Date: 2020-09-02

Dr. Toyin Ajibade, a lecturer, University of Ilorin, has stressed the need to adopt modern information and communication technology towards the promotion of commercial agriculture and trade integration through produce marketing.

Ajibade stated this on Monday, during a Focus Group Meeting and Mobile App Usability testing of the "KasuwaGo App", one of the outputs of the project titled: 'Promoting Trade Integration in Regional Legumes Mobile Technology" held in Ilorin.

The project is being funded by the Feed-the-Future Innovation Lab for Legumes Systems Research, and also partnership with the Michigan State University, East Lansing, United States of America.

The don, lecturer at the Department of Agricultural Economics and Farm Management, Unilorin, said that mobile-phone technology can be used to improve the value chain of legume farming in Nigeria, Niger and Burkina Faso.

She said that the problem associated with low levels of trade integration for decades including the loss of missed opportunities, would be a thing of the past if the mobile information technology is adopted by farmers and others, who are associated with legume production and distribution.

According to her, the project seeks to examine how mobile-phone technology can improve legume value chains, using a virtual marketplace by focusing on three important legume producing and consuming countries, including Nigeria, Niger, and Burkina Faso.

Ajibade observed that West African legumes markets have suffered from low levels of trade integration for decades, and as a result, have missed opportunities that include: higher levels of food security and greater economic opportunity in value chains.

"There is scarce public information on production, supply, demand, and price of legumes available to all the actors in the value chain.

"Information frictions, hence, represent a significant barrier to the functioning of legumes value chains in West Africa. "Poor knowledge of market opportunities or lack of information on potentially profitable markets can be an important barrier to smallholder farmers and small-scale traders, especially in the early stages of entry into the market," she said.

The expert in Farm Management noted that the adoption of the system would facilitate higher level of food security and greater opportunities in value chains.

She explained that most of the problems hindering development in produce marketing are due to poor knowledge of market opportunities or lack of information on potentially profitable markets.

She added that such has constituted an important barrier to the success of the efforts of smallholder farmers and small scale traders, especially in the early stages of entry into the market.

Ajibade explained that the project includes "developing and deploying a mobile app and evaluating the effectiveness of different design features to make this virtual market platform scalable and sustainable ".

She disclosed that the app is currently available in three language options, English, Yoruba and Hausa, adding that the project would later have Nupe and French added to it.

She said the innovation would impact farmers, and that the response has been wonderful, adding that the farmers and those who trade in their produce were very receptive of the technology, which has great potentials to boost their trade capacity and enhance their ways of doing business.

The researcher pointed out that once the virtual marketplace App is fully set up, it will become easily accessible in the Google Play Store.

'The app will be pilot tested and made available to legume buyers and sellers at all stages of the value chain-from farmers to aggregators, traders, wholesalers and retailers.

"Overall, the project promises a transformative leap forward for legume market integration in West Africa, using readily-available, commonly-used technology," she said.

The don expressed her appreciation to the management of the University of Ilorin for granting her necessary support, which enabled her to go far in her collaboration on what she called "this meaningful research".

She also appreciated the conducive and an enabling environment for the research activities.

Ajibade expressed optimism that the research would go a long way in improving the livelihood of farmers, traders and other actors in the food systems in Africa, while also adding value to her academic and professional development.