Empowering farmers with reliable and timely information

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Empowering farmers with reliable and timely information

The primary objective of IDSS is to significantly enhance the 

capacity of (smallholder) farmers, retailers and extension 

agents by providing localized advice. The advisory service 

will be customized, combining advanced geo-data and better 

agronomic practice into actionable crop-specific advice for 

farmers. IDSS service will eventually empower the farmers with 

information they currently lack to solve critical problems. 

The service will be available through different channels, 

including automated outbound call and mobile applications. 

IDSS aspires to raise awareness, providing knowledge and 

building resilience of local farming communities and prove 

itself as a reliable tool in collecting information. 

Target user group 

IDSS is aimed at 970,000 smallholder farmers among the 

targeted twelve districts of Bangladesh. Among all of these 

farm households, about 25-30% are either landless or have land 

less than 0.05 acre. Also, a great majority (80%) of landed farm 

households are smallholder farmers, owning land between 0.05 

to 2.49 acres. Improvement of productivity and income of poor 

farming communities through reliable and timely advice to 

farmers is the ultimate goal of this project. 

Business proposition

The satellite-based information services will provide food 

producers with timely, accurate, understandable and 

actionable information and advices - with a minimal cost.  

The revenue comes from different streams, to be able to 

operate a long-term sustainable information service for the 

rural population of Bangladesh. 

The combination of improved mobile connectivity, faster 

penetration of smartphone use among farmers, new satellite 

Intelligent Decision Support System 

(IDSS) for Farmers

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services and private investments offers the opportunity to 

develop innovations for large-scale implementation and 

operation of IDSS services. 

 

Partnership 

•  ACI Agribusiness, ACI Ltd. (Bangladesh)

•   Department of Agricultural Extension, Ministry of Agriculture,

Government of Bangladesh 

•  Nelen & Schuurmans (Netherlands)

•  SarVision (Netherlands)

•  SNV Netherlands, Development Organisation

 

Contact

 

Lead Organisation:

ACI Agribusiness,  

Md Shamim Murad, 

 [e-mail] 

 

NSO Project Advisor:  Joost van Uum, 

 [e-mail] 

 

[e-mail] 

g4aw.spaceoffice.nl

This is a publication of Netherlands Space Office, in collaboration with Ministry of Foreign Affairs © Netherlands Space Office (February 2016)

Disclaimer: No rights can be derived from the information provided in this notice.  

The policies and provisions laid down in the publication of the G4AW Facility in the Government Gazette are leading.

GEODATA FOR 

AGRICULTURE

 AND WATER

Information services 

providing smallholder 

farmers with timely 

and reliable advice 

for productivity and 

income improvement 

at minimal cost

All photos: Balaram Mahalder