Chile

Farming advice on a cell phone

Posted by CorinneRamey on Jun 16, 2009

At a small agrarian cooperative in Chile, farmers with little access to the internet have a new source of farming information: text messaging. The messages, a combination of national and international news and farming information about topics like weather and pricing, are part of a project called DatAgro, which aims to bring relevant farming information to rural populations that have little access to computers.

DatAgro is a collaboration between Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit DataDyne and the Santiago-based Zoltner Consulting Group, which looks at ways that ICTs can be used for development. The project is primarily funded by a $325,000 Knight News Challenge Grant and will continue until November 2010.