With an increasing number of mobile users among mountain communities, sending messages through mobile phones has become one of the most efficient methods for providing information to people living in remote areas. The Resilient Mountain Village pilot adopted this approach to share information on weather (weather forecasting), market prices, and agriculture advisories with the farmers in its pilot sites. RMV has been sending messages to lead farmers directly, and the messages are further shared by the recipients with other households in their neighbourhoods.

The issue

The agricultural extension services in the mid-hills of Nepal are not only hindered by limited resources and scarcity of trained frontline staff at the district level but also by the remoteness of the villages. Many villages in the mid-hills remain inaccessible, particularly during the monsoon, due to poor road networks. In such villages, farmers find it extremely difficult to access information about agricultural advisories as well as market prices, and depend mainly on information disseminated word of mouth. However, by the time information reaches them, it is generally too late.

The major technology dissemination approach adopted so far in Nepal has been the traditional direct interactions and field-level practical demonstrations at the community level. Along with the traditional dissemination platforms like national radio and local FM radio, television is also being used for extension services. The establishment of call centres, provision of toll-free numbers at DADO’s offices, SMS, and apps are just being introduced, and modern smartphone-based Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is being started as pilot interventions by various projects.

The solution

The Center for Environmental and Agricultural Policy Research, Extension and Development (CEAPRED), in partnership with ICIMOD, has been piloting the mobile-based SMS initiative in Resilient Mountain Villages (RMV) pilot sites, covering eight villages in four municipalities of Kavrepalanchok District since 2014. The SMS provides weather information to over a thousand farmers so that they can prepare to respond to adverse weather conditions, provides market-price information to increase the farmers’ bargaining power, and provides crop-advisory services to help them adopt improved technologies to increase production.

A website is used for mass dissemination of the SMS through mobile phones. The mobile numbers of the lead farmers selected by the respective communities are registered on the website and the required number of SMSs are purchased in advance from Nepal Telecom. At the CEAPRED office, professional staff develop the messages by collating the weather information from the World Weather website, market information on vegetable crops collected from the local market and/or the AEC/FNCCI website, and technical messages on relevant topics for particular crops and season developed by CEAPRED staff; these SMSs are then sent, on Sunday, to 200 farmers at eight sites, on Sunday, Wednesday, and Friday. Each farmer receiving the message shares it with four to seven of their immediate neighbours. The text messages are composed in Nepali so that even barely literate farmers can read and understand the messages.

Mobile SMS is probably the most cost- effective tool of extension service to reach a large number of farmers at one time. In Nepal, a one-time SMS per person costs about NPR 1.8; at the same time, it has been established that owing to the SMS advisory services, some farmers have increased their income by NPR 20,000 for the same period compared to when they were farming without the SMS information.

Impact and uptake

The mobile-based SMS service is one of the tested technologies in RMV pilots. The service has enhanced the decision-making capacity of farmers in the RMV pilot sites. Weather forecasting messages have enabled farmers to make the right decision in, say, crop harvesting; they will not proceed with harvesting if the message warns them about the occurrence of rainfall in next day or so.

Market-price information has helped farmers with price determination. In 2016, for example, the price trend in potatoes showed an abrupt increase from Rs 20 to Rs 25 within a period of one week at the wholesale market. An SMS informing farmers about the increase helped farmers fetch a better price for their crop. Similarly, critical technical messages received through SMS motivated farmers to practice climate-adaptive safe food production technologies, and they are now able to increase their production at reduced costs.

CEAPRED and ICIMOD have been collaborating with the Government of Nepal, particularly with the the Ministry of Agricultural Development (MoAD) since the beginning of the RMV project. The vice president and executive officers in the National Planning Commission have visited and appreciated the initiative. The Government of Nepal has initiated pilots on ICT through the Agriculture Management and Information System (AMIS) for which the MoAD and Nepal Telecom (NTC) signed an MOU in 2015. Through these platforms, farmers are provided with technical messages and weather information.

Contributors

Keshab Datta Joshi, CEAPRED

Roshan Subedi, CEAPRED

Further reading/information

1)            Resilient Mountain Villages (RMV): Laying Foundations for Resilient Development through Simple Solutions [Brochure]. (2016). ICIMOD

2)            Preparation of Jholmal in RMV Pilot Sites: Upscaling a local practice. (2016). ICIMOD