A development and agricultural technology company, TECH4AG, with the mission to unlock opportunities and improve nutritional and agricultural value chain in Africa through technology, innovation, research, and partnerships has empowered 20 female dairy farmers with Free Smart Mobile Phone tablet recently to boost Digital inclusion and dairy best practices in Oyo State.
The firm, through its Tech4Dairy project, in partnership with FrieslandCampina WAMCO Nigeria PLC and 2Scale, gave the free smart phone tablets which contains the mDairy App with relevant dairy information, videos and services on animal health, milk hygiene, nutrition, pasture development, etc to the beneficiaries.
The female beneficiaries are Fulanis and fresh milk suppliers to FC WAMCO selected from 5 clusters in Oyo State – Alaga, Maya, Iseyin, Fashola and Saki.
Co-founder TECH4AG, Gbadegesin Alawode said the project is aimed at promoting digital literacy, inclusion, awareness and boosting mobile phone ownership among marginalized female dairy farmers.
“We strongly believe in equity and that every woman should benefit from the digital transformation of the dairy sector irrespective of their gender, location, and education. We hope to reach 50,000 more female dairy farmers and extension officers by 2030”, He said.
Adding that it will make digital services like the mDairy platform accessible and understandable while ensuring no women dairy farmer is left out.
Alawode also noted that the mDairy application built by TECH4AG is an integrated digital application developed to boost local milk production in Nigeria to improve the dairy value chain, provides dairy farmers with online and offline information about best dairy practices, record keeping of milk, and health of cows via their mobile phones also offers surveys, analytics, and reporting to dairy companies and other users via a web version to enhance program planning and decision making.
General Manager, Dairy Development Programme, FC WAMCO Adekunle Olayiwola, stated that the Tech4Dairy project is a new innovation to improve the dairy farmers lives particularly the women. The mobile phone tablets will help farmers have access to quality dairy training, inputs from extension officers and management of the milk full chain in their farms.
“This is an epic event that symbolizes inclusion and growth to the GDP of the country. The mDairy platform is one of the best in the world and I hope to see this spread across Nigeria and Africa in few years”. He said
One of the beneficiaries, Lawal Zuwerat, said “I want to thank TECH4AG/mDairy for this laudable initiative as it will help me and other beneficiaries improve our digital skills while improving our business and livelihood”.
Published in Guardian Newspaper on 10 March 2022