Busy says the company is delighted to support the agriculture sector to transform the nation. In a statement delivered at the Joy FM Agri-Business Talk, Chief Executive Officer of Busy, Praveen Sadalage acknowledged that “despite its relevance, agriculture today faces, fundamental challenges that go beyond financing and the business side of agriculture.”
He said the challenges are those that “research, innovation and technology in agribusiness can help us solve.”
Read the statement below:
Good evening, Honorable Deputy Minister of Agriculture; Dr. Alhassan Yakubu, invited guests, members of the media, Ladies and Gentleman.
We at Busy are delighted to be a part of the conversation on how Ghana, as a country can leverage on the opportunities Agriculture presents to support the transformation of our country
I am particularly excited at the caliber of minds gathered for this evenings conversation. I have no doubt in my mind that this conversation will prove to be one of the most thought-provoking conversations on how all of us as a nation can move Agric-business forward.
The importance of Agric-business to our economy as a country cannot be overemphasized and I’m sure all of us here can give numerous anecdotal evidence of how it has helped transform the economies of many countries around the world.
Despite its relevance, agriculture today faces, fundamental challenges that go beyond financing and the business side of agriculture.
Limitations such as the ever-deteriorating global climate conditions and the fast depletion of natural resources are challenges that we need to grapple with moving into the future.
Though daunting, these challenges are challenges that research, innovation and technology in agribusiness can help us solve.
Fortunately, institutions like the CSIR, ADRA, the Ministry of Food and Agriculture and other development partners have started some work on this but there is the need for us to support them to do more.
Our ability as a country to stay ahead of these challenges and effectively share knowledge across the board with all stakeholders; most importantly the farmer is key to our success.
In the past decade, we have seen refreshing innovations that have allowed farmers to connect with multiple markets to trade and -business.
There is, however, the need to go beyond and do more, and this is where technology companies like Busy come into play.
Our 4G LTE (‘Fourth Generation – Long Term Evolution’) technology, provides substantial performance improvements over previous mobile technologies and offers the promise that connectivity will no longer be a barrier to realizing the benefits of enterprise mobility.
Compared with previous mobile network technologies, 4G LTE offers much higher bandwidth (speed of data transfer), lower latency (faster response times from the network) and improved spectrum efficiency (increasing overall network capacity). In practice, this allows:
- More applications to be used on mobile devices, in the field, out of the home or office
- Faster or real-time sharing of large files and streaming media
- Near-immediate delivery of time-sensitive data, such as for real-time interaction or transactions
- Conduct research and share new knowledge and insights
4G LTE will deliver improvements in the performance of many existing applications, and make feasible new applications that depend on reliable high-speed or responsive data transfer (and this where Busy 4G comes in).
Examples include innovative telemedicine applications, remote monitoring, fully-mobile virtual desktops and high-definition mobile video conferencing.
The improved user experience and practicality of LTE will also hasten uptake of those existing applications that already work on mobile devices– but just not very well.
These will help bridge the knowledge gap in the agricultural value chain. The educational requirements in agriculture vary at each level. Farmers in remote rural areas need to improve and broaden their knowledge; basic literacy and numeracy may be the first step.
They will then need information about improved livestock, plant and cereal varieties, different methods for planting, cultivating, harvesting and storage, new techniques such as management of soil, water and pests, and finally how to work in a way that protects the land for future generations.
And if they wish to be commercially successful they must be ready to plant new cash crops, learn about markets and acquire the basics of accounting and management. All these will not happen overnight, especially as the majority of these farmers may be illiterate to start with; and much of the success then; will rest with extension workers.
The extension workers require specialist training with regular update training. For much of the knowledge they will pass on to farmers, the extension workers will depend on field research workers, who should work in research institutions.
With affordable 4G services and mobile data devices, this knowledge transfer from research workers to extension workers to farmers can be inexpensively implemented. A targeted national policy can lead to the development of training videos or live streaming sessions and delivered via purpose built applications.
Though relatively young, Busy is very upbeat about using its technology to support the transformation of businesses and is more than open to partnerships that will further Agric-business and the agricultural sector.
It is my utmost hope that conclusions and insights drawn from today’s conversation will further enrich and fast track our road to having a fully transformed agribusiness sector, and Busy 4G will be here to support every step of the way.
Thank you.