Farmbetter: 3-in-1 Digital Advisory Platform

Smart farming support—anytime, anywhere.

farmbetter is a proven digital solution that enables development programs to deliver climate-smart advisory services at scale—while tracking adoption, inclusion, and impact. Farmers receive personalized guidance via a WhatsApp chatbot, tailored to their location, crops, and soil conditions. Field agents use a mobile app to register farmers, provide follow-up, and monitor behavior change. Project teams access a live dashboard showing real-time adoption data, gender and youth reach, and field activities.

This system reduces delivery costs, shortens feedback loops, and simplifies M&E. Already active in 9 countries, farmbetter is used in donor-funded programs (e.g., SDC, GIZ, SWISSAID) and is built to align with logframes, gender targets, and climate resilience outcomes. Partners fund the license and training, while the platform ensures quality, consistency, and results across diverse regions.

This technology is pre-validated.

9•8

Scaling readiness: idea maturity 9/9; level of use 8/9

Adults 18 and over: Positive high

Adult farmers, regardless of education level or farm size, gain timely and relevant agronomic advice. This helps smallholder men and women in both rural and peri-urban areas increase productivity, improve income stability, and reduce vulnerability to seasonal shocks.

Others: Positive high

Farmers in geographically isolated areas gain timely agronomic guidance without needing to travel to extension offices. This reduces information gaps between rural and urban farmers and strengthens local food production systems. The platform can be adapted to provide information in simple language or local languages, and through formats that reduce dependence on high literacy, ensuring inclusion of users who may otherwise be excluded from written technical materials.

The poor: Positive high

Farmers with limited financial capacity benefit from low-cost, accessible advisory services that optimize input use, reduce production risks, and improve return on investment. The impact is particularly significant in remote areas where access to formal extension or markets is limited.

Under 18: Positive high

Children and youth benefit indirectly when their households adopt improved farming practices. Better yields and income improve access to nutritious food, school attendance, and educational performance. The effect is strongest for rural youth from low-income households where farming is the primary livelihood.

Women: Positive high

Women farmers—often managing smaller plots or engaging in home gardens—gain equal access to quality agricultural information. The technology addresses barriers such as limited mobility, lower access to extension services, and fewer financial resources, enabling women to improve yields, income, and household food security.

Climate adaptability: Highly adaptable

The platform provides climate-smart recommendations tailored to local agroecological zones, benefiting farmers in diverse settings—from drought-prone rural areas to high-rainfall zones—regardless of farm size or resource level.

Farmer climate change readiness: Significant improvement

Advisory services improve readiness for climate shocks by offering location-specific, seasonal guidance. The benefits are greatest for smallholders in vulnerable regions with limited access to formal climate information systems.

Biodiversity: Positive impact on biodiversity

Promotes diversified cropping systems and integrated pest management. The impact is stronger in mixed-farming households where biodiversity also supports nutrition and resilience.

Environmental health: Greatly improves environmental health

Promotes safe and efficient input use, reducing chemical runoff and soil degradation. This benefits farmers in both high-density peri-urban zones (reducing water contamination) and rural catchment areas.

Soil quality: Improves soil health and fertility

Encourages organic matter restoration, crop rotation, and reduced tillage. These practices are especially impactful for small-scale farmers on degraded soils with limited access to synthetic fertilizers.

Water use: Much less water used

Disseminates water-saving irrigation and moisture-retention practices. The benefits are particularly significant for farmers in water-scarce zones and for women who often bear responsibility for water collection and management.

Problem

High cost of advisory delivery: Development programmes can require substantial resources to provide face-to-face training and field support across multiple locations.
Limited evidence of adoption: Programme teams may know that advice was delivered but lack reliable data on whether farmers applied the recommended practices.
Slow monitoring and reporting: Manual data collection and disconnected reporting systems can delay programme reviews and performance assessments.
Difficulty measuring inclusion: Monitoring whether women, young people, and underserved communities receive and use advisory services can be challenging.
Weak feedback mechanisms: Programme teams may not receive timely information about farmers' challenges, engagement, or need for additional support.
Challenges demonstrating results: Inconsistent records can make it harder to document programme reach, behaviour change, and progress towards productivity and climate-resilience objectives.

Solution

More cost-efficient advisory delivery: The platform combines WhatsApp-based advice and digital extension tools to help programmes reach farmers without relying exclusively on in-person activities.
Better tracking of adoption: Digital records enable programme teams to monitor farmer engagement and the application of recommended agricultural practices.
Streamlined monitoring and reporting: The dashboard consolidates information on farmer reach, extension activities, and adoption to support programme monitoring and evaluation.
Improved inclusion assessment: Gender and age indicators can help development partners assess the reach of their advisory services among different beneficiary groups.
Faster feedback and adaptation: Digital monitoring and farmer feedback can help programme teams identify gaps, refine advisory content, and adjust delivery approaches.
Stronger performance evidence: Consolidated information on service delivery and practice adoption can support evidence-based assessments of programme progress and implementation effectiveness.

Key points to design your program

Farmbetter enables development partners to deliver climate-smart agricultural advice at scale, reach underserved farmers, and track project impact through real-time data. It is ideal for integrating into funded programs to enhance farmer knowledge, build extension capacity, and provide measurable results aligned with SDGs.

Key Points to Integrate farmbetter into Development Projects

Identify target regions and farmer groups where climate-smart advisory will create high impact. Consider literacy, language, and digital access to ensure relevance and inclusivity.
Negotiate licensing and customization with the farmbetter team to include locally relevant content, languages, and branding in the WhatsApp chatbot and dashboard. Costs may include annual licenses, customization, and translation.
Onboard farmer advisers and local facilitators by training them to use the adviser app for digitized extension services. Budget for training sessions, trainer fees, and materials.
Provide farmers with onboarding support through workshops, demo days, or local champions to ensure high adoption. This step may require small incentives such as starter data bundles for mobile use.
Ensure connectivity strategy by identifying where the platform will need internet access (e.g., chatbot conversations, dashboard updates) and budgeting for data costs or offline use solutions.
Set up real-time monitoring using the dashboard to track farmer engagement, types of advice accessed, and impact indicators. Allocate staff or partner time for analysis and reporting.
Integrate with other program components such as input distribution, training, or climate services to maximize synergies and project outcomes.
Plan sustainability measures so that after the funding cycle, farmer groups or local partners can cover ongoing costs through cooperatives, private sector linkages, or cost-recovery schemes.

Cost vs. revenue

Data reliability of this estimate:: 100 %

Return on investment 242 %

Every USD invested returns USD 2.42 net income.

Detailed financial information ›

IP

Provisional application, Copyright, Trademark

Scaling Readiness describes how complete a technology's development is and its ability to be scaled. It produces a score that measures a technology's readiness along two axes: the level of maturity of the idea itself, and the level to which the technology has been used so far.

Each axis goes from 0 to 9 where 9 is the “ready-to-scale” status. For each technology profile in the e-catalogs we have documented the scaling readiness status from evidence given by the technology providers. The e-catalogs only showcase technologies for which the scaling readiness score is at least 8 for maturity of the idea and 7 for the level of use.

The graph below represents visually the scaling readiness status for this technology, you can see the label of each level by hovering your mouse cursor on the number.

Scaling readiness score of this technology

Maturity of the idea 9 out of 9

Uncontrolled environment: validated

Level of use 8 out of 9

Used by some intended users, in the real world

Maturity of the idea										Level of use
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9

Cost of the investment Sum of all fixed and operational expenses..	USD 8,830 per year per organisation
Gross revenue Sum of all income before subtracting costs.	USD 21,383 per year per organisation
Net income Gross revenue minus total cost.	USD 12,553 per year per organisation
Return on investment Percentage of income earned for each dollar invested, calculated as: (income ÷ cost of investment) × 100	242 % per year per organisation

References:

Temmplate_Cost, Revenue and ROI calculation for TAAT technologies_choice-sheet_LOCKED.pdf (PDF, 62.1 KB)

Countries with a green colour: Tested & adopted
Countries with a bright green colour: Adopted
Countries with a yellow colour: Tested
Countries with a blue colour: Testing ongoing

Countries where the technology is being tested or has been tested and adopted
Country	Testing ongoing	Tested	Adopted
Kenya	–No ongoing testing	–Not tested	Adopted
Tanzania	–No ongoing testing	–Not tested	Adopted
Uganda	–No ongoing testing	–Not tested	Adopted

This technology can be used in the colored agro-ecological zones. Any zones shown in white are not suitable for this technology.

Agro-ecological zones where this technology can be used
AEZ	Subtropic - warm	Subtropic - cool	Tropic - warm	Tropic - cool
Arid
Semiarid
Subhumid
Humid

Source: HarvestChoice/IFPRI 2009

The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals that are applicable to this technology.

Goal 1: no poverty

Increases farm profitability through better yields and reduced input waste, raising household incomes for smallholder farmers.

Goal 2: zero hunger

Improves food availability and stability by enabling farmers to produce more and better-quality crops.

Goal 3: good health and well-being

Promotes the production of diverse, nutritious foods and reduces harmful chemical exposure through safe input-use recommendations.

Goal 5: gender equality

Ensures women farmers have equal access to agronomic knowledge, improving their decision-making power and income potential.

Goal 8: decent work and economic growth

Strengthens rural economies by increasing agricultural productivity and creating opportunities for value chain engagement.

Goal 12: responsible production and consumption

Encourages resource-efficient farming practices, reducing waste and improving input-use efficiency.

Goal 13: climate action

Disseminates climate-smart agricultural practices that improve resilience to climate variability and reduce vulnerability to extreme events.

Goal 15: life on land

Promotes biodiversity-friendly practices, soil conservation, and sustainable land management.

1. Acquire the Technology (License and Setup)

Organizations contact FarmBetter Ltd. to purchase a SaaS license tailored to the number of farmers or agents they plan to support (e.g., cooperatives, NGOs, governments). The setup includes negotiation for language customization and content localization.

2. Customize and Localize the Platform

The system is configured using over 1,700 peer-reviewed sustainable agriculture practices from databases like WOCAT. Content is translated and adapted to local languages, crops, soils, and climate zones.

3. Train Trainers and Field Agents

A Training‑of‑Trainers session is conducted where master trainers, extension agents, or cooperative staff are taught to use the mobile app and WhatsApp chatbot, and register farmers. Trained agents then roll out training to local staff.

4. Onboard Farmers via WhatsApp

Farmers either self-register or are registered by agents via WhatsApp. The chatbot prompts a short survey on farm location, crops, goals, and challenges, then delivers customized advice tailored to the farm situation.

5. Use the Extension Agent App in the Field

Agents use the farmbetter Android app to manage farmer profiles, track adoption of recommended practices, plan follow-ups, and sync data when internet is available—also works offline.

6. Monitor Performance via Dashboard

Project managers and organizations access a web-based dashboard to track farmer engagement, practice adoption, agent activity, and inclusion metrics such as gender or age. This supports data-driven decision-making and M&E reporting.

7. Iterate Based on Feedback and Scale Up

Implementation partners review dashboard data and farmer feedback to refine content, adapt language or delivery mode, and expand reach. Advanced features like AI-based chatbot automation are gradually introduced.

8. Maintain and Sustain the System

License renewals and refresher training ensure continuity. Updated practices and features (including offline support and voice messages) are pushed periodically to all users to maintain relevance.