Tanzania

Kilimo Thabiti- Agriculture that is resilient to climate change

To support climate-smart solutions that support farmers in their decision making, Weather Impact, Tanzania Agricultural Research Institute (TARI), ESOKO and Tanzania Youth Espouse for Gender and Development (TYEGD) are working together in the Kilimo Thabiti project. We develop, provide and test a location-specific dynamic Agri-Weather Advisory service. To tailor this service to the farmer and make it crop-specific, the development goes beyond sending general weather forecasts and farming advisories.

With a powerfull digital platform that has been developed by Esoko, complete farmer profiles are registered. This includes a lot of usefull data such as district and ward location, type of crop, gender and age. The dashboard is shown below;

Fig. 1 mAgric Colekt dashboard with farmer registrations information.

Cassave and maize
Tanzania is home to over 63 million people, 80% of which is dependent on the agricultural sector, which accounts for 25% of its GDP. The agricultural sector of Tanzania is dominated by smallholder farmers. They produce 95% of the national food requirements. Many produce staple crops such as maize and cassava, which are part of the top 3 most consumed foods in the country and 30% of the total agricultural land is dedicated to maize. These two crops are therefore essential for food production, population’s income and food security and represent the two largest planted areas in the Mara region. Cassava and maize are not only consumed domestically but also serve as cash crops for export.

Local populations have experienced heavy droughts, floods and delays in the start of the rain season coupled with uneven rainfall distribution during the season. Due to climate change,
crop yields of staple produce (i.e., maize, cassava) are projected to decrease (USAID 2018).

Two-way communication with farmers

By developing an agri-weather advisory service for the Tanzanian farmers, we aim to enhance food security and increase crop-yield for cassava and maize farmers for the next season.
The service will be disseminated directly on the telephone of 2400+ farmers via SMS, voice message and mobile application in the Mara region in Tanzania. 500+ farmers will receive training on usage of the Agri-weather tool, climate change, and digital literacy. The service is based on real time crop-growth modeling, weather forecasts and two-way communication with farmers. The communication channel used within this project will work both ways, allowing farmers to receive agri-weather advisories, but also send information back (e.g. crop types, planting dates, crop status, questions, feedback, etc.). This way, we use local farmers’ knowledge and information to make the service more specific and accurate.

The project is funded by the Fund for Innovation in Development (FID) and plans to deliver:

Three local partners are involved in the development of this innovation:

Kick-Off week

January 2024 marked the official launch of the Kilimo Thabiti project in Tanzania! A week full of working sessions, farmer visits and fun team-building activities, together with all partners. We have trained 30 lead farmers for on the ground data collection to enhance the accuracy of the advisories. They learned how to take correct rainfall and soil moisture measurements and can transfer this knowlegde to other farmers.

A number of special government officials was invited to attend this kick-off as well and we even made it to three television news channels in Tanzania, which truly made it a great start!

Video: Item about the Kilimo Thabiti project on the national Tanzanian television news channels 

“Those text messages do not mislead, they help us a lot and prepare us psychologically for the coming weather conditions. If I had a plan to dry my crops in the sun, and then I got a message that it will rain, I have to postpone drying the crops until it is sunny again. This helps us to avoid loss”
Veronica Muhende, a farmer from Sarawe village in Bunda District.

During a second trip in August 2024, we heared farmers’ voices and opinions on the agro-weather SMSs and trainings on good agricultural practices we provided earlier. A real moment of truth!
The feedback was overwhelmingly positive! Although the project targets maize and cassava farmers specifically, farmers have shared that they use the weather forecasts way beyond the cultivation of those two crops: for example for saving water for irrigation, accurate timing of the cultivation of vegetables, drying of crops, and even the drying of bricks.

We also learned that the farmers trained as citizen scientists became the voices for weather in their communities.

We continuously take farmers’ feedback into account, for further developement of our service in the upcoming season from October.

Video: Farmers’ views and impact of the services in Kilimo Thabiti project – Created by Hosea Revocatus (TARI)

“These SMS alerts are incredibly reliable and have transformed the way we plan our farming activities,” – Ms. Muhende, a farmer from Sarawe village, Tanzania.

More news about this project;

Kilimo Thabiti Kick-off week
Weather Impact launced Kilimo Thabiti
TARI – Kick-off Kilimo Thabiti
Kilimo Thabiti’s technology praised by farmers

Location of this project