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Enhancing institutional and grassroots capacity in the use of ICTs

ICT4Ag

Capacity building in ICTs for agriculture has the fundamental purpose of enhancing institutional and grassroots capacity to influence agriculture and rural development policy processes and support increased efficiency of agricultural value chains. CTA offers capacity building opportunities in a number of areas including:  

  • Web 2.0 and social media allow development actors to easily communicate with peers and other stakeholders, strengthen their networks, selectively access information, produce and publish their own content or redistribute content published by others.
  • M-Apps for agriculture play an important role in connecting different nodes and supporting actors along value chains to make informed decisions.
  • Participatory spatial information management and communication is extremely effective in giving a voice and authority to grassroots concerns and aspirations related to spatially-defined issues, such as climate change adaptation, land use planning, and land tenure. The adoption of such practices coupled with acquired skills in using social media has enabled grassroots communities to add value and authority to their local knowledge and to ‘have a voice’ in policy processes.
  • Youth, ICT and agribusiness
  • Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), better known as drones are a new emerging technology which could revolutionise the way agricultural entrepreneurs interact with their land, water, crops and infrastructure. Since 2015, CTA has been investing in the topic and is planning to support UAV awareness raising, capacity building and governance.

Enhancing institutional and grassroots capacity in the use of ICTs builds on CTA’s broad experience gained over the last 30 years in supporting the adoption and institutionalisation of Web 2.0 and social media, and introducing Participatory Geographic Information Systems (PGIS).

© 2016, CTA. Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation

CTA is a joint international institution of the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States and the European Union (EU). CTA operates under the framework of the Cotonou Agreement and is funded by the EU.