Smallholder Farmers and Mobile Phone Technology in Sub-Sahara Agriculture
Osadebamwen Anthony Ogbeide & Ideba Ele (2015). Smallholder Farmers and Mobile Phone Technology in Sub-Sahara Agriculture, Mayfair Journal of Information and Technology Management in Agriculture 1(1), 1-19

Abstract
One of the major constraints in Sub-Sahara agriculture is inefficiency and; improving it in agricultural value chain is important to increasing productivity and reducing poverty.  One of the ways to improve the efficiency in the agriculture supply chain is the adoption and use of mobile phone.  Mobile phone ownership and usage for social and agricultural purposes have received attention with an indication that it is growing in Sub-Sahara Africa.  It provides different avenues for the transfer of knowledge and information among stakeholders of Agribusiness.  This study investigates how much farmers have applied this technology and the benefits derived from it.  Considering these objectives, a quantitative data derived through multi-stage sampling procedure was collected through a process of questionnaire administration that yielded 328 smallholder farmer respondents.  The data was analysed using Stata 12 software.  The results indicate that more young farmers use mobile phones and more than 82% of the farmers possess at least secondary school certificate.  The farmers spend more (mobile phone bill) seeking market information than any other agricultural activities and obtaining weather information was one area in which they have not received reasonable benefits.  One country information limits generalisation of the study and caution should be taken when using the data.

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