Going digital in agriculture: how radio and SMS can scale-up smallholder participation in legume-based sustainable agricultural intensification practices and technologies in Tanzania

Abstract

In 2016, a study was conducted in Tanzania to assess the impact of radio and SMS in scaling-up smallholder participation in legume-based sustainable agricultural intensification (SAI) practices and technologies. The study aimed to answer the following research questions: (i) does participation in the campaign enhance farmers' knowledge of legume-based sustainable agricultural intensification practices and technologies? (ii) what is the impact of the campaign on the adoption of legume-based sustainable agricultural intensification practices and technologies?; (iii) does exposure to multiple ICT-enabled channels result in larger gains (in terms of knowledge and adoption) than exposure to only one channel? (iv) is it more cost-effective to use radio or SMS alone or use them in combination? The results show that both awareness and adoption are boosted if SMS supports radio campaigns. However, radio alone is the most cost-effective approach. Each dollar spent on the radio campaign results in 2.1 farmers that have adopted at least one new practice, compared with 0.5 farmers for SMS and 0.4 farmers for radio and SMS combined. Other factors were also important in facilitating uptake of legume-based SAI practices, such as gender, age, education and land size, but were not statistically significant when rated against the communication channels used.

Barriers to sustainable intensification: overlooked disconnects between agricultural extension and farmer practice in maize-legume cropping systems in Tanzania

“…Previous bean production studies in Tanzania have addressed total bean production over a season, which obscures the complex bean management patterns found in this study (Letaa et al, 2015;Piikki et al, 2017;Silvestri et al, 2020;Stahley et al, 2012). Recommendations need to take into account planting sequences, household member involvement, and production objectives.…”

Lessons on enabling African smallholder farmers, especially women and youth, to benefit from sustainable agricultural intensification

“…The next essential determinant for enabling SAI environments is the access to information and resources. Digital information services, such as the ones tested by Ortiz-Crespo et al (2020) and Silvestri et al (2020), aim to use the power of ICTs to enhance farmers' access to information, and extension services, while access to improved and certified seed can be enhanced by innovative supply systems (Orr et al, 2020).…”

“…This approach enabled delivery of information services to a diversity of resource-limited smallholders, while also reducing the workload of extension agents. Silvestri et al (2020) show that a combination of ICT channels can be a more effective means to disseminate information and boost adoption of SAI than relying on a single medium. They show that combining radio and SMS improve farmer access to information on legume agronomy and can lead to greater adoption of improved production practices.…”

Farmers’ Perceptions of Climate Change and Agricultural Adaptation in Burkina Faso

“…However, given the increasing access to phones and sustainable improvement in the network throughout the country, other digital services (SMS and phone applications) for mainstreaming agrometeorological information to farmers should be further explored. In fact, the use of these Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) has been shown to close the gaps between climate information producers and end users, in addition to being effective for building climate resilience among African farmers [48][49][50].…”