Presented by Ciniro Costa Jr., Alliance of Bioversity & CIAT, at the "Best practices for digital tool inclusiveness and farmer co-creation of practices with local stakeholders" workshop on 30 November 2022. In this informal expert workshop, the TRANSITIONS Inclusive Digital Tools (ATDT) project reviewed and received feedback from stakeholders and experts on proposed guidance for smallholder farmer’s inclusion and co-creation of farm practices for agroecology and climate change action. Invited participants included digital resource specialists, farmer-support organizations, and agroecology and climate change experts. In 2023, we will apply the principles with our action partners in Brazil and Vietnam to guide digital innovations. In the workshop we sought input to the relevance, coherence and usability of the proposed principles to guide future work. More on the ATDT Project: https://bit.ly/InclusiveDTs

1. Stakeholder perspectives
in Brazil
Ciniro Costa Jr
AT-DT Brazil
Expert Workshop: Best practices for digital tool inclusiveness
and farmer co-creation of practices with local stakeholders.
November 30th

2. Stakeholders consultation
Producer Gov’t
Technical
Assistance
Industry DT Developer
• We interviewed and carried out a webinar with approximately15 stakeholders who are directly and indirectly involved
with the beef cattle value chain
• Aimed to understandthe perceptionof these actors about: (i) the use of digitaltools, their barriers and opportunities;
(ii) principles to make these digitaltools more inclusiveof rural producers; (iii) proposalsand incentivesfor the adoption
of ag-practices and (iv) the role of digital toolsin this process.
Academia

3. Key pillars to support best practices for digital tools inclusiveness
• Create market access and encouraging the participation of women and youth;
• Create new forms of investments/credit lines/incentives;
• Dimensioning investments and efforts outside the gate (connectivity); inside the gate (perceived value); and to
turn these opportunities into information and knowledge.
• Consider different stakeholders to co-create solutions/problem-solving
• Tighten the links along the value chain actors;
• Create forums/spaces for exchanging experiences;
• Integrate existing platforms and systems;
• Gather local/regional information and contextualize demands.
• Improve connectivity;
• Customize equipment and technology for the producer;
• Develop tools aimed at smallholders;
• Provide equipment and technology for technical assistance/rural extension institutions.
Infrastructure
and
technology
Technical
Assistance
Governance
Policy and
Investments
• Stimulate the exchange between the producer and the extensionist - listen to smallholder demands;
• Build capacity of more professionals for rural technical assistance, involve educational institutions;
• Regionalize knowledge.
• Promote the financial literacy of producers;
“The practical implementation of principles needs to consider the
Brazil contexts as well as the role of digital tools for smallholders.”

4. Eight priority actions to support inclusive digital tools
Infrastructure
and
technology
Technical
Assistance
Governance
Policy and
Investments
1. Improve access to internet in rural areas;
2. Create demand by finding what producerswant and how they view DT adding value (“demand drives tech. adoption”);
3. Carry out a diagnosisof existing DT and access the needed structure for producersand publicentities to use them;
4. Foster the communicationbetween stakeholdersworking in the same region;
5. Organizeand disseminateinformationin a participatory way;
6. Develop DT tools with informationthat help understandpractices and economic returns of agroecology interventions;
7. Link DT with financialinstitutionsto improve smallholders’access to credit;
8. Build public policies integrated with incentives (such as PES, for example)

5. • Long term engagement is a challenge – Incentives may be
necessary
• Farmers using digital tools although mostly use social media for
back and forth communication e.g. Whatsapp, Zalo, Messenger
• Contracting farmers are more familiar with digital tool use
• Training and working with aggregators is important
• Focus on reaching women – timings, locations, responsibilities
etc
• Trade-offs important – apps should not be aimed to replace
face-to-face interaction but rather to support (videos, images,
etc)
• Long-term sustainability of digital tools through a business plan,
bundled services, uptake by private mobile service provider
Best practices
Rice- Vietnam

6. Thank you!