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With research staff from more than 60 countries, and offices across the globe, IFPRI provides research-based policy solutions to sustainably reduce poverty and end hunger and malnutrition in developing countries.

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researcher spotlight

Samuel Benin

Samuel Benin is the Acting Director for Africa in the Development Strategies and Governance Unit. He conducts research on national strategies and public investment for accelerating food systems transformation in Africa and provides analytical support to the African Union’s CAADP Biennial Review.

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Multidimensional digitally-enabled agricultural extension in Africa: Accelerating agricultural transformation in the face of global crises

Co-Organized by Sasakawa Africa Association (SAA), IFPRI and African Forum for Agricultural Advisory Services
Official Side-Event for Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD8)

August 26, 2022

  • 6:30 – 9:15 am (America/New_York)
  • 12:30 – 3:15 pm (Europe/Amsterdam)
  • 4:00 – 6:45 pm (Asia/Kolkata)
Information

African smallholders face many risks and uncertainty in the face of climate change and other shocks. Economic, health and environmental crises exacerbate resilience; take for example the COVID-19 pandemic and the escalating food and fertilizer prices resulting from the conflict in Ukraine. The unavailability and nearly four-fold price increase of fertilizer will affect food production and prices in Africa. Risk-proof and productivity enhancing practices, skills and technologies provided by agricultural extension are essential to cope with these challenges, enabling smallholders to produce food and maintain livelihoods while sustaining natural resources. Such complex challenges require multidimensional approaches with pluralistic actors and multiple methods, particularly digitalization.

In Africa, there are countries with well-developed public extension systems with high staff numbers, such as Ethiopia, and others with smaller numbers of public agents where private services complement the public system, such as Uganda. Most countries are somewhere in between, but for countries with limited government resources, the use of the private sector and civil society to supplement the public system and connect to markets becomes even more important.

Digital tools are particularly important for extension, for decision-making and to connect diverse actors and facilitate access to input/output markets, improved technologies, extension services/information, finance, and private sector provision. Digital technology applications are increasingly integrated in extension systems to support farmers to increase productivity and incomes, expand opportunities and increase resilience by adopting better suited varieties, managing pests and disease, adapting to climate change, obtaining inputs, and accessing financial services. Digitalization of agricultural extension is an important tool to reach farmers with services and information to accelerate agricultural transformation in Africa to reach the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030. Increasing investment in digital technologies to help small-scale farmers will bring significant benefits long after the supply chain disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and Ukraine crisis has passed.

Thus, strengthening multidimensional and digitally-enabled agricultural extension is a key means to strengthen resilience of smallholder farmers in Africa. This symposium will highlight trends, good practices, and recommendations for multidimensional, digitally-enables agricultural extension.

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