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| ©IFAD/Horst Wagner |
A Michigan State University study on the “Impact of Agricultural Market Information Systems Activities on Market Performance in Mozambique” suggests that access to market-information increase probability of farmers-participation in market-activities by 34%, and increase the mean-price obtained for commodities sold with as much as 12% [1].
However, the reliability and sustainability of MIS’ have historically been a major challenge, and most systems stay reliant on donor support throughout their lifespan. The majority of MIS’ are based on data collected by enumerators, who observe prices in public marketplaces and report these to a central system, for example via a mobile phone. This is very human-resource intensive and costly, and require substantial amount of management and supervision. As prices reported often go through a rigorous control prior to being disseminated, many system often report data that is outdated and of no use to the farmer.
SANGONeT and International Development Enterprises (iDE) started with the support of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, a mobile phone point of sale (POS) and inventory control app in Zambia called Lima Links. The data generated from the POS is then used to obtain real-time and accurate price information, which is disseminated to farmers, completely eliminating the need for using third party enumerators. This does not only reduce cost (and thus increase likelihood of a sustainable business model) but also reduce the margin of error and delay of delivering price information.
Lima Links is still at very early stages, but it is a very interesting innovation in the MIS realm, well worth following further.You can access an excellent assessment of MIS in East Africa done by USAID here , and read USAID's profile paper on Lima Links here .
[1] Kizito, Donnovan, & Staaz. (2012). Impact of Agricultural Market Information Systems Activities on Market Performance in Mozambique