Digital tools for agriculture are developing rapidly, and it is widely expected that they will support more environmentally friendly farming methods. Farm advisors, who play a crucial role in facilitating services for farmers, are increasingly making use of these tools. Digital solutions that support advisory services in agriculture are becoming a popular way to disseminate good agricultural practices and are expected to contribute to changes in how food is produced.
Despite their potential and promises, not all digital tools are widely accepted by users, nor do they all have a tangible impact on the food system. The reasons for this are complex, but one key factor is the mismatch between the context and capabilities of users and the readiness level of the technologies. An increasing number of farmers and stakeholders are therefore calling for digital tools to be developed in line with the principles and best practices of responsible innovation, placing the user at the centre of the design process.
At CANALLS, we prioritise an approach that places the extension agent at the core of the design process. Our primary objective is to develop a tool that adapts to the context and skill levels of agricultural advisors in Central Africa. The tool aims to provide meaningful support to extension agents in their daily work, thereby improving the quality of advisory services, particularly in remote areas.
Unlike the development of many other technological tools, our starting point was to identify the actual requirements of extension agents. This is not a straightforward task, as multiple extension systems often coexist within a single country, forming a complex network of knowledge, actors, and information flows—commonly referred to as the Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation System (AKIS). Developing a responsible and effective tool therefore requires an understanding of farmers’ needs, advisors’ needs, and the key characteristics of the AKIS in which they operate.
Under these conditions, we initiated a process to better understand extension agents’ needs, challenges, and opportunities. We engaged with both extension agents and researchers working closely with them. We found that advisory workflows are highly diverse and depend largely on the organisation for which the advisor works. Consequently, if agroecology is to be integrated into advisory workflows, it is essential to consider the objectives, resources, and activities of the organisations involved.
As a first step, we identified five main types of advisory services: public organisations, cooperatives, project-led advisory services, private company advisory services, and local freelancers. We also identified several systemic barriers, including weak basic communication infrastructure, such as limited access to electricity, internet connectivity, and road networks.
Taking all these factors into account, we reviewed the tools already available on the market and concluded that the most appropriate solution would be a “dialogue tool” facilitating interaction between advisors and farmers. Based on this premise, we developed our own concept built around three main components:
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a mobile tool for offline farm data collection,
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a web-based tool to support data storage, reporting, analysis, and comparison, and
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a printed tool that helps advisors structure dialogue with farmers around agroecological elements at farm level.
We named the tool AGRECO, combining the concepts of agriculture and ecology.
The development of AGRECO followed a co-creation approach, which is central to the CANALLS project. Co-creation involves the iterative development of a concept through continuous testing and feedback from its primary users. The co-creation cycle was initiated in the Ntui Living Lab. The first round of feedback was conducted with extension agents in Cameroon in December 2024, followed by a second round with members from the eight Living Labs in May 2025. A third round of feedback is planned for the end of 2025.
AGRECO is designed as a digital assistant for extension agents and includes several core functions: registering advisory activities in the field (both individual and group-based), conducting agroecological diagnostics, generating farm-level recommendations based on these diagnostics, producing field activity reports, monitoring changes in agroecological practices over time, enabling exchanges with colleagues across countries, and providing access to publicly available didactic materials to support advisory work. A key future milestone will be the dissemination of AGRECO through the network of the African Forum for Agricultural Advisory Services (AFAAS).
Although AGRECO is still at prototype stage, the next steps include further testing under real conditions and across different crops, improving the user interfaces based on field feedback, and adapting the tool to the specific characteristics of different regions.
