Radio, the new social network

Some people may think that radio is on its way of extinction. But, for rural farmers, in many countries of Africa, it´s the other way around. Another misconception is that radio is a “one-way channel of communication”, but Farm Radio International, is proving that interaction with farmers is providing solutions to many agricultural problems, empowering women and giving voice to the less favored people. For this reason, The Sustainable Food Lab chose this experience to be visited during its 2016 Annual Leadership Summit Learning Journey, that was held in Tanzania. This, and many other experiences helped to enrich discussions on sustainable agriculture and sustainable sourcing.

Some of the women say: “Now I feel like I am heard, now I´m in radio, I got respect from people that hear me”, or, “I didn´t realize that my work did so much for farmers”. These were the common phrases that were told by rural women to Karen Hampson, Regional Program Manager of East and Southern Africa in Farm Radio. And this is achieved because Farm Radio share practical knowledge and give voice, they are meeting the needs of small scale farmers.

With or without interactivity, radio still as the main media for people living in rural areas, which, according to the World Bank (2015), is 46% of the world´s population. Another source confirming its importance, is The World Fact Book – CIA, which estimates that there are over 2.4 billion radio receivers, most of them, are small scale farmers living in rural areas.

Farm Radio International is a Canadian charity that is pushing radio to a new level of interaction. With a software they developed, farmers can leave a “missed call”. The system returns them a call, so, they can talk with experts about critical problems they experience and get information about the best practices they should apply.

The system also allows to gather opinions or conduct polls around farmers. For example, on the adoption of technologies, or to collect testimonials. This is how it works: The Interactive Voice Response IVR/VOTO systems plays an automatic audio: “Why are you farming that type of beans? Please explain by leaving a voice message after the beep”. Then, farmers send their response. This way, it´s possible to find out what is going on in the field, in a cheap way. This can help organizations to implement a good planning process for better surveys; to measure customer satisfaction or to conduct peacebuilding work in post-conflict contexts. “The Hangar” is Farm Radio International’s radio & ICT innovation Lab, a kind of “nest” or incubator where all these new ideas are born and, in the words of Bart Sullivan: “with our system, we can have many radio stations or partner organizations having access to the same login, and they can download our content”. Another innovation they are using is the “VoxBox”, a device that allows processing of multiple live phones calls on air in the radio station.

For sure, Farm Radio is a catalyzer that is escalating knowledge to a new level, their Participatory Radio Campaigns is serving about 50 million small-scale farmers in Africa as they are working with more than 500 radio partners in 38 African countries to fight poverty and food insecurity.

According to Bart Sullivan, it´s possible to estimate the impact of radio programs: “There is a population model that can predict coverage of radio frequencies based on the strength of their transmitter and topography. When merged with Google Earth, it´s possible to see a map that shows the geographical areas with good, regular and no coverage”. If this is combined with surveys of the percentage of people listening Farm Radio´s programs, it´s possible to have an accurate estimation of the population that is reached, which is good for monitoring impacts, for donors or government.

The experience of Farm Radio is very interesting and can be used in Latin America, for example, VECO Mesoamérica is running a project with financial support of Swiss Cooperation (COSUDE) which is called: Cocoa Knowledge Management in Central America. Most cocoa farmers are located in rural areas, having radio as their main media communication and, in second place, normal cellphone; so, tools like the Vox Box or software developed by Farm Radio may have a great impact in sharing better cocoa practices among this population.