Information exchange about farming techniques, markets and market prices is key to improving the agricultural sector. IICD has supported farmer organisations in Burkina Faso, Ghana and Mali since 1998 to help improve the production, processing and marketing of their produce through the use of ICT. Not without success. Earlier this year the Malian farmer organisation of COPRAKAZAN was awarded by the national government for doubling its profit and declared to be an example to other farmer organisations in the country.

The forum ‘The marketing of agricultural products through ICT’ aims to increase the impact of the lessons learned and build the national network for ICT and development in Burkina Faso. The event is organised by Burkina NTIC, in particular its ICT cluster Agriculture.

The organisers will collect best practice examples of marketing agricultural products through ICT, to understand where the opportunities are and to draw lessons for the future. Best practices will be gathered from Burkina Faso and neighbouring countries.

The forum will bring about 45 participants together from various agricultural institutions in Mali and Burkina Faso, and IICD project partners. Agriterra and the Swiss Agency for Development Cooperation SDC will also attend, as well as resource people from the SEND foundation in Ghana, IT company Manobi from Senegal, ANOPACI from Ivory Coast, and the regional trade platform ESOKO (TradeNet).

The Ning social network platform is being used to gather ideas and best practices from experts throughout the region to discuss at the forum. After the forum the platform will be used for further sharing and documenting of experiences and views on the marketing of agricultural products through ICT. A Ning platform is a free social networking tool to help people build their own online social or professional network. The platform is moderated by Burkina NTIC, and membership is open to all: http://agri-tic.ning.com/.