Mobile + agriculture: 1st m-agri mobile bootcamp launched in Botswana

Official opening of the event : Ms Lepata Mafa, Head of Corporate and Legal Affairs of Orange Botswana with Mr Dikagiso Mokotedi the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Infrastructure Science and Technology -

Botswana is a country with great links with agriculture. It is quite common to say that “all Batswana (inhabitants of the Botswana) are farmers”. The agriculture sector represents the third exportation source of income for Botswana.

The bond is especially

strong with cattle which national herd represents approximately 2.6 million heads (for approximately 2 million Batswana). It represents a cultural link between the Batswana: cattle ownership is seen as a wealth symbol and is included in some cultural practices like the Lebola = a certain amount of cattle the groom has to pay the bride family.
In the meantime, Botswana also ranks second in Africa in terms of mobile technology penetration, with 1.5 mobile phones per capita.
This competition, supported and co-organized by Orange, the World Bank and the Botswana Innovation Hub was designed to prompt young Batswana to leverage on these facts to create the agricultural service of tomorrow.

What was this m-agri event about?
First, let’s define m-agri (AKA: “mobile – agriculture”) as the utilization of mobile technology (cell phone, tablets) in the practice of agriculture.

mobile technology in the practice of agriculture

This event was designed at engaging and grow Batswana youths’ vision, talent, and entrepreneurship and leverage on the vast potential impact that m-agriculture can have on Botswana’s lives to deliver entrepreneurial and innovative agricultural solutions.

It was composed of training sessions on the Emerginov open source development platform, marketing workshop (“how to partner with a Mobile Network Operator” and a 2 days code camp (=development camp) where 10 teams have been able to code their applications and services before presenting them to a jury of experts.

Apart from Orange, this initiative gathered a pool of relevant local and international supporting institutions: Botswana Innovation Hub, the World Bank, InfoDev, the Ministry of Agriculture and the Southern African Innovation Support program (SAIS) were all on board to support this great initiative.

How did it go?For the first time this kind of event was organized in Botswana, we can say that it was quite a success! Indeed 82 developers (students and start-ups) have been trained during the three first days of the event. But it was not only about quantity because the feedback given by local developers about the training and the platform in itself was very positive.

The best illustration is that, although it was not compulsory, 6 of the 10 teams decided to develop their projects on the Emerginov platform.

prototypes designed in less than 48 hours

Moreover, the jury was really happy and impressed by the quality of the applications and services prototypes designed in less than 48 hours by the applicant teams. They mentioned that Botswana had a real and growing potential in term of mobile related development skills and that more support of this kind was needed.
The necessity to work towards the set-up of a permanent institution like a local incubator able to give a quality support to young entrepreneurs has also been underlined.

The first team won a laptop, an invitation to the World Bank economic forum to be organized in May in South Africa, a week mentorship in South Africa, the possibility to be incubated at BIH some local exposure via radio sponsorship and airtime from Orange Botswana.
A special prize has also be given to the best women composed team.

1st Emerginov training session 18th March

Why was Orange supporting this initiative?This competition is at the crossroad between supports to local entrepreneurship, improvement of agriculture thanks to telecommunication technologies and youth empowerment, all these topics being at the cornerstone of the work being done collaboratively between Orange Botswana and Orange Labs locally.

By supporting this kind of initiatives, Orange Botswana wants to support the local innovation ecosystem stakeholders and be the closest Mobile Network operator to local developers. The objective is eventually to be the first to partner with local talents having project with an interesting business potential.

What are the next steps?
Orange Botswana is already working with local start-ups to help them assess the business potential of their projects. The Emerginov platform will remain available for the local developer community and discussion are under way so that the University of Botswana uses it as one of their training tool. Last, another hackathon should be organized in Botswana in July, a few weeks after a youth mhealth competition will have ended.

Signature : Julien Legland

starafrica.com