Promoting agri-food systems resilience through ICT in developing countries amid COVID-19

An increasing body of literature has demonstrated COVID-19's harmful impact on agri-food systems, which are a major source of livelihood for millions of people worldwide. Information and communication technology (ICT) has been playing an increasing role in enhancing agri-food systems' resilience amid COVID-19. In this study, the PRISMA approach was employed to perform a systematic review of the literature from January 2020 to December 2021 on the overall impact of COVID-19 on agri-food system networks and ICT's role in enhancing agri-food system resilience in developing countries. This study reveals that COVID-19 has posed abundant obstacles to agri-food systems actors, including a lack of inputs, technical support, challenges to selling the product, transportation barriers, and low pricing. These impediments result in insufficient output, unforeseen stock, and revenue loss. COVID-19's restrictions have caused a significant food deficit by disrupting the demand and supply sides of the agri-food system networks. A high number of small-scale farmers have had to deal with food insecurity. As a result of the cumulative effects, actors in the agri-food system are getting less motivated to continue producing. This study also argues that many challenges in the agri-food systems can be overcome using ICTs, including maintaining precise farm management, product marketing, and access to production inputs. To assist stakeholders in coping with, adapting to, and building resilience in the agri-food system networks, this article emphasizes the critical need to turn to and expand the application of advanced agricultural ICTs to meet the world's growing needs for food production and to ensure the resilience and sustainability of farming systems, particularly in the face of a pandemic like COVID-19

Impact of COVID-19 on vegetable supply chain and food security: Empirical evidence from Bangladesh.

In Bangladesh, the COVID-19 pandemic is likely to have substantial effects on the livelihood of people, but smallholder vegetables growers will be even more affected because of the perishability nature of the product. The first case of COVID-19 was confirmed in Bangladesh on 8th March, 2020 and consequently the country went into lockdown on 26 March, 2020. This study has made a survey of vegetables farmers through a mobile phone to understand the impact of COVID-19 on vegetables supply chain, gross margin and the future production plan of the growers. In Bangladesh, the lockdown has disrupted the food supply chain and increases the likelihood of food insecurity. Lockdown has impeded vegetable farmers' access to markets, thus limiting their productive and sales capacities. The price of yield has dropped by more than half resulting in huge loss for vegetable growers. The loss incurred by the farmers for producing Brinjal, Cucumber, Pointed gourd, Yardlong beans and Bottle gourd are BDT 4900, BDT 10900, BDT 57400, BDT 52500 and BDT 18500 per acre respectively as a result of COVID-19. The decreased income increases farmers' likelihood of vulnerability and food insecurity and poses a challenge to continued produce. 'Cash support' is more important than 'food support' in order to keep vegetable farmers in farming, to ensure a ready supply of necessary low-cost resources, and to help fight against the upcoming food shortage

Strategies and barriers to adaptation of hazard-prone rural households in Bangladesh

The global farming communities have already experienced the impact of climate change in a range of ways and made their adaptation decision. Adaptation is, however, context-specific and varies across and within countries which warrants location specific research. This chapter presents the strategies and barriers to adaptation of hazards-prone rural households in developing countries using Bangladesh as a case study. The cross-sectional survey data were collected from 380 riverbank erosion hazard prone rural households in Bangladesh. The results reveal that households have undertaken a range of farming and non-farming adaptation strategies which varies significantly among farming groups. The large and medium farmers have adopted mainly agricultural adjustment such as diversifying crops and tree plantation. Whereas the small and landless farmers mostly adopted non-agricultural adjustments such as driving and migration. Access to credit and lack of information on appropriate adaptation strategies are among the important barriers to adaptation. Intervention by the government through planned adaptation, such as access to institutional and credit facilities, and new farming technologies and verities through agro-ecological based research are required to enhance the resilience of such vulnerable households

Influence of socio-demographic factors on mobile phone adoption in rural Bangladesh: policy implications

Access to information and communication technology (ICT) has been considered crucial to alleviate poverty and improve food security of rural households. The mobile phone is an ICT that is widely used by rural households in developing countries. This study examines the determinants of mobile phone adoption using survey data of vulnerable rural households in Bangladesh, a developing country; the study empirically assesses the income hypothesis of mobile phone adoption in particular. Four alternative specifications of the model are developed to test the stability and robustness of the estimates. The study finds rural households have heterogeneous access to ICT such as radio, TV, computer and the Internet except mobile phone. Our estimated Gini coefficient indicates high income inequality among the rural households. The model results suggest that household income positively influences mobile phone adoption. However, the impact is not statistically significant. Other factors such as respondents’ age, education and farm category are statistically significant influences on mobile phone adoption. An increasing use of mobile phones is likely to enhance the sharing of valuable information among rural households for the better management of their livelihoods and improved farming decisions