing holistic digital services and instant agronomic advice.”365

By the end of 2019, they plan to begin by offering hyperlocal real-time weather forecasts along with actionable advice and recommendations based on weather data. While the partnership is global in nature, and initially plans to target Asia, Brazil and Europe, Yara has said that it plans to reach African farmers “very soon.”

Microsoft

Microsoft has entered the African market with a focus on precision agriculture and AI technology. In collaboration with Techno Brain, Microsoft is working on a new Agriculture Data Platform in East Africa. Via Microsoft’s intelligent cloud system, the partners are seeking to collate data on rainfall, land type, and soil nutrition and create customised and wide-ranging farm management advice on crops, harvest timing, and pest control. The project is expected to pilot in Malawi and Tanzania in 2019. In addition, Microsoft’s FarmBeats technology, which uses IoT and AI to streamline farm operations, has moved one step closer to a public release of its innovations.

SAP

SAP is currently focusing on applying its software technology to develop comprehensive farmer databases and to connect smallholder farmers to larger agricultural value chains. SAP has created a software system called Rural Sourcing Management, which is designed to collect and share data on farm

characteristics and input/output transactions.

In Nigeria, SAP is working with CBI Nigeria to integrate 850,000 small maize farmers into the agricultural value chains. In Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana, SAP’s software has helped one of the world’s leading chocolate manufacturers, Barry Callebaut, to develop a supply chain management tool to onboard ~200,000 farmers since 2016. And in Uganda, the company’s cloud-based solutions have supported the efforts of Kalangala Palm Oil Grower’s Trust (KPOGT) to improve the income of its 2,000 farmers. SAP’s software enables KPOGT to both communicate market prices for palm oil to its farmers and to inform local oil palm companies of when deliveries are expected.

15 countries, Paga has begun tapping into the Nigerian market, and the Bank of Kigali has added more than 1.5 million users to its mobile money platform in Rwanda. Looking ahead, these national initiatives will be accompanied by a new joint venture between MTN and Orange (with support from the BMGF), called ‘Mowali,’ which has the potential to reach beyond the African powerhouses and extended digital financial services to millions of rural households across the continent.

smallholder farmers in a more cost- effective way. According to recent GSMA

data, 135 mobile money services supported more than 120 million active accounts in Africa in 2017, representing a growth of 18% compared to 2016. Much of this growth came in rural areas and will continue to do so in the years to come. While Kenya has long been an African leader – and world leader – in mobile money, with solutions such as M-Pesa and Equitel, over the past few years, MTN Mobile money has expanded to more than

Google

Google has partnered with ISRIC World Soil Information to make soil maps widely accessible. The BMGF-funded Africa Soil Information Services (AfSIS) project has released maps that predict “more than 20 soil properties at six standard depths at 250 meter resolutions.” AfSIS created them with “new analysis, statistics, field trials and crowdsourcing.” The public can explore these maps for free via Google Earth.366 _{Furthermore, Google Maps and FAO are}

collaborating on climate change resilience and mitigation. Google has brought big data, cloud computing, and mapping capabilities to the table and partnered with FAO “to make remote sensing data more efficient and accessible.” Satellites can track a host of climate change-related metrics (e.g., deforestation, land usage).367

Through its foundation, Google is currently exploring its options for engaging on African smallholder agriculture, but has no formal programming announced at this stage.

Bosch

Bosch’s technologies are currently helping support the creation of value-additive activities in different markets. Bosch’s packaging technology has enabled the growth of the processing sector for coffee in Ethiopia and cassava in Nigeria, value that was previously being left on the table.368 _{Looking forward, Bosch is}

evaluating the possibilities of big data and artificial intelligence in transforming agriculture. Bosch has begun to develop digital applications that will allow algorithms to assess plants, insects, and weeds (i.e., via photographs) and inform farmers on better input usage, agricultural practices, and likely much more.369

TCS

TCS has two agricultural analytics platforms that have expanded or piloted in Southern Africa. These platforms compile various

kinds of information (e.g., on soil moisture, weather, prevalent diseases) that can help farmers.370 _{TCS’s best-known solution is}

mKRISHI in India, which receives questions from farmers via IVR, and replies via SMS and IVR. This network is used as an advisory information dissemination channel as well. Given mKRISHI’s success in India and TCS’s expansion into Africa, it would be a natural step to launch a solution similar to mKRISHI in Southern Africa, perhaps fuelled in part by the aforementioned analytics platforms.371

Alibaba

Alibaba has already played an important role in transforming Chinese agriculture through its Rural Taobao business (profiled in depth in Chapter 2) and other innovations such as ET Agricultural Brain, which uses artificial intelligence and machine learning (using a combination of visual recognition, voice recognition, and real-time environment monitoring) to help farmers care for their livestock and crops.

Alibaba has already made Africa a clear priority for its growth. It has invested in several projects to help improve the ecosystem for e-commerce, including the Netpreneurs network (which is building entrepreneurial capabilities on the continent), the new economy initiative (targeting policy markets) and a partnership between the Alibaba Business School and University in Rwanda to develop commerce-oriented curriculum, among others. In late 2018, Rwanda joined Alibaba’s Electronic World Trade Platform (eWTP), which “provides small and medium-sized enterprises with operational infrastructure, such as commerce logistics, cloud computing, mobile payments and skills training.” These initiatives highlight a clear vision for how Alibaba plans to build the enabling environment and the level of importance it is placing on national-level partnerships. Given the company’s broader aspirations in Africa, and its success with cutting edge D4Ag solutions in China, it is quite possible that the company will make a major foray into D4Ag in Africa in the near future.372

More recent incubation efforts have focused specifically on agriculture and agribusiness. For example, SmartHectar and enpact launched an innovation hub for agriculture technology, food technology and water technology in West Africa (based out of Ghana) in 2019. The World Bank is in the process of setting up a new AgTech incubator and accelerator in Kenya as part of the broader WB Disruptive Technology for Africa strategy and is considering replicating this approach in other African countries, such as Nigeria. A larger and more diversified tech start-up ecosystem will likely bring improved technology and catalyse greater investments in local start-ups, including in agriculture. Equally important, a richer ecosystem could bring in new talent and develop local talent.