Enabling Data Access Project: Supporting Grantmakers and Digital Capabilities in India and Ethiopia
The Enabling Data Access project, funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation aims to support the improved design of grants with data components in collaboration with the Open Data Institute (ODI). The core goal of the project is to understand the various challenges faced by grantmakers and those who manage grants (Program Officers (POs)) within the Digital Farming Services Gates Foundation…
Being Data-Driven: A New Approach to Decision Making
With many areas of our day-to-day lives becoming digital, from how we communicate to the exposure of previously trapped knowledge across geographic and social boundaries, it is not a surprise that the agricultural sector is also shifting to digital platforms. As such, the adoption of good digital practices at a global scale is important for…
‘$10bn to feed 10 billion by 2050’, CABI tells AGRF
CABI has told the African Green Revolution Forum (AGRF) 2019 that investment in agritech needs to double to at least $10bn a year if the world’s smallholder farmers are to help feed a global population expected to reach 10 billion by 2050. Dr Dennis Rangi, CABI’s Director General, Development, speaking as part of a panel discussion on…
Data democracy: a new age
The power of data over our lives is hard to overestimate. It governs how we understand and interact with the modern world, how it is measured and controlled. So, what is being done to utilise open data for global food security and nutrition?
Data from plant clinics is contributing to Trinidad and Tobago's agricultural database
Home gardening enthusiasts and farmers from as far as Rio Claro seized the opportunity to have their plant sicknesses diagnosed at a plant clinic hosted by Trinidad and Tobago’s Ministry of Agriculture, Land and Fisheries (MoALF) at its Farmers’ Training Centre in Centeno. After a in-depth one-on-one discussion with Ministry representatives from the Extension, Training and Information Services Division…
Game changers: digital agriculture and new technologies
ICTs play a pivotal role in facilitating solutions for smallholder farmers and the markets they are trying to access. For GLOBALG.A.P., the world’s leading farm assurance program, the only way to make the auditing of the 160,000 farms it covers economically viable is through technological solutions. CABI’s Plantwise programme also relies on ICTs for collecting…
Plantwise showcases open access Knowledge Bank at global open data summit
Last week, CABI and Plantwise representatives attended the GODAN Summit in New York, the largest event ever planned for open data in agriculture and nutrition. It brought together key stakeholders from around the world to consider how open data can help achieve Zero Hunger – one of the key Sustainable Development Goals (SDG2). Speaking at the…
CABI’s Dr Kuhlmann talks plant health innovation at G20 Agricultural Chief Scientists meeting
Yesterday, CABI’s Executive Director of Global Operations, Dr Ulrich Kuhlmann, spoke about the importance of agricultural innovation and sharing plant health knowledge at the 5th meeting of the G20 Agricultural Chief Scientists (MACS). As the host country, China chaired the meeting. The G20 MACS took place in Xi’an on 30-31 May 2016, with representatives from…
Who owns open agricultural data?
This is an edited re-blog from an Open Data Institute (ODI) blog post published under Creative Commons BY-SA 2.0 UK license by Martin Parr, Head of Open Data at CABI. Follow Martin on Twitter. The Plantwise programme has developed a knowledge bank to share Good Agricultural Practice and a very high level of anonymised data about incidences of plant…
Open Data & Farming 101
by Ben Schaap, Tim Davies and Ana Brandusescu, GODAN What is open data? We all make decisions everyday based on different sources of information. Much of that information ultimately starts out as digital data. Open data is about changing the default, so that instead of being locked away for the benefit of a few, data…