Awareness and the Use of Mobile Phones for Market Linkage by Smallholder Farmers in Kenya

2010 ◽  
pp. 1-18 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julius Juma Okello ◽  
Ruth M. Okello ◽  
Edith Ofwona-Adera
Keyword(s):  
Mobile Phones ◽  
Smallholder Farmers ◽  
Market Information ◽  
Farmers Market ◽  
Ict Adoption ◽  
Market Linkage ◽  
Female Farmers ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Agricultural Input

In many developing countries smallholder farmer participation in agricultural input and output markets continues to be constrained by lack of market information. Actors in most developing country markets operate under conditions of information asymmetry which increases the costs of doing business and locks out smallholder farmers. Attempts to address this problem are currently focusing on the use of ICT technologies to provide market information and link farmers to markets. This study examines the awareness and use of one such technology – mobile phones. It finds for male and female smallholder farmers in Kenya a high level of awareness and widespread use of mobile phones, mainly for social purposes. This study further finds that a low level of education, the cost of mobile phone airtime recharge vouchers and the lack of electricity for recharging phone batteries are the major impediments to the ownership and use of mobile phones, with female farmers more constrained than males. A high awareness of mobile phones among smallholder farmers presents an opportunity to strengthen smallholder farmers’ market linkage. However constraints to the usage of mobile phones will need to be addressed. The study findings indicate priorities for policymakers dealing with the specifics of ICT adoption as a tool to promote rural viability via rationalization of Kenyan agricultural markets.

Agro-Market Information and Farmers' Market Linkage: Way Forward

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
K.C. Siva Balan ◽  
Jayalakshmi Umadikar ◽  
Suma Prashant ◽  
Sangeetha U. ◽  
Archana K. Prasad
Keyword(s):  
Market Information ◽  
Farmers Market ◽  
Market Linkage

Smallholder farmers’ knowledge of mobile telephone use: Gender perspectives and implications for agricultural market development

2017 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 36-51 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alex Barimah Owusu ◽  
Paul W. K. Yankson ◽  
Stephen Frimpong
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Mobile Phone ◽  
Mobile Phones ◽  
Information Dissemination ◽  
Agricultural Sector ◽  
Smallholder Farmers ◽  
Mobile Telephone ◽  
Market Information ◽  
Agricultural Marketing ◽  
The Impact

Recent growth in mobile telephone and mobile-based information services in many developing countries provides opportunities to reduce costly and incomplete information dissemination in the agricultural sector and ensure efficient functioning of markets. But in order to successfully use mobile phones for the optimal development of agricultural markets, understanding the impact of social structure on mobile phone adoption, its uses and perceived impacts are invaluable. Although global assessments of capacity in the use of information communication technology (ICT) devices have been considered, such assessments mask significant geo-spatial variations among local farmers—male and female—with respect to their capacity to effectively use basic mobile phone functions. Documenting and recognizing this is important for the development of national agricultural ICT policies, as well as programmes aimed at increasing farmers’ knowledge and use of ICT for agricultural marketing. This article’s contribution to agricultural marketing and the use of ICT in developing countries (such as Ghana) is anchored in the assessment of the technical capacity and mobile telephone-based market information access to farmers in selected rural districts of Ghana. The selected districts are where most households are poor and heavily dependent on farming as their mainstay, and furthermore, where market information which mobile phones facilitate is crucial to maximizing their incomes.

scholarly journals Effects of the psaltry cassava out-grower scheme in enhancing smallholder productivity in Oke-Ogun Area of Oyo State, Nigeria

2020 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 137-150
Author(s):  
Fadairo Olushola ◽  
Alarape Oladimeji
Keyword(s):  
Smallholder Farmers ◽  
Scale Up ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Post Intervention ◽  
Farmers Market ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Market Linkage ◽  
Severe Constraint ◽  
And Control

This study assessed the effects of Psaltry cassava Out-grower scheme in enhancing smallholder productivity in Oke-Ogun area of Oyo State. Pre- and post-intervention combined with treatment and control group designs were used. Data were collected from 232 Out-grower and 49 non- Out-grower farmers using interview schedules. Data were analysed using percentages, ttest and regression analysis. Assured markets (90.5%) and training on postharvest handling of crops (69.9%) were the most common supports received from Psaltry. Long bureaucracy involved in documentation (x̄ =2.23) was the most severe constraint faced in the scheme. Total cassava harvested and productivity among Out-growers increased from 30,950.89±31,133.48kg to 106,116.88±96,926.01kg and 5,649.2±3835.3kg/Acre to 9,143.6±8799.1 kg/Acre before and after participating in Psaltry scheme, respectively. A significant difference existed between the productivity of Out-growers and non- Out-growers (t=7.256; p≤0.05). Membership of group (β=0.319) and length of involvement in the Psaltry scheme (β=0.157) positively and significantly influenced Out-growers’ cassava productivity. The Psaltry Outgrower scheme had stimulated beneficiary’s smallholder farmers towards higher productivity. A scale-up of the Psaltry model has prospects for transforming smallholder farmers to commercial producers. Keywords: Out-grower scheme, cassava farmers, market linkage, smallholderfarmers, psaltry scheme

Changing Role of Agriculture in Income and Employment, and Trends of Agricultural Worker Productivity in Indian States

2020 ◽  
pp. 183-189
Keyword(s):  
Green Revolution ◽  
Positive Trend ◽  
Worker Productivity ◽  
Indian States ◽  
Agricultural Worker ◽  
The Sixties ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Changing Role

The productivity of land has been often discussed and deliberated by the academia and policymakers to understand agriculture, however, very few studies have focused on the agriculture worker productivity to analyze this sector. This study concentrates on the productivity of agricultural workers from across the states taking two-time points into consideration. The agriculture worker productivity needs to be dealt with seriously and on a time series basis so that the marginal productivity of worker can be ascertained but also the dependency of worker on agriculture gets revealed. There is still disguised unemployment in all the states and high level of labour migration, yet most of the states showed the dependency has gone down. Although a state like Madhya Pradesh is doing very well in terms of income earned but that is at the cost of increased worker power in agriculture as a result of which, the productivity of worker has gone down. States like Mizoram, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Tripura, though small in size showed remarkable growth in productivity and all these states showed a positive trend in terms of worker shifting away from agriculture. The traditional states which gained the most from Green Revolution of the sixties are performing decently well, but they need to have the next major policy push so that they move to the next orbit of growth.

scholarly journals Determining the critical period for weed control in high-yielding cotton using common sunflower as a mimic weed

2019 ◽  
Vol 33 (6) ◽  
pp. 800-807 ◽  
Author(s):  
Graham W. Charles ◽  
Brian M. Sindel ◽  
Annette L. Cowie ◽  
Oliver G. G. Knox
Keyword(s):  
Weed Control ◽  
Critical Period ◽  
Yield Loss ◽  
Field Studies ◽  
Growing Degree Days ◽  
Degree Days ◽  
Weed Density ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Planting Season

AbstractField studies were conducted over six seasons to determine the critical period for weed control (CPWC) in high-yielding cotton, using common sunflower as a mimic weed. Common sunflower was planted with or after cotton emergence at densities of 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, and 50 plants m−2. Common sunflower was added and removed at approximately 0, 150, 300, 450, 600, 750, and 900 growing degree days (GDD) after planting. Season-long interference resulted in no harvestable cotton at densities of five or more common sunflower plants m−2. High levels of intraspecific and interspecific competition occurred at the highest weed densities, with increases in weed biomass and reductions in crop yield not proportional to the changes in weed density. Using a 5% yield-loss threshold, the CPWC extended from 43 to 615 GDD, and 20 to 1,512 GDD for one and 50 common sunflower plants m−2, respectively. These results highlight the high level of weed control required in high-yielding cotton to ensure crop losses do not exceed the cost of control.

scholarly journals Increasing smallholder farmers’ market participation through technology adoption in rural Timor‐Leste

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sonia Akter ◽  
Namrata Chindarkar ◽  
William Erskine ◽  
Luc Spyckerelle ◽  
Julie Imron ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Technology Adoption ◽  
Smallholder Farmers ◽  
Market Participation ◽  
Farmers Market ◽  
Timor Leste

scholarly journals Computing the Exact Number of Similarity Classes in the Longest Edge Bisection of Tetrahedra

Mathematics ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (12) ◽  
pp. 1447
Author(s):  
Jose P. Suárez ◽  
Agustín Trujillo ◽  
Tania Moreno
Keyword(s):  
Data Structure ◽  
Stability Condition ◽  
Open Problem ◽  
Integer Arithmetic ◽  
Exact Number ◽  
Similarity Class ◽  
The Stability ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Cost

Showing whether the longest-edge (LE) bisection of tetrahedra meshes degenerates the stability condition or not is still an open problem. Some reasons, in part, are due to the cost for achieving the computation of similarity classes of millions of tetrahedra. We prove the existence of tetrahedra where the LE bisection introduces, at most, 37 similarity classes. This family of new tetrahedra was roughly pointed out by Adler in 1983. However, as far as we know, there has been no evidence confirming its existence. We also introduce a new data structure and algorithm for computing the number of similarity tetrahedral classes based on integer arithmetic, storing only the square of edges. The algorithm lets us perform compact and efficient high-level similarity class computations with a cost that is only dependent on the number of similarity classes.

One-IPC high-level simulation of microthreaded many-core architectures

2016 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 152-162 ◽  
Author(s):  
Irfan Uddin
Keyword(s):  
Design Space Exploration ◽  
Instruction Set ◽  
Efficient Design ◽  
Simulation Framework ◽  
Fine Grained ◽  
Detailed Simulation ◽  
High Level ◽  
Many Core ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Multiple Clusters

The microthreaded many-core architecture is comprised of multiple clusters of fine-grained multi-threaded cores. The management of concurrency is supported in the instruction set architecture of the cores and the computational work in application is asynchronously delegated to different clusters of cores, where the cluster is allocated dynamically. Computer architects are always interested in analyzing the complex interaction amongst the dynamically allocated resources. Generally a detailed simulation with a cycle-accurate simulation of the execution time is used. However, the cycle-accurate simulator for the microthreaded architecture executes at the rate of 100,000 instructions per second, divided over the number of simulated cores. This means that the evaluation of a complex application executing on a contemporary multi-core machine can be very slow. To perform efficient design space exploration we present a co-simulation environment, where the detailed execution of instructions in the pipeline of microthreaded cores and the interactions amongst the hardware components are abstracted. We present the evaluation of the high-level simulation framework against the cycle-accurate simulation framework. The results show that the high-level simulator is faster and less complicated than the cycle-accurate simulator but with the cost of losing accuracy.

Criteria for the Evaluation of Social Policy Effectiveness of States

2014 ◽  
pp. 87-97
Author(s):  
V. Sautkina
Keyword(s):  
Developed Countries ◽  
Legal Aspects ◽  
Educational Services ◽  
State Control ◽  
National Education ◽  
Current State ◽  
The Usa ◽  
The Government ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Cost

The following article is devoted to the study of current state of national education and healthcare systems. The cost of services in these areas constantly increases, there for even developed countries are forced to make significant efforts in order to maintain earlier achieved results. Due to this reason countries entered into the period of constant reforms with the purpose of maintaining that high level of health and educational services for all segments of population with a constant reduction of its volume of financing. The legal aspects of these changes are requiring manifestation of the will of politicians in order to overcome the opposition of parties which are defending their interests. As an example, the main opponents of the healthcare reforms proposed by Barak Obama in the USA are Republicans who are concerned about a significant increase of a state control over the entire national insurance system. The author comes to the conclusion that only joint actions of the government and every segment of population might actually improve the quality of medical and educational services.

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