The Sunday News
Mhlupheki Dube
ONE of the revolutionary developments that have happened in the last two decades is the growth in use and adoption of technology in the various sectors of society. This has seen the phenomenal rise in the use and misuse of the social media platforms and the use of technology in other platforms such as mobile money.
Use of mobile money platforms has completely transformed the banking sector breaking the usual frontiers and changing perceptions about banking. However, the growth in technology and its use in other sectors have not been fully embraced in other sectors such as the agricultural sector in general and livestock production in particular.
It is the submission of this article that the livestock production sector cannot continue to conduct business as usual while there are huge strides being made in technology sector. It is time the livestock production especially the marketing sector embraced use of technology for ease of doing business. One of the most critical yet least developed section of the livestock value chain is the marketing side. In my view this is the most important time for the farmer yet he is suddenly confronted with very limited options because he either resides far away from the marketplaces or his own local market is erratic and uncompetitive.
I have written before about some districts whose economy revolves around livestock but do not have any organised and reliable livestock markets. My question therefore is how we can leverage on technology and its advancement to provide markets or to provide solutions for farmers who are looking for markets for their livestock.
Should we continue to stick around conceptualisation of a livestock market as an auction place or abattoir? Can we not have a revolutionary product in the format of mobile money which completely overhauled the banking and money transfer business, breaking financial taboos and opening new horizons?
How much of innovation and critical transformational thinking are we putting in trying to provide answers to the livestock marketing challenges which are being faced by smallholder farmers? It is my conviction that if players in the livestock industry and other supporting institutions apply their minds with a singular aim of providing a solution to livestock marketing challenges a solution can be found.
It is simply not proper that a farmer goes through all the rough patches of raising his animals only to be confronted by a marketing bottleneck because the system has failed or refused to evolve with times. In this world of computer applications that are developed everyday making people’s lives better than the day before is it not possible that an application can be developed by programmers and computer software engineers to make livestock marketing better?
Why should a farmer in Binga, Beitbridge and other such far places be made to endure long drives to Bulawayo to access a reliable market for his/her animals? I really long for a day when I will be called to witness a ground breaking technological intervention solving some of the perennial but critical challenges faced by farmers such as livestock marketing. In that regard I would like to applaud my colleague Mr Vusa Mphosa for taking a bold and giant step by developing an application that seeks to answer to farmers’ challenge in so far bridge some of the information gaps that affect decision making.
It is such innovations which I strongly feel can challenge the status quo and define new methods of doing business in the livestock industry. The industry need to change in its ways and views towards doing business so that farmers can reach a point where they can transact in the comfort of their homes and get heifers delivered at farm gate. This method of doing business the hard way only has no place in modern society and modern farming. Uyabonga umntakaMaKhumalo.
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