Words by Smiley Team
Two nonprofits have teamed up in the Serengeti region of Tanzania to provide farmers with smartphones and an app to help them spot pests and diseases which could destroy their crops.
Hope for Girls and Women, an organisation seeking to end FGM in Tanzania worked with PlantVillage to help farmers protect their crops, and also to educate rural communities and start conversations around gender based violence.
A two-day training session was held for 20 farmers from the region in April 2021, with sessions on learning how to spot common pests and diseases and ways to increase crop production.
Training was also provided on using the app, both to report pests and diseases and to receive support and advice from the PlantVillage team and other farmers on how to manage them.
At the end of the event all of the farmers were given smartphones and signed an agreement to also use them to support the reporting of both FGM and gender based violence cases.
The project has been supported by the Tanzania Development Trust, a charity that has funded development projects within Tanzania since 1975.
Agness Marinya is the digital champion for the Burunga village, and uses the app to check her crops. She said: “It is an easy way to monitor crops and gives you feedback on how crops grow, and I will provide training to other farmers in my village.
“With better agriculture people are less likely to need to cut their daughters and sell them for cows. I have three children, all girls. I am so proud of my work as a digital champion in Burunga, because there have been so many changes in my village.
“Now the number of girls who are cut is reduced. We all need to raise our voices to say no so our children can live free from FGM.”
To find out more about the initiative visit the Tanzania Development Trust website or follow them on Twitter.
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