Worldwatch's Nourishing the Planet blog has another post up this week about how cell phones, not tractors or fertilizers, are the hottest new tool in farming. People throughout Asia and Africa are using their phones to find out which markets are offering the best prices, what the weather is going to be and what sort of crop pests are threatening.
It's interesting that struggling farmers in India are willing and even eager to shell out for their cell service because the returns are just so great since farmers use weather and pest reports to avoid huge crop losses, and using market information gotten via cell phone can substantially boost sales.
Check out Heifer's holiday edition of the World Ark magazine to read Frank Bures's story about how people in African countries are using cell phones and other technology to catapult themselves out of poverty.
