Agriculture Connect

The challenge is many small-to-middle holder farmers are reluctant to adopt smart technology in their farms because they perceive it as a big risk. The three reasons behind this perception's existence are the technology knowledge gap in farmers, the high cost of technology, and that farmers have a traditional and change-averse culture. Agriculture Connect addresses these concerns by providing freemium satellite analysis for seven layers of data: weather, fertilizer, pests, yield, tillage, soil map, and planting. By allowing farmers to access a few layers of data for free, and designing the interface in a simplistic manner, this eliminates the high cost and technology learning curve barriers. 

In addition, the farmers’ data will be available to organizations - financial organizations, agro-suppliers, accreditation firms, crop insurance, grocery stores, whole-traders, etc. - that pay a monthly subscription fee. Agriculture Connect globally transforms small-middle farmers’ lives because this data allows them to operate efficiently

A Michigan State University academic, Karim Maredia, says most developing country farmers make agricultural decisions based on generic recommendations or historical information rather than scientific data. He states there are many cases where farmers blindly apply inputs/resources since they follow the agricultural practices they have been taught. This results in an overuse, underuse, and misuse of inputs and wastes a farmer’s income. Maredia has spent over 30 years offering short- and long-term training, advisory services, and consultation to developing nations. 

In the Punjab region of Pakistan, there are 5,249,800 farmers. Many of these farmers have small farms. The freemium model and the network effect will help reach these farmers. In Punjab, there are five farmers who have agreed to use the service. Agriculture Connect is in the process of connecting with agriculture universities and institutions to expand the service.

There are 149,000 farms in the UK and agriculture is worth 120 billion British pounds to the UK economy. Based on recent studies, farmers in the UK are hesitant to adopt satellite technology due to high costs. Agriculture Connect solves this with the freemium model. In the Oxfordshire region, two farmers have agreed to use the service. 

Agriculture Connect analyses seven layers of data that farmers need through satellite imaging technology. To accomplish this, data science is used to develop the system; by training the machine learning bot with satellite images. This helps in providing real time updates about the farms. 

This data is available to various organizations on a subscription basis. For financial intuitions, they become confident in giving farmers grants and loans because they can see historical and live progress. Agriculture suppliers can sell to farmers based on farmer needs. Agriculture accreditation and certification firms can easily access the farm’s performance and give awards.

Most importantly, whole traders, grocery stores and restaurants can view farmers’ data to see how far away each farm is and what produce is being sold. There are many farms and it can become challenging to keep track of who is selling what. Also, there is a food sovereignty certification program that awards whole traders and grocery stores for using the name of the farm on the price tag when selling to customers.

In addition, Agriculture Connect provides an AI chatbot and live chat with agriculture specialists to answer farmers’ questions and help educate farmers about the benefits of smart farming.

Agriculture Connect helps three types of small-to-medium sized farmers: 

• The ones who have learned farming because of their family and/or through their community. 

• The group of farmers who are self-taught. 

• The type of farmers who are a mix of the first two categories.

The Agriculture Connect team created these three types after interviewing around 10 people who are farmers and who work with these farmers. It became clear that many farmers are financially struggling, especially the ones with less than 50 acres of land. Due to the financial constraints, it becomes crucial that they operate the farm correctly and make strategic decisions. Otherwise, they can lose their main source of income. Also, these farmers have a time constraint. They need to earn profits in a short period of time.  

Currently, there are nine farms that are willing to undergo a pilot study and test out the prototype. The farms are listed below: 

• 1 farm in Africa

• 2 SME farms in the UK

• 6 smallholder farms in Pakistan

The farms in Pakistan are earning minimum profits and drastically need a solution to scale up on their yield and cost efficiency. The farms in the UK and Africa are also looking to increase their profits and need support. Agriculture Connect strives to aid the farmers in their operational and strategic decision-making, and use this data to help these farmers receive financial support, agriculture certifications, specialized list of farming products based on their issues, etc.  

This challenge is finding ways communities can manage, protect and restore the local ecosystems. One great benefit of this is that up to 33% of carbon mitigation can happen.  

Agriculture Connect uses satellite imagery analysis, which is part of precision agriculture. Five farming associations did a study and confirmed that when precision agriculture technology is widely available, it improves environmental stewardship and gives economic and financial returns for the farmers. One key barrier in this is farmers adopting the technology. Also, the information retrieved from satellite imagery helps manage the crop production inputs in a way that is environmentally friendly.

Agriculture Connect is a social enterprise that is in the process of building and testing its product. The solution utilizes machine learning and artificial intelligence. The machine learning models are being developed through fine tuning already built machine learning models in the market; such as Google's BERT model. Also, The team is working with five farms while the product is being developed. One farm in the UK, one in Africa and three in Pakistan.  

The marketplace that connects the farmers with agriculture hardware and input providers, such as materials needed for sowing, is already developed. These product recommendations will be given based on the data gathered from the satellite analysis. This marketplace code is also being used to connect farmers with whole traders, grocery stores and restaurants. 

Currently, there are not many competitors who analyze all seven layers of data. Also, a few of them only have the weather layer free for farmers. Agriculture Connect is currently experimenting but the goal is to make 2-4 layers of data free for farmers while the remaining layers require a monthly fee. By having a freemium model, farmers can appreciate the value and insights that satellite imaging provides to their farmers. It was not easy for Agriculture Connect to get to this stage. 

In January 2021, Agriculture Connect was a three sided marketplace where Pakistani farmers could buy smart technology from software and hardware providers. Additional features were representatives who helped farmers understand the technology. Also, sharing the latest information about grants, and having an AI chatbot that gave advice to farmers based on their geographical location. Ultimately, this concept became local finalist for the UK & Ireland zone in Schneider Go Green 2021 and the winner for ProjectSet’s Innovation Challenge for Entrepreneurship challenge 2021.

The team developed an prototype version of the marketplace; however, when it came to recruiting farmers, the team experienced challenges. The team got feedback from various professionals such as a Bridgestone America director, three senior agriculture professionals and five farmers. Based on this feedback, the team changed approaches and started exploring new countries in the US and UK. The future was uncertain and there were disheartening days where Agriculture Connect was placed on pause. Late May, the team discovered the satellite imagery solution.

The impact is measured based on how farmers use the following information:

·         Finding which ground area in the farm will produce higher yield and which areas will not. This will help farmers save on fertilizer and chemicals.

·         Discovering problems before they exist

·         For a field, pinpointing nitrogen levels in the soil, deviations for a particular field and analysing vegetation indices.

·         Monitoring plant temperatures across the field to find infection patterns of disease or pest infections.

·         Monitoring water consumption in the crops and evapotranspiration

·         Planning the crop nutrition programs

·         Estimating the harvesting time

·         The total amount saved on operational costs

For financial intuitions, they become confident in giving farmers grants and loans because they can see historical and live progress (amount of farmers they give grants too). Agriculture suppliers can sell to farmers based on farmer needs (amount of transactions). Agriculture accreditation and certification firms can easily access the farm’s performance and give awards (amount of farmers they give awards to).

Most importantly, whole traders, grocery stores and restaurants can see how faraway each farm is and what produce is being sold (amount of transactions). There are many farms and it can become challenging to keep track of who is selling what. Also, there is a food sovereignty certification program that awards whole traders and grocery stores for using the name of the farm on the price tag when selling to customers.

Full-time: 2

Mentors: 2

The team is made up of two siblings, Haniya and Hussain. Their grandfather, Colonel Baber Sarfraz, spent 30 years doing agriculture projects in Pakistan after retiring from the Pakistani army. Haniya and Hussain grew up hearing about their grandfather’s experiences, successes and struggles in growing guavas, olives, roses, palm trees, etc. When brainstorming an agriculture solution, the team wanted something that would make their grandfather’s life untroubled. The purpose behind Agriculture Connect is to simplify the life of the team’s grandfather and the farmers in a similar plight. Also, the team’s educational and career backgrounds work well together to make this a reality.    

Haniya has four years of experience in entrepreneurship while teaching part-time on a contract basis. She is currently doing her MBA from the University of Plymouth.

Hussain has one year of experience with IT and data analytics and one year of part-time experience in consulting. He is completing his Advanced Diploma in IT Systems and Design from the University of Oxford.  

Haniya and Hussain’s father has 20+ years of experience working in IT at Saudi Aramco and he is providing part-time mentorship in developing the technical side of Agriculture Connect.

The Agriculture Connect team wants to use the resources that MIT Solve provides to overcome the financial and human resource barriers. Also, to help in carefully managing the fast scalability challenge that will appear within the next years.

As Agriculture Connect grows bigger, managing and monitoring the technology and data can become complex. It would be great to receive guidance in this area.

Agriculture Connect uses data science and machine learning to help
farmers through satellite data analysis. Research has proven that when this is done at scale, it can help improve environmental stewardship. The financial support will help speed up the development of the product and the scaling process.

Agriculture Connect uses data science and machine learning to help farmers through satellite data analysis. The financial support will help speed up the development of the product and the scaling process.