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Case Study of CABI Direct2Farm service in India

S
Sharbendu Banerjee

Direct2Farm is a mobile infomediary service that provides farmers in India information to enhance their knowledge, improve market readiness, and help them cope with climate adversities. It works with partners like IFFCO Kisan Sanchar Limited to provide voice-based advisories to over 4 million farmers. An impact assessment found that the information from Direct2Farm has contributed tangible gains for farmers and they are willing to trial new knowledge and share it with each other. The service aims to make farming more profitable and sustainable, especially for smallholder farmers.

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Case Study of CABI Direct2Farm service in India, based on VoiceSite technology: Direct2Farm a Mobile Infomediary Service for farmers that help them to access information on demand to enhance knowledge, improve market readiness and respond well to climatic adversities. Direct2Farm service is backed up by CABI with the aim of making farming profitable and sustainable, especially for the smallholder farmers. In India, under the Direct2Farm project, CABI has been working with the following partners in since 2009; IFFCO Kisan Sanchar Limited (IFFCO)-2009: Joint Venture between IFFCO and Airtel, to provide voice based agro-advisory to farmers. Currently reaching about 4 million farmers in India mKisan (GSMA/USAID)-2012: Voice based agro- advisory and market linkage support. Targeted to reach 1 million farmers in 6 Indian states (Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Karnataka) Caf辿 M坦vel (Coffee Board of India)-2012: A specialized Infomediary service for the coffee growers in the state of Karnataka, India. This is funded by International Coffee Organization and supported by Coffee Board of India, under the Ministry of Commerce and Industry. Direct2Farm Scale Up: Direct2Farm project has expanded in India and Africa. In India, about 400,000 farmers in 6 states are connected to Direct2Farm mobile service as direct beneficiaries. There are about 30,000 women farmers registered with Direct2Farm mobile service. The beneficiaries receive regular information and updates on their mobile phone and also use an IVR based Knowledge Repository, which has been created to facilitate remote learning and expert consultation by the farmers through a Toll Free IVR 1800-114-151. Direct2Farm platform is based on the VoiceSite technology developed by its technology partner Phoneme. The VoiceSite is accessed through a toll free number 1800-114-151, and managed through a web-based dashboard. Currently the service features available in Direct2Farm are; Registration through IVR or Call Centre
2 Weekly crop and livestock advisories through local language voice messages as per the farming profile of the subscribers Weekly weather and market price alerts through local language voice messages as per the location of the subscribers SMS alerts on demand or on special campaign (e.g. promoting blood donation, quit tobacco etc.) in collaboration with different government departments Expert consultation on crop and livestock problems through dedicated farmers helpline The service managed through a web application, comprising of the following A dashboard for real-time analytics A campaign manager for uploading content and execution of campaigns A CRM for managing subscriber data Campaign reports Helpline reports Direct2Farm Dashboard & Campaign Management Panels
3 Impact Assesment An impact assessment study undertaken by IMC Worldwide Ltd, a leading international development consultant and monitoring and evaluation specialist during Dec 2015, revealed the following encouraging facts about the Direct2Farm service; Mobile information delivered by Direct2Farm has contributed towards tangible gains by the farmers
4 Farmers are willing to trial new knowledge gained through Direct2Farm and share the learning between them In summary it has been found that mobile agriculture, or for that matter any ICT application in agriculture, is effective when it is scalable, hyper- localized and helps people make tangible gains. However, the informational services are not financially viable, unless they are bundled with transactional services, especially financial services such as m-Banking, m- Money or m-Insurance.
5 D2F Key Performance Indicators 2015 Total Number of subscribers: 427,000 (Women 30,000) Number villages covered: 1890 Voice Messages Narowcasted: 10 milion Average listenership: 60% Text Messages Narrowcasted: 7 million Calls in Farmer Helpline: 50,000 Messages developed on Crop: 4090 Messages developed on Livestock: 1750 Weather Alerts: 250 D2F Success Stories 2015: Encouraging women in adapting mobile phones: Mobile phone adoption by women is abysmally low in most of the developing countries. As per GSMA analysis, only 11% of the rural women have direct access to phones. A lot of this can be attributed to negative socio-cultural perception regarding mobile phones in villages. Through the Direct2Farm project in India, efforts were made to ensure to pass on an impactful message in the rural mass irrespective of gender that mobile can bring change in their life if it is rightly used. In this effect, an event organized in one backward village in Haryana, northern India, on the eve of International Womens Day in 2015. The even was about a story competition, which purpose was to gather the maximum number of real-life stories from females, where mobile has got some significant change in their life. 76 women participated and penned down their stories, in this competition. In these 76 participants, 28 were schoolgirls, 11 were housewives, nine older than 55 years of age, and three completely illiterate and seven who asked somebody else to write their stories. The rest were youth. This figure was quite encouraging. Finally, three were selected as winners out of 6 finalists based upon ranking, which was done on quality of narration, depth, intensity and originality of the story. This entire episode has brought all the females together and encouraged them to write their stories. The level of participation was showing the emerging confidence among the females of that village; this was not less than their male counterparts.
6 Winner of the competition was Manisha More, here is her story which she delivered in a impactful manner I was in class 10th , when this incidence took place. It was an evening when the entire village was in the celebration mode. There was a marriage ceremony in Bibipur village; people were in festive mood. They were dancing, the music band was at the top of their tone, and loud noise of firecrackers can be heard all around. Suddenly a firecracker slipped from the hand of a person going in the marriage procession, this firecracker remained unnoticed. I picked it up and kept it considering it as a roll of wool. I was completely ignorant that the object could be an unfired firecracker. I cut the wool layer of the firecracker; still I could not make it out what it was. My father saw me with that object and asked me to throw it away as it is dangerous firecracker. I convinced my father that the object is harmless, as it has been used during marriage procession. But, he kept on insisting me to throw it away. I thought stove (chulha) would be the best place to dispose it off. Unknowingly, I threw it into the stove. Then after, my mother came into kitchen to lit fire for cooking. The object got blasted as soon as she set on fire. She was got injured badly and got fainted. Her one hand got badly injured. I was in panic and could not understand what to do. I went to my neighbors and they immediately called on my fathers mobile. My father straightway called a doctor and called some relatives to help with some money. My mother was hospitalized and finally, she was saved. Years have crossed to this incidence. Still, her left hand is not as efficient as her right hand. This reminds me of the accident. But, I am happy she is around us. I am really thankful to the mobile technology, which helped to manage everything quickly and saved my mother. She ended up her story with a impactful quotation Mobile par hogi jis ki command, duniya mein hogi uski demand (One who will have command over the mobile will be always in demand)," Supporting farmers in coping up with climate change: Hemlals Story Most of the areas of Jharkhand, a tribal sate in the east-central part of India are drought prone. Farmers here depend mainly on rainfall for the farming and late monsoon or less rain makes situation desperate for them. Hemlal Prasad Yadav is one such farmer from Giridih district of Jharkhand, who has always been
7 troubled by the frequent droughts and had to toil hard to feed his family. Being in a remote area, there is hardly and support or information available about weather forecast or new technologies that can help him to grow crop with very less water. He heard about Direct2Farm service from the village headman, when volunteers from Kisan Sanchar visited their village and Hemlal immediately decided to register in the service; because not only he would get information directly in his mobile phone, there was a free trial period offered so that he can really test whether the service is good or not. After registering, Hemlal started getting regular crop advisory and weather updates on his phone, and gained new knowledge about how to retain soil moisture in field so that he can grow crops with minimum irrigation. He also learned about pests prevalent in this location and how to control them. With this new knowledge, Hemlal is confident that he will be able to get a decent harvest this year and his family will no longer go hungry. In Hemlals world This service is a life saver for the farmers in this remote location, if other farmers too, give their mobile numbers, then everyone will get benefit from this service and our family and children will be happy and healthy Educating farmers on safe pesticide usage: Sureshs Story Suresh Kumar is a smallholder farmer from the Jind district of Haryana in northern India. In the local market, pesticide dealers sell all kinds of chemicals to the unsuspecting farmers, by making tall claims. Farmers get panicked when the see their crops are getting damaged because of some insect or disease and in desperation, they try anything that the dealers suggest. However, those chemicals mostly do not do any good and each year many farmers make huge loss first by spending money on expensive chemicals and then when their crop fails. This has been happening for years and farmers have taken it as way of life because they dont have any other way to get immediate advice when the pests attack their crops. During the last Rabi season, Suresh attended a Krishi Vichar Gosthi (farmers consultation) organized by Kisan Sanchar, and there he heard about Direct2Farm. The volunteers told him that Direct2Farm service would provide him advance information about various pests and how to manage them. Not only that, farmers can calls up the Toll free number (1800- 114-151) and record their questions, which will be answered by the agriculture experts and they can have live chat with the experts, any time. This seemed like a ray of hope for Suresh, because he was worried about pest problem in his crop. However, he was sceptical, since this was a mobile service and he has never used mobile agro-advisory service before. The volunteers assured him that he can try the service free for some time and only if he finds the service good, he needs to continue. This built confidence and Suresh immediately registered himself for the Direct2Farm service. The volunteers asked him about which crop varieties he grows and he was explained that the experts will provide him information which is relevant for the crop varieties that he grows so that he gets what is needed and no unnecessary botheration. Since then Suresh is a regular subscriber of Direct2Farm service and he has gained lot of new knowledge. In Sureshs
8 own words. Information provided through these messages is very useful and farmers should work according to the advices to get most benefit. I find the helpline service best, because talking to an expert helps me to clear my doubts on the spot and no one can mislead me because they know I can always cross check from an expert, then and there. I will definitely continue with Direct2Farm in future Applying Human Centered Design principles for content developemnt: One of the key success factors of any service is its closeness with the users; its said that knowing you is knowhow. Direct2Farm, in spite of being a mobile-based service, firmly believes in human factor and has created a robust feedback mechanism where farmers are periodically contacted for service feedback and improvement. In fact the Toll free number 1800- 114-151 has a section meant only for providing feedback by the farmers, which are documented, and appropriate actions are taken for improvement. Recently Direct2Farm team travelled to 4 villages in the Vaishali district of Bihar in eastern India for a Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) study to understand information needs and gaps among the farmers in the area. This is important because at the onset of Kharif season, Direct2Farm should be ready with all the critical information that the farmers need to get a good harvest. Application of PRA principles makes interaction interactive, and farmers themselves come out with their key problems, which is critical for effective service delivery. Some interesting revelations that came out of the study is that there is lot of difference between what the male and female farmers know about weed control and grain storage. It was discovered that the women folk, just by years of practical experience, has gathered valuable insights about managing weeds and grain insects, which their menfolk are still unaware. This one was a real example of women empowerment and at the end of 2 days and 100 kilometres of muddy trail; Direct2Farm team came back wiser and happier.

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Case Study of CABI Direct2Farm service in India

  • 1. Case Study of CABI Direct2Farm service in India, based on VoiceSite technology: Direct2Farm a Mobile Infomediary Service for farmers that help them to access information on demand to enhance knowledge, improve market readiness and respond well to climatic adversities. Direct2Farm service is backed up by CABI with the aim of making farming profitable and sustainable, especially for the smallholder farmers. In India, under the Direct2Farm project, CABI has been working with the following partners in since 2009; IFFCO Kisan Sanchar Limited (IFFCO)-2009: Joint Venture between IFFCO and Airtel, to provide voice based agro-advisory to farmers. Currently reaching about 4 million farmers in India mKisan (GSMA/USAID)-2012: Voice based agro- advisory and market linkage support. Targeted to reach 1 million farmers in 6 Indian states (Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Karnataka) Caf辿 M坦vel (Coffee Board of India)-2012: A specialized Infomediary service for the coffee growers in the state of Karnataka, India. This is funded by International Coffee Organization and supported by Coffee Board of India, under the Ministry of Commerce and Industry. Direct2Farm Scale Up: Direct2Farm project has expanded in India and Africa. In India, about 400,000 farmers in 6 states are connected to Direct2Farm mobile service as direct beneficiaries. There are about 30,000 women farmers registered with Direct2Farm mobile service. The beneficiaries receive regular information and updates on their mobile phone and also use an IVR based Knowledge Repository, which has been created to facilitate remote learning and expert consultation by the farmers through a Toll Free IVR 1800-114-151. Direct2Farm platform is based on the VoiceSite technology developed by its technology partner Phoneme. The VoiceSite is accessed through a toll free number 1800-114-151, and managed through a web-based dashboard. Currently the service features available in Direct2Farm are; Registration through IVR or Call Centre
  • 2. 2 Weekly crop and livestock advisories through local language voice messages as per the farming profile of the subscribers Weekly weather and market price alerts through local language voice messages as per the location of the subscribers SMS alerts on demand or on special campaign (e.g. promoting blood donation, quit tobacco etc.) in collaboration with different government departments Expert consultation on crop and livestock problems through dedicated farmers helpline The service managed through a web application, comprising of the following A dashboard for real-time analytics A campaign manager for uploading content and execution of campaigns A CRM for managing subscriber data Campaign reports Helpline reports Direct2Farm Dashboard & Campaign Management Panels
  • 3. 3 Impact Assesment An impact assessment study undertaken by IMC Worldwide Ltd, a leading international development consultant and monitoring and evaluation specialist during Dec 2015, revealed the following encouraging facts about the Direct2Farm service; Mobile information delivered by Direct2Farm has contributed towards tangible gains by the farmers
  • 4. 4 Farmers are willing to trial new knowledge gained through Direct2Farm and share the learning between them In summary it has been found that mobile agriculture, or for that matter any ICT application in agriculture, is effective when it is scalable, hyper- localized and helps people make tangible gains. However, the informational services are not financially viable, unless they are bundled with transactional services, especially financial services such as m-Banking, m- Money or m-Insurance.
  • 5. 5 D2F Key Performance Indicators 2015 Total Number of subscribers: 427,000 (Women 30,000) Number villages covered: 1890 Voice Messages Narowcasted: 10 milion Average listenership: 60% Text Messages Narrowcasted: 7 million Calls in Farmer Helpline: 50,000 Messages developed on Crop: 4090 Messages developed on Livestock: 1750 Weather Alerts: 250 D2F Success Stories 2015: Encouraging women in adapting mobile phones: Mobile phone adoption by women is abysmally low in most of the developing countries. As per GSMA analysis, only 11% of the rural women have direct access to phones. A lot of this can be attributed to negative socio-cultural perception regarding mobile phones in villages. Through the Direct2Farm project in India, efforts were made to ensure to pass on an impactful message in the rural mass irrespective of gender that mobile can bring change in their life if it is rightly used. In this effect, an event organized in one backward village in Haryana, northern India, on the eve of International Womens Day in 2015. The even was about a story competition, which purpose was to gather the maximum number of real-life stories from females, where mobile has got some significant change in their life. 76 women participated and penned down their stories, in this competition. In these 76 participants, 28 were schoolgirls, 11 were housewives, nine older than 55 years of age, and three completely illiterate and seven who asked somebody else to write their stories. The rest were youth. This figure was quite encouraging. Finally, three were selected as winners out of 6 finalists based upon ranking, which was done on quality of narration, depth, intensity and originality of the story. This entire episode has brought all the females together and encouraged them to write their stories. The level of participation was showing the emerging confidence among the females of that village; this was not less than their male counterparts.
  • 6. 6 Winner of the competition was Manisha More, here is her story which she delivered in a impactful manner I was in class 10th , when this incidence took place. It was an evening when the entire village was in the celebration mode. There was a marriage ceremony in Bibipur village; people were in festive mood. They were dancing, the music band was at the top of their tone, and loud noise of firecrackers can be heard all around. Suddenly a firecracker slipped from the hand of a person going in the marriage procession, this firecracker remained unnoticed. I picked it up and kept it considering it as a roll of wool. I was completely ignorant that the object could be an unfired firecracker. I cut the wool layer of the firecracker; still I could not make it out what it was. My father saw me with that object and asked me to throw it away as it is dangerous firecracker. I convinced my father that the object is harmless, as it has been used during marriage procession. But, he kept on insisting me to throw it away. I thought stove (chulha) would be the best place to dispose it off. Unknowingly, I threw it into the stove. Then after, my mother came into kitchen to lit fire for cooking. The object got blasted as soon as she set on fire. She was got injured badly and got fainted. Her one hand got badly injured. I was in panic and could not understand what to do. I went to my neighbors and they immediately called on my fathers mobile. My father straightway called a doctor and called some relatives to help with some money. My mother was hospitalized and finally, she was saved. Years have crossed to this incidence. Still, her left hand is not as efficient as her right hand. This reminds me of the accident. But, I am happy she is around us. I am really thankful to the mobile technology, which helped to manage everything quickly and saved my mother. She ended up her story with a impactful quotation Mobile par hogi jis ki command, duniya mein hogi uski demand (One who will have command over the mobile will be always in demand)," Supporting farmers in coping up with climate change: Hemlals Story Most of the areas of Jharkhand, a tribal sate in the east-central part of India are drought prone. Farmers here depend mainly on rainfall for the farming and late monsoon or less rain makes situation desperate for them. Hemlal Prasad Yadav is one such farmer from Giridih district of Jharkhand, who has always been
  • 7. 7 troubled by the frequent droughts and had to toil hard to feed his family. Being in a remote area, there is hardly and support or information available about weather forecast or new technologies that can help him to grow crop with very less water. He heard about Direct2Farm service from the village headman, when volunteers from Kisan Sanchar visited their village and Hemlal immediately decided to register in the service; because not only he would get information directly in his mobile phone, there was a free trial period offered so that he can really test whether the service is good or not. After registering, Hemlal started getting regular crop advisory and weather updates on his phone, and gained new knowledge about how to retain soil moisture in field so that he can grow crops with minimum irrigation. He also learned about pests prevalent in this location and how to control them. With this new knowledge, Hemlal is confident that he will be able to get a decent harvest this year and his family will no longer go hungry. In Hemlals world This service is a life saver for the farmers in this remote location, if other farmers too, give their mobile numbers, then everyone will get benefit from this service and our family and children will be happy and healthy Educating farmers on safe pesticide usage: Sureshs Story Suresh Kumar is a smallholder farmer from the Jind district of Haryana in northern India. In the local market, pesticide dealers sell all kinds of chemicals to the unsuspecting farmers, by making tall claims. Farmers get panicked when the see their crops are getting damaged because of some insect or disease and in desperation, they try anything that the dealers suggest. However, those chemicals mostly do not do any good and each year many farmers make huge loss first by spending money on expensive chemicals and then when their crop fails. This has been happening for years and farmers have taken it as way of life because they dont have any other way to get immediate advice when the pests attack their crops. During the last Rabi season, Suresh attended a Krishi Vichar Gosthi (farmers consultation) organized by Kisan Sanchar, and there he heard about Direct2Farm. The volunteers told him that Direct2Farm service would provide him advance information about various pests and how to manage them. Not only that, farmers can calls up the Toll free number (1800- 114-151) and record their questions, which will be answered by the agriculture experts and they can have live chat with the experts, any time. This seemed like a ray of hope for Suresh, because he was worried about pest problem in his crop. However, he was sceptical, since this was a mobile service and he has never used mobile agro-advisory service before. The volunteers assured him that he can try the service free for some time and only if he finds the service good, he needs to continue. This built confidence and Suresh immediately registered himself for the Direct2Farm service. The volunteers asked him about which crop varieties he grows and he was explained that the experts will provide him information which is relevant for the crop varieties that he grows so that he gets what is needed and no unnecessary botheration. Since then Suresh is a regular subscriber of Direct2Farm service and he has gained lot of new knowledge. In Sureshs
  • 8. 8 own words. Information provided through these messages is very useful and farmers should work according to the advices to get most benefit. I find the helpline service best, because talking to an expert helps me to clear my doubts on the spot and no one can mislead me because they know I can always cross check from an expert, then and there. I will definitely continue with Direct2Farm in future Applying Human Centered Design principles for content developemnt: One of the key success factors of any service is its closeness with the users; its said that knowing you is knowhow. Direct2Farm, in spite of being a mobile-based service, firmly believes in human factor and has created a robust feedback mechanism where farmers are periodically contacted for service feedback and improvement. In fact the Toll free number 1800- 114-151 has a section meant only for providing feedback by the farmers, which are documented, and appropriate actions are taken for improvement. Recently Direct2Farm team travelled to 4 villages in the Vaishali district of Bihar in eastern India for a Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) study to understand information needs and gaps among the farmers in the area. This is important because at the onset of Kharif season, Direct2Farm should be ready with all the critical information that the farmers need to get a good harvest. Application of PRA principles makes interaction interactive, and farmers themselves come out with their key problems, which is critical for effective service delivery. Some interesting revelations that came out of the study is that there is lot of difference between what the male and female farmers know about weed control and grain storage. It was discovered that the women folk, just by years of practical experience, has gathered valuable insights about managing weeds and grain insects, which their menfolk are still unaware. This one was a real example of women empowerment and at the end of 2 days and 100 kilometres of muddy trail; Direct2Farm team came back wiser and happier.