Crop Monitoring Service

With CROPMON, when crop growth is non-optimal, farmers will receive alert messages based on near real-time satellite imagery

> Download the CROPMON project leaflet

Service to be provided

CROPMON is a four year project, funded by the Geodata for Agriculture and Water (G4AW) facility. CROPMON aims to develop and make available an affordable information service, that provides farmers - including smallholders - with information that helps them to make improved farm management decisions during the growing season. Farmers receive text messages based on near real-time satellite imagery informing them of the growth and health status of their crops. This information is then used to make comprehensible, farm and crop specific recommendations for farmer practices, which are returned to the farmers via SMS and/or a mobile app. To reach the project goals and to establish a successful information service, the activities covered in the project range from:

• The setup of experimental plots, data collection and calibration of scientific models, to;
• The development of an IT platform and data warehouse to support the backend of the service, to;
• Extensive promotion, training and capacity building to create awareness, acceptability and usability of the service.

Target user group

The project focuses on farmers and their crops: coffee, maize, wheat, grass and sugarcane in the southwestern part of Kenya; counties Bomet, Busia, Bungoma, Elgeyo-Marakwet, Embu, Kakamega, Kericho, Kiambu, Kirinyaga, Kisii, Kisumu, Machakos, Meru, Migori, Muranga, Nandi, Nakuru, Narok, Nyeri, Trans-Nzoia, Uasin Gishu. The aim of the project is to have 150,000 farmers subscribed to the CROPMON information service by the end of the project. Once successfully established for these target crops and areas, the information service will be implemented for other crop types, as well as in other counties and countries in the years following the project period.

Business proposition

CROPMON provides information services to the farmers on:

• The actual crop condition;
• The most probable crop growth limiting factor (climate, soil fertility, water supply, etc.) when crop development drops;
• And advice how to remedy or reduce the limiting factor by adjusting farm management.

Depending on crop type, aggregator and county, the service is being included in existing services and paid for indirectly. Opportunities are explored to sell data to aggregators such as (local) governments, banks, insurance companies, fertilizer industry and agro-dealers.

Partnership

Lead Partner:

• SoilCares Research BV

Partners:

• Springg BV (Netherlands)
• NEO BV (Netherlands)
• Weather Impact BV (Netherlands)
• Cereal Growers Association (CGA, Kenya)
• Coffee Management Services Ltd (CMS, Kenya)
• Equity Group Foundation (EGF, Kenya)
• KALRO Sugar Research Institute (SRI, Kenya)
• SoilCares Ltd. (Kenya)

> Visit the reporting tool for project results and updates