Edo State Mentors Technology Start-ups on Government Open Data Scheme

Following the world’s open data day that was celebrated on February 21st, 2015, Edo Information and Communications Technology (ICT) agency has collaborated with the state’s ministry of Agriculture, SabiHub, the only technology hub in Edo state and Open Knowledge Foundation to organise the first Heckathon, which is a technology competition on government Open data scheme in West Africa.

Tagged, Agric Data Hackaton 2015, the participants who were drawn from various universities and tech hubs across the country were asked to focus on the state’s Ministry of Agriculture, in analysing the challenges in the sector and to proffer technology solutions, using the available agriculture datasets on Edo State opendata portal (www.data.edostate.gov. ng) for the competition.

Managing Director of the ICT Agency, Mrs. Yemi Keri, explained that state open data provides a platform for citizen engagement and participation in governance, noting that that “our achievements are not just for the government but for all to tap into freely hence our data is licensed under the creative common license that enables the free use and reuse of datasets on the portal , providing innovative flexibility of the use of data.”

The State Commissioner of Agriculture, Abdul Oroh, told the participants to leverage the available dataset on agriculture to find simple solutions to some of the challenges facing agricultural sector in the state.

According to him, some of the challenges he expected the participants to provide solutions to, include: obsolete skills and out-dated technology; inadequate and inaccurate baseline data coupled with poor record keeping as well as lack of qualified personnel collect data from the field; inadequate agro-services to meet the needs of farmers; poor accessibility to credits by farmers; inadequate land; low income and exploitation of farmers by middlemen; non availability of structured market for agricultural products and inadequate storage infrastructure. Other challenges he mentioned include, low range of enlightenment campaign; inability to prioritize areas of comparative advantage; absence of access roads and lack of processing plants for most of the farm produce.