Agriculture Pt-1: Is it SO Easy?

“Farming looks mighty easy when your plow is a pencil, and you’re a thousand miles away from the corn field.”

US President Eisenhower, address at Bradley University, Peoria, Illinois, 25 September 1956.

Hi readers hope you enjoyed the series of blog on fake news, corona, and vaccination etc., and other topics. If you want to know more about previous blogs, please sent a message and I will upload that specific information.

Now fasten your belts and be prepared to know everything about agriculture (or agree + culture) what do you think?

You must have heard the words

1.Conventional agriculture

2. Industrial Agriculture

3. E-agriculture,

4. M-agriculture,

5. Precision agriculture,

6. Smart agriculture,

7. Digital agriculture, and

8. Deseret Agriculture

Surprising, isn’t it? Don’t worry. I am here to make it so easy for you that you will understand everything about all these entities and how they are related to each other. I hope I will finish it in two or three blogs at the maximum. So let us first talk about

The Agriculture

You all know what Agriculture is? but many of you may not know how the types (1-8) mentioned above are created and why? and what difference does these terms made with what significance? This is a different perspective therefore, the purpose of this series of blogs is to clarify some perceptional difficulties that will made choice of agricultural practices selective, easy, and affordable depending upon the specific situation(s).

Let’s first talk about what is and how agriculture came into existence, and with what general perceptibility?

Conventional agriculture is viewed right from the beginning as cultivating plants and rearing animals and remained an important developmental component of human civilization in which farming of domesticated species of both plants and animal created food surpluses that enabled people to live in the cities. This practice began thousands of years ago with collection of wild grains beginning around 105000, planting of these grains around 11500, and domestication of pigs, sheep, and cattle nearly 10000 years ago and remained in practice independently in at least 11 regions of the world. But conventional agriculture is not sustainable because it hides within its domain, immense diversity against which alternative agricultural practices (conservation, no till and organic agriculture) can be tested. This itself indicated that conventional agriculture is inherently unsustainable which ignited intense debate on the future of agriculture with focus on approaches that can contribute to sustainability of agriculture and term “Industrial agriculture” came into existing

Industrial agriculture means large scale monoculture coupled with heavy inputs of chemical fertilizers, insecticides, pesticides, and irrigation water to grow food, fiber, fuel, and raw material products that employed over one third of world’s work force in agriculture. The practice was introduced in 20^th, century when 2 billion families were still dependent on subsistence farming.

Industrial Agriculture was also used as a discourse that was inherently social and irreducible to individual intentionality and actions. This way, it also carried with it tacit assumption of being distinctively unsustainable due to environmentally destructive (being input intensive), highly mechanized (large scale use of machinery comprising tractors and other fuel-based field instruments) and, largely dominated by corporate interests (the practice of large-scale agriculture on farms owned or influenced by large AgriTech companies): all the three are unhealthy and damaging for rural communities and subsistence farmers. Once again heated debate started on how to reduce massive application of chemical inputs and heavy irrigation because not only that it was destroying soil properties and degrading environment but also putting alarmingly heavy burden on irrigation water, scarcity of which was already compounding due to continuously changing climatic conditions.

This was the time when agriculture was increasingly becoming knowledge intensive with the emphasis on having access to timely and accurate information tailored for specific locations and conditions which can help farmer making timely and situation specific decisions. FAO believed that this purpose could be solved through Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) that could provide latest and most useful agricultural technology and information to farmers. ICT in agriculture or e-agriculture, is therefore, all about designing, developing, and applying innovative ways to use ICTs in the rural domain, with primary focus on agriculture.

E-Agriculture is a global practice that facilitates dialogue, information exchange and sharing of ideas and resources related to the use of ICTs for sustainable agriculture and rural development. This means dissemination of agriculture related information through on and offline broadcasting to the farmers and to trade their produce. Internet is being used as media for flow of information. Becoming a member of e-agriculture Community of Practices (CoP: the idea was invented in 2000 by Wenger, McDermott, and Snyder in “Cultivating Communities of Practices” where in focus of individual learning and identity development shifted as a tool to organization to manage Knowledge Workers) provides accesses to other community members, share experiences, follow news and blogs published on e-Agriculture platform, share good practices in the use of ICTs in agriculture, and learn about new and upcoming digital trends.

Farmers in Pakistan are unknowingly using ICT technology without being aware of it. Most of them know it as “online extension services” while some are being (mis)used as unspoken user for various data collection.

FAO, e-agriculture community (https://www.itu.int), is made up of over 14,000 members from 170 countries and territories who are ICT specialist, researchers, students, policymakers, businesspeople, and development practitioners. They keeping in mind the common interests that brings them together, and that of improving policies and processes around the use of ICT in support of agriculture and rural development to have a positive impact on rural livelihoods however,

e-Agriculture is also not problem free as rural digital divide in livelihood exists throughout the world for ICT activities and related initiatives that goes beyond technology.

It is a multifaceted problem of ineffective knowledge exchange and management of information content, that lacks human resources, institutional capacity, sensitivity to gender and mundane response to the diverse needs of different groups (this is particularly important for Pakistan). Hence, FAO lead the development and subsequent facilitation activities that engaged stakeholders at all levels. The organization’s ICT work published 4 key finding on September 16, 2020 on smallholder farmer’s use of mobile phones for agriculture, which says. i., farmers are using App, but adoption is low, ii., digital divide exists in wealth, gender, and education, iii., women lag slightly behind men in smartphone ownership and iv., a way forward which means better leverage the m-services (Mobile agriculture services) that already exists which farmers groups can use through word of mouth for improving awareness.

Mobile Agriculture (m-Agri) is thus, a subset of e-agriculture that came into existence with the introduction of mobile technology and portable/wireless devices. These devices and services helped in creation of innovative services and applications used within the agriculture value chain in developed and developing countries including Pakistan. In developed markets, where mechanization is advanced and thus, agricultural labour force is significantly smaller than that of many developing countries, mobile agriculture applications tend to be implemented up to the value chain whereas in developing countries where a large proportion of the workforce is employed in agriculture, mobile technology is more commonly used to deliver services for producers and traders.

GSMA’ (Global System for Mobile Communications), is an industry organization that represents the interests of mobile network operators worldwide. GSMA’s MDI (Mobile and Development Impact) is an open data portal that has created a standard set of categories for covering applications of mobile technology in agriculture to provide an overview of m-Agri industry and the range of mobile applications in agriculture across the world, with a focus on emerging markets.

Categories that serve a role in m-Agri industry by providing a common framework and a standardized naming system includes:

1. Prices,
2. Market intelligence information: an applications that use mobile technology to deliver or retrieve market information including,
3. Trading facilities,
4. Weather information,
5. Peer to peer learning (learning from one another as opposed to collaborative learning where students learn alongside one another),
6. Data collection,
7. Financial services such as payments, loans, insurance,
8. Learning/ advisory/ extension services applications that use mobile technology to deliver or retrieve agricultural/agronomy information and advice,

4-8 are surely being used in Pakistan

9. Geospatial application (a computer data system capable of capturing, storing, analyzing, and displaying geographically referenced or geospatial information including information attached to a location, such as latitude and longitude, or street location) that enabled data and information related to geography and space to be managed, processed, and visualized. They contribute to land and water use planning, natural resources utilization, agricultural input supply and commodity marketing, poverty, and hunger mapping, etc. (Pakistan is using these information on job sharing basis),

10. Embedded ICT in farm equipment & processes which is an applications that enable greater efficiencies in farm equipment and agricultural processes, and traceability in agricultural products’ transport and marketing through mobile technologies such as
RFID (radio-frequency identification: a technology whereby digital data is converted/encrypted in RFID tags or smart labels) which is a wireless system with two components: tags and reader. The device “reader” possesses antenna(s) that emit radio waves and receive signals back from the RFID tag: which can be a machinery standing in the field. Wireless Internet, and cellular telephones are used for labelling, traceability and identity preservation, operations monitoring, quality control, and product tracking, logistics and business processes (being partly used in Pakistan), and

11.Agricultural news: applications that provide news on agriculture-related subjects (also being used in Pakistan)

So dear readers enjoy this article, and I will see you next week with the remaining four entities

Take good care of yourself, BYE

Now fasten your belts and be prepared to know everything about agriculture (or agree + culture) what do you think?

You must have heard the words

1.Conventional agriculture

2. Industrial Agriculture

3. E-agriculture,

4. M-agriculture,

5. Precision agriculture,

6. Smart agriculture,

7. Digital agriculture, and

8. Deseret Agriculture

Surprising, isn’t it? Don’t worry. I am here to make it so easy for you that you will understand everything about all these entities and how they are related to each other. I hope I will finish it in two or three blogs at the maximum. So let us first talk about

The Agriculture

You all know what Agriculture is? but many of you may not know how the types (1-8) mentioned above are created and why? and what difference does these terms made with what significance? This is a different perspective therefore, the purpose of this series of blogs is to clarify some perceptional difficulties that will made choice of agricultural practices selective, easy, and affordable depending upon the specific situation(s).

Let’s first talk about what is and how agriculture came into existence, and with what general perceptibility?

Conventional agriculture is viewed right from the beginning as cultivating plants and rearing animals and remained an important developmental component of human civilization in which farming of domesticated species of both plants and animal created food surpluses that enabled people to live in the cities. This practice began thousands of years ago with collection of wild grains beginning around 105000, planting of these grains around 11500, and domestication of pigs, sheep, and cattle nearly 10000 years ago and remained in practice independently in at least 11 regions of the world. But conventional agriculture is not sustainable because it hides within its domain, immense diversity against which alternative agricultural practices (conservation, no till and organic agriculture) can be tested. This itself indicated that conventional agriculture is inherently unsustainable which ignited intense debate on the future of agriculture with focus on approaches that can contribute to sustainability of agriculture and term “Industrial agriculture” came into existing

Industrial agriculture means large scale monoculture coupled with heavy inputs of chemical fertilizers, insecticides, pesticides, and irrigation water to grow food, fiber, fuel, and raw material products that employed over one third of world’s work force in agriculture. The practice was introduced in 20^th, century when 2 billion families were still dependent on subsistence farming.

Industrial Agriculture was also used as a discourse that was inherently social and irreducible to individual intentionality and actions. This way, it also carried with it tacit assumption of being distinctively unsustainable due to environmentally destructive (being input intensive), highly mechanized (large scale use of machinery comprising tractors and other fuel-based field instruments) and, largely dominated by corporate interests (the practice of large-scale agriculture on farms owned or influenced by large AgriTech companies): all the three are unhealthy and damaging for rural communities and subsistence farmers. Once again heated debate started on how to reduce massive application of chemical inputs and heavy irrigation because not only that it was destroying soil properties and degrading environment but also putting alarmingly heavy burden on irrigation water, scarcity of which was already compounding due to continuously changing climatic conditions.

This was the time when agriculture was increasingly becoming knowledge intensive with the emphasis on having access to timely and accurate information tailored for specific locations and conditions which can help farmer making timely and situation specific decisions. FAO believed that this purpose could be solved through Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) that could provide latest and most useful agricultural technology and information to farmers. ICT in agriculture or e-agriculture, is therefore, all about designing, developing, and applying innovative ways to use ICTs in the rural domain, with primary focus on agriculture.

E-Agriculture is a global practice that facilitates dialogue, information exchange and sharing of ideas and resources related to the use of ICTs for sustainable agriculture and rural development. This means dissemination of agriculture related information through on and offline broadcasting to the farmers and to trade their produce. Internet is being used as media for flow of information. Becoming a member of e-agriculture Community of Practices (CoP: the idea was invented in 2000 by Wenger, McDermott, and Snyder in “Cultivating Communities of Practices” where in focus of individual learning and identity development shifted as a tool to organization to manage Knowledge Workers) provides accesses to other community members, share experiences, follow news and blogs published on e-Agriculture platform, share good practices in the use of ICTs in agriculture, and learn about new and upcoming digital trends.

Farmers in Pakistan are unknowingly using ICT technology without being aware of it. Most of them know it as “online extension services” while some are being (mis)used as unspoken user for various data collection.

FAO, e-agriculture community (https://www.itu.int), is made up of over 14,000 members from 170 countries and territories who are ICT specialist, researchers, students, policymakers, businesspeople, and development practitioners. They keeping in mind the common interests that brings them together, and that of improving policies and processes around the use of ICT in support of agriculture and rural development to have a positive impact on rural livelihoods however,

e-Agriculture is also not problem free as rural digital divide in livelihood exists throughout the world for ICT activities and related initiatives that goes beyond technology.

It is a multifaceted problem of ineffective knowledge exchange and management of information content, that lacks human resources, institutional capacity, sensitivity to gender and mundane response to the diverse needs of different groups (this is particularly important for Pakistan). Hence, FAO lead the development and subsequent facilitation activities that engaged stakeholders at all levels. The organization’s ICT work published 4 key finding on September 16, 2020 on smallholder farmer’s use of mobile phones for agriculture, which says. i., farmers are using App, but adoption is low, ii., digital divide exists in wealth, gender, and education, iii., women lag slightly behind men in smartphone ownership and iv., a way forward which means better leverage the m-services (Mobile agriculture services) that already exists which farmers groups can use through word of mouth for improving awareness.

Mobile Agriculture (m-Agri) is thus, a subset of e-agriculture that came into existence with the introduction of mobile technology and portable/wireless devices. These devices and services helped in creation of innovative services and applications used within the agriculture value chain in developed and developing countries including Pakistan. In developed markets, where mechanization is advanced and thus, agricultural labour force is significantly smaller than that of many developing countries, mobile agriculture applications tend to be implemented up to the value chain whereas in developing countries where a large proportion of the workforce is employed in agriculture, mobile technology is more commonly used to deliver services for producers and traders.

GSMA’ (Global System for Mobile Communications), is an industry organization that represents the interests of mobile network operators worldwide. GSMA’s MDI (Mobile and Development Impact) is an open data portal that has created a standard set of categories for covering applications of mobile technology in agriculture to provide an overview of m-Agri industry and the range of mobile applications in agriculture across the world, with a focus on emerging markets.

Categories that serve a role in m-Agri industry by providing a common framework and a standardized naming system includes:

1. Prices
2. Market intelligence information: an applications that use mobile technology to deliver or retrieve market information including
3. Trading facilities
4. Weather information
5. Peer to peer learning (learning from one another as opposed to collaborative learning where students learn alongside one another)
6. Data collection
7. Financial services such as payments, loans, insurance
8. Learning/ advisory/ extension services applications that use mobile technology to deliver or retrieve agricultural/agronomy information and advice

4-8 are surely being used in Pakistan

9. Geospatial application (a computer data system capable of capturing, storing, analyzing, and displaying geographically referenced or geospatial information including information attached to a location, such as latitude and longitude, or street location) that enabled data and information related to geography and space to be managed, processed, and visualized. They contribute to land and water use planning, natural resources utilization, agricultural input supply and commodity marketing, poverty, and hunger mapping, etc. (Pakistan is using these information on job sharing basis),

10. Embedded ICT in farm equipment & processes which is an applications that enable greater efficiencies in farm equipment and agricultural processes, and traceability in agricultural products’ transport and marketing through mobile technologies such as
RFID (radio-frequency identification: a technology whereby digital data is converted/encrypted in RFID tags or smart labels) which is a wireless system with two components: tags and reader. The device “reader” possesses antenna(s) that emit radio waves and receive signals back from the RFID tag: which can be a machinery standing in the field. Wireless Internet, and cellular telephones are used for labelling, traceability and identity preservation, operations monitoring, quality control, and product tracking, logistics and business processes (being partly used in Pakistan), and

11.Agricultural news: applications that provide news on agriculture-related subjects (also being used in Pakistan)

So dear readers enjoy this article, and I will see you next week with the remaining four entities

Take good care of yourself, BYE