We’ll be launching Sprout formally on November 22nd, during Mercy Corps AgriFin's 6th Annual Learning Event. Event Registration Coming Soon...Watch this space for more details.
The 6th ALE is a forum to share thoughts, strategies, and the emerging practices in the digital space towards addressing complex challenges faced by smallholder farmers exacerbated by the ongoing global issues. The event will consist of keynote speeches, presentations, launches, demonstrations, panel discussions, quizzes, raffles and a full day marketplace where great innovative solutions will be on display.
In other news, on March 9th, 2022 the MC AgriFin organized a session at the GIZ funded ICT4Ag event titled “Women in Agribusiness - how giving female farmers access to open and climate-smart agronomic content pays off”. The session was kicked off by Stewart Collis, Senior Program Officer at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and followed up by an overview of the Sprout Platform, by Elias Nure D-CSA and Sprout Platform lead at the MC AgriFin Program. It was a spirited discussion moderated by Hileena Eshetu Chole, Knowledge Sharing & Network Building Specialist of the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and panellist included members of the following organizations: Mercy Corps AgriFin, KALRO, Food Security for Peace and Nutrition Africa, Shamba Shape Up Kenya, The Mediae Company, Agricultural Transformation Agency, and CoAmana, DigiCow Dairy. For more information or if you would like to watch the session, click HERE.
The session was a lively panel discussion from a wide range of partners that span multiple geographies across the public and private sector. During the session, it was noted that digital content acquisition is a time consuming process. Also, the discussions established the importance of creating gender intentional content for more inclusivity and impact. Women farmers face a wide range of gender-specific obstacles—such as lack of access to land, financing, markets, agricultural training and education, suitable working conditions, and equal treatment—put female farmers at a significant disadvantage before they ever plough a field or sow a seed. Innovative applications along the value chain have played a role to help female farmers achieve higher agricultural yields, keep value creation local and build sustainable, climate-resilient food systems.
For this multifaceted challenge, one of the proposed solutions is the Sprout platform, an open data platform where a wide range of content can be consolidated and shared amongst partners before being distributed to smallholders, where they can use the information to build their capacity and become more resilient. During the session, participants shared their experiences on how digital open content platforms have helped address the gender disparity gap and support women with relevant climate smart and general agriculture best practice content. Some of the highlights include participants’ experience with content aggregation, dissemination and customization for targeted groups with a key focus on women small producers in the food system.
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