Farmers’ use of Mobile phones in Receiving Agricultural Information towards Agricultural

Development

Dr. M. Abul KashemBangladesh Agricultural University

ProfessorDepartment of Agricultural Extension Education

Mymensingh 2202, BangladeshTel: +88-091-67401ext. 2547(W), 4547(H)

Mobile:+88-01711-957 558email: kashem1953@gmail.com

Bangladesh At a Glance

Bangladesh is an agricultural country – agriculture alone contribute about 25 per cent of the GDP.

With an area of 143,998 sq km it has population of about 165 million ( area of Uganda is 241,038 sq km with popn. of about 32 million, while area of Sweden is 450,295 sq km with popn. of about 90 million).

Women constitute almost half of the total population More than70 percent of working population are involved in agricultural activities.

There are quite a good number of GOs and NGOs are involved in communicating farmers towards agricultural development.

Major GOs work for agricultural development are:

DAE, DLS, DoF DAM and BRDB

Major NGOs involved in agric. dev are:

BRAC, PROSHIKA, RDRS, Grameen Krishi

Foundation

Gov. organization devoted to transfer agric information is:

AIS (Agriculture Information Service)

At present AIS has established 12 AICs across the country with mobile and internet facilities and it has plans to extend AICs to 4500 unions by 2020

Private Mobile and Internet Service Provider to Farmer:

D-Net, Banglalink, Palli Phone D-Net has its own information centres and doing excellent jobs

in providing need-based information especially to women and disadvantaged groups of people.

Chronological Dev. of D-Net Activities

2003: Establishment of 13 Information Centre (IC) (through these centres information were collected for the types of information needed by the women, handicapped people and older people)

2004: Lady in IC was popularly known as “Mobile Lady”

( ML helped women, disadvantaged people to contact with experts in agric., livestock, fisheries, health & FP and law in the capital)

2005: D-Net received Gender and ICT Award

2008: MLs were given 5 days trg. & their designation were changed to “Welfare Information Lady”

Facilities Available to WIL

1. Laptop having longer charge facilities

2. Modem for connecting internet for e-mail , Skype & browsing for other purposes

3. Mobile Phone

4. Small printer

5. Digital Camera

6. Stethoscope for measuring blood pressure, and thermometer

7. Rain coat and an umbrella

8. Measuring device for pregnancy risk factors

9. Small photo printer

10. Television, scanner (optional)

( Initially a WIL has to invest BDT 70,000 – 80,000 on her own)

“JIGYASHA”(Queries) – FARMERS’ CALL CENTRE

Banglalink – one of the major mobile phone operators in Bangladesh launched with the technological support of Agriculture Information Service (AIS), a new service ‘Banglalink Jigyasa (Queries) 7676’ which provides suggestions and answers to any queries related to agriculture, vegetables and fruit farming, poultry, livestock, fisheries etc.

The service gives people with easy access to advice and solutions to agriculture-related problems. To avail the service a Banglalink

customer needs to dial 7676, talk and get expert’s advice on the problem. The promotional charge for the service is Tk 2 per minute. This call centre has recently become quite popular with over 5000 callers per day.

There are also other effective utilization of mobile phones in Bangladesh, such as Rural Information Centre (RIC) administered by D-Net, Telemedicine, paying electricity, gas and water bills in the bank, transferring money, students’ submission of admission documents to universities by sending SMSs.

Through RIC farmers’ get opportunities for solving practical problems, e.g. diagnosis, control pests, diseases of crops, animals and fishes. Through video conferencing doctors diagnose problems and then send SMS or advise through mobiles for treatment.

The Mobile Phone subscribers in Bangladesh up to September 2010

Operators Active Subscribers*

(million) Grameen Phone Ltd. (GP) 28.654

Robi Axiata Limited 11.707

Orascom Telecom Bangladesh Limited (Banglalink)

18.107

PBTL (Citycell) 1.907

Teletalk Bangladesh Ltd. (Teletalk) 1.183

Warid Telecom International L.L.C. (Warid) 3.581

Total 65.142

*The above subscribers' numbers are declared by the mobile operators Source:http://www.btrc.gov.bd/newsandevents/mobile_phone_subscribers/mobile_phone_subscribers_September_2010.php

Figure 1. Farmers' use of communicationmedia

91.489.1

71.1

10.26.2

39.5

4.7

10.5

78.9

49.2

12.5

69.9

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

Communication media

% u

sers

Legend:

A = Contact with relatives, friends and othersB = Contact with Businessman for market informationC = Contact with sub-Assistant Agriculture Officer D = Contact with fertilizer dealerE = Contact with word member of union council F = Contact with insecticide dealerG = Contact with progressive farmersH = Contact for transportation of agricultural produceI = Contact with seed dealer

J = Contact with land owner or tenant farmerK = Contact with educational institutions L = Contact with NGO workersM = Contact with social welfare organizationN = Contact with Assistant Agricultural Extension Officer or Agricultural Extension Officer O = Contact with Additional Agriculture Officer or Upazila Agriculture Officer P = Contact with agro-processing industries

Source: Mukta, Karim and Kashem, 2010

METHODOLOGY

The study was conducted in Sadar Upazila (Sub-district and the lowest administrative unit of the local government in Bangladesh) of Mymensingh district. The mobile phone user farmers of six villages of boira and two villages of Bhabokhali union (the lowest functional unit in Bangladesh) of the Sadar Upazila constituted the population of the study. The total number of the mobile phone user farmers in these eight villages was 305.

About twenty five percent of the farmers were selected as samples following the simple random sampling method. Thus 76 farmers were selected as sample for the present study. Data were collected through pre-tested and pre-designed personal interview schedule during 12 September to 15 October 2009.

Farmers were asked whether their contacts with the input dealers were regular, occasional or not at all (based on the number of times per season) for each of the dimensions. A weight of 2, 1 and 0 were assigned for regular, occasional and not at all responses respectively.

With a view to get a comparative picture on the use of mobile phone for each of the sixteen dimensions a Mobile Phone Use Index (MPUI) was computed by using the following formula:

MPUI = Nr × 2 + No × 1 + Nn × 0 where,

Nr = Number of farmers using mobile phone regularly No = Number of farmers using mobile phone occasionally Nn = Number of farmers never using mobile phone

Thus, MPUI could vary form 0 to 152 where 0 indicates no use and 152 indicate regular use of mobile phone. Each dimension was ranked according to obtained score.

In order to measure the problems faced by the farmers in communicating with the input dealers while using mobile phone each respondent was asked, against 10 pre-identified problems, (problems were identified through Focus Group Discussion – FGD) to indicate the extent of problems in a 4-point rating scale such as not at all, low, medium and high with a score of 0, 1, 2, and 3

respectively.

Rank order for each of the problems was computed by developing Problem Facing Index (PFI). The PFI was measured by using the following formula:

Problem Facing Index (PFI) = (Ph×3) + (Pm×2) + (Pl×1) + (Pn×0).

where, Ph = High problem faced by the farmers while using mobile

phone Pm = Medium problem faced by the farmers while using

mobile phone Pl = Low problem faced by the farmers while using mobile

phone Pn = No problem faced by the farmers while using mobile

phone

Thus, PFI of an item could range from 0 to 228, where 0 indicated no problem at all and 228 indicated high extent problem faced.

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

Use of Mobile Phones by the Farmers in Receiving

Agricultural Information from the Input Dealers Table 1: Use of mobile phone by the farmers in receiving agricultural information

Mobile phone using farmersMean % CV

Categories (score) No. Percent

Low (up to 10) 11 14.50

14.66 27.53

Medium (11-16) 41 53.90

High (>16) 24 31.60

Total 76 100.00

Table 2: Ranking of sixteen dimensions of mobile communication with the input dealers

Aspects of using mobile phones MPUI Rank order

Availability of Inputs

1. Availability of fertilizers 142 1

2. Availability of seeds 131 2

3. Availability of pesticides 117 3

4. Availability of herbicides 57 13

Quality of the Inputs

Better seeds 112 4

Balanced fertilizers 58 12

Appropriate pesticides 76 10

Appropriate herbicides 32 14

Market price of the Inputs

Market price of fertilizers 104 5

Price of the different seeds 98 6

Price of pesticides 94 7

Price of herbicides 24 15

Appropriate dose/Quantity of Inputs

Different fertilizer doses 65 11

Seed rate of different crops 79 9

Pesticide doses 97 8

Herbicide doses 20 16

Table 3: Relationships between the selected characteristics of the mobile phone user farmers and their use of mobile phones in receiving agricultural information (N=76)

Dependent variable

Independent variables Values of correlation coefficient (“r”)

Age -0.319** Literacy 0.320** Farm size 0.041 Annual income 0.260* Organizational participation

-0.036

Non-localite behaviour

0.465**

Agricultural knowledge

0.364**

Aspiration 0.487** Self-confidence 0.441**

Use of mobile phone by the farmers

Attitude towards technology

0.287*

** significant at 1% level of probability * significant at 5% level of probability

Table 4: Problems faced by the farmers while using mobile phone with rank order

Sl. No.

Problems in using mobile phone Obtain score for each problem

Rank order

1. High call rate 203 1 2. Difficulty in loading money to mobile set 201 2 3. Failure to contact other mobile phone

users instantly 181 3

4. Lack of adequate mobile credit 172 4 5. Damage of mobile 139 5 6. Lack of repairing facilities 131 6 7. High cost for repairing 113 7 8. Mobile operating problem 75 8 9. Lack of electricity for charging mobile 69 9 10. Network problem 32 10

CONCLUSION

Among the sixteen dimensions of contact, farmers had the highest contact with the input dealers through mobile phone in respect of the availability of agricultural inputs, such as fertilizers, seeds and pesticides. Farmers become very anxious to know the availability of agricultural inputs before starting any crop growing season and as such their use of mobile phone with the input dealers topped the rank. Hence, it would be wise if arrangement can be made by the concerned agencies for toll free mobile call, at least up to 2-3 minutes, by the farmers to the input dealers.

More than half (54 percent) of the mobile phone user farmers had medium use of mobile phones while 31 percent had high and only 15 percent had low use in receiving agricultural information from the input dealers.

High call rate, difficulty in loading money to mobile set, and failure to contact other mobile phone users instantly appeared as the top three problems of using mobile phone by the farmers. Arranging toll free call for the farmers in respect of their queries regarding agricultural inputs may be helpful to overcome the problem of high call rate.

Arrangement for more and more flexi load shops in the rural areas may help to reduce the difficulty in loading money to mobile set while increasing the network towers may be useful in reducing the network problem of contacting other mobile phone users for interpersonal communication for exchanging views about agricultural inputs.