The National Root Crops Research Institute (NRCRI), Umudike, Abia State, says it has been motivated to provide solutions to the agric sector through the price data innovation for decision support in the food system.
The Executive Director/Chief Executive Officer of NRCRI, Professor Chiedozie Egesi, who disclosed this at a one-day workshop organised under the auspices of the newly created Digital Agriculture Unit (DAU), in collaboration with the International institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) Ibadan, said the institute is happy to be part of the market intelligence gathering efforts taking place through the project.
Professor Egesi expressed concern over the country’s 33 per cent food inflation rate, which continues to increase by one per cent every month for the past four months describing this scenario as unpleasant for the country.
“To us at NRCRI, the challenge is to undertake monitoring of agricultural produce trend, especially our mandate crops of economic importance and proffer solution with proper prognosis to the causes of the increasing inflation.”
In his presentation on the concept of Price Data Innovation, Relevance and Broader Vision and Elements of Task, Tool/Platform, the Geo-data and Digital Agriculture Consultant at IITA, Dr. Julius Adewopo said the meeting was part of the project to advance agricultural digital innovations and decisions supporting agricultural systems.
He reiterated the broader vision, which includes capturing price data of commodities in the whole of Nigeria and partnering with institutions such as National Agricultural Extension and Research Liaison Services (NAERLS) to achieve such vision.
“We are trying to align with farmers and groups in the food systems to make better decisions starting with prices of commodities as we understand that agricultural production will not be profitable if the prices are not right.
“By engaging with NRCRI, we started to think about ideas on frequent price data collection so that decision makers can access the data and use them to make better decisions when and who to give subsidy, which are all important to encourage farmers increase in productivity and profitability.”
In his presentation, titled: Methodological Approach, the Head of the Digital Agricultural Unit, Dr Samuel Onwuka, said Price Data Innovation in the food system involves leveraging new technologies and approaches to address challenges related to pricing within the food supply chain.
He said the workshop was aimed at building the capacity of stakeholders on how to apply digital tools like the Open Data Kit (ODK) in the real time price data collection. It also gave the Digit Agriculture Unit an opportunity to review the work plan for the pilot real time commodity price data innovation survey which is expected to kick off after the workshop.
