eProd and Open Data for agriculture
“Even though the data of the eProd database is owned by the licensee, it is important to be part of an academic platform and discuss what if… the unique data of the 250,000 farmers that eProd reaches already, would be accessible to the public in an Open Data platform”, says Almut van Casteren, MD eProd Solutions. The Center for Agricultural Networking & Information Sharing, or CANIS, part of the University of Nairobi, organized a workshop to create a shared understanding and set a focused action agenda for creating Impacts with Open Data for agriculture and nutrition in Kenya on October 3rd 2017. Open data is data that anyone can access, use and share.
Dr Kiringai, director CANIS: “Sharing access to data is widely recognized as a priority goal by the development community and a driver for economic growth. High level interest on a political level has drawn special attention to the potential value of open data in the light of growing global challenges affecting the health and welfare of people everywhere. The Government of Kenya is pursuing an active open data policy and has its own open data portal that features hundreds of data sets on agriculture and nutrition. “With all these data sources available on the supply side, there is scope to deploy them for creating impacts in agriculture and nutrition, specifically with respect to food security. However, steps of enrichment of data to knowledge need to be taken, just as understanding the needs of the beneficiaries that could work with the data”.
eProd Solutions has introduced wireless Bluetooth weighing scales and printers. The physical weighing and paperwork involved at the point of produce collection pose a challenge to the collection team. The field officers and collection teams have typically little time to weigh and record the deliveries made and at the same time prepare delivery confirmations. “Now eProd manages our paper based delivery group summary overviews that we hand over to our farmers, but now we can also print individual receipts during the collection. Our farmers love it”, Daniel Mbuvi, administrator of Equator Kenya.
How many phones have you lost already because of water or dropping them? 
In the beginning of the year, we launched the eProd mobile application that you can use on your mobile devices in the field. With the mobile app, georeferenced data entry in the field is made easier, faster and much more efficient. The mobile app is used for field collections but has many more eProd functionalities fully integrated. The Field Inspection Module allows your staff to capture and assess production data for agriculture and livestock.
In our April Newsletter issue, we informed you about the strategic partnership between eProd and 
Weather Data is fundamental to agricultural intelligence because the effect of weather drives on crop physiology, pest pathology, and daily operational/economical decisions. aWhere’s unique weather data is specifically designed for agricultural use, and includes up to 10 years of daily observations across the entire agricultural earth, along with current weather and weather forecasts updated four times per day.
New development: Most agribusinesses acknowledge that managing farmer field activities is challenging, especially capturing, recording, and analyzing field data. With this in mind, eProd’s development team has come up with an easy tool for field officers to capture field activities and carry out field follow-up through the eProd mobile app. From planting to harvest, eProd now makes it easy to collect data in the field and manage each stage of production. What’s more, this new field component will assist agribusinesses in decision making and projecting future production.