Smallholders download and share videos from the Internet to learn about sustainable agriculture

TLDR

Sustainable agriculture videos aim to encourage farmer experiments, but traditional distribution methods have limited reach, especially for elders lacking digital skills, prompting a shift toward internet-based access. The study seeks to develop an app that enables youth to easily download and share sustainable agriculture videos with community members, reducing data usage. The authors surveyed 142 registered farmers in November 2017 to assess their opinions of Access Agriculture’s free online video platform. The survey revealed that farmers increasingly use the internet to proactively search for sustainable agriculture videos, with most discovering them by web surfing rather than social contacts, indicating that online access partly overcomes the limitations of traditional DVD and village screening distribution.

Abstract

Of 1,211 farmers and their representatives registered on www.accessagriculture.org, 142 participated in an on-line survey in November 2017, designed to learn farmer's opinions of Access Agriculture, an NGO which hosts a digital platform where anyone can watch or download videos and other information for free. These farmer learning videos all convey practical information on sustainable agricultural innovations, to encourage farmer experiments. Previous experience showed that smallholders liked having their own copy of videos (e.g. on DVD), but this study showed that farmers are now starting to find their own way to the internet to pro-actively search for information. Although some farmers learn about on-line videos by social contacts, most of the farmers found the videos on www.accessagriculture.org by surfing the web. This suggests that limitations of reaching farmers with traditional forms of video distribution (e.g. DVDs and village screenings) will be partly overcome by the Internet. Youth have become the new information brokers for communities, as elders may lack the digital technology skills needed to use the Internet to get agricultural information. To share videos with other community members, youth will benefit from additional tools, such as an app, to allow easy download and sharing with limited data consumption.