By Rosemary Mirondo Rmirondo@tz.nationmedia.com
Dar
es Salaam — The government's agenda of becoming an industrialized
country by 2025, can only become a reality if innovation is given
precedence.
That is why the Tanzania Commission for Science and Technology
(Costech) through
Dar Technohama Incubator (DTBi) focuses on promoting innovation and
technology entrepreneurship through capacity building and skill
development for the youth by nurturing them with entrepreneurial skills.
With this in mind, a
young innovator Kilimo Point CEO Rogers Urio said he has come up with a
platform that enables farmer's access information on agriculture
markets, inputs as well as investment.
"I came up with the
idea, during my first year in university in 2014 by putting up web base
application that connects farmers to vital information that will try to
put an end to their challenges," he said.
He said, the
platform which can be accessed via online, and also through small
messages SMS for farmers who are not on line. Adding that through the
medium farmers are able to relay their needs as well as access available
information.
However, he said
that since some of the farmers cannot access both the mediums, they also
go physically to collect information from the farmers as well as inform
them of the opportunities.
According to him,
so far they have been able to reach farmers in Morogoro and Bagamoyo who
have been connected to markets for their produce, farming inputs and
investors who are ready to invest in their products for purchase.
He noted that they plan to roll out the programme countrywide, but will do that depending on its success.
On his part another
innovator, a second year student at Ardhi University said he has
innovated a website that ensures parents even those in remote areas are
able to access their child school information straight from the website
direct to their phones via short messages (SMS).
The website dubbed
scholar dream with ID scholadream.com is now being accessed by at least
10 schools in the country while other 210 have downloaded the
application ready for use.
Scholar dream CEO
Amani Ghachocha said he came up with the idea when he joined Ardhi
University two years ago and witnessed the chaos facing students in
accessing relevant information timely.
"I then came up
with an idea that will enable schools have own website that collects all
relevant information in one place and the management communicates with
parents via the website straight to their mobile phone," he said.
He noted that the
website enables the school management to collect all vital information
and process it for sharing thereby enabling parents receive school
report cards, information on school fees among others as well as child
development via the sms.
He named some of
the schools accessing the website as Brothers Font of Academy, Blooming
Birds Elementary School and Geta Day Care and Kindergarten school among
others.
Meanwhile, Costech senior researcher, Dr Dugushulu Mafunda said costech receives youth in various stages of their innovations.
He said they
empower innovators with access to information and networks that they
need in order to develop civic technology that enables them create
solutions to local governance challenges through leveraging ICT,
However he noted
that some of the youths are from universities who are well trained and
skilled and only need mentorship to enable their innovation reach the
market.
However he noted
that the other group is at a grassroots level of innovators who have not
completed studies but have good ideas, and therefore need extra
mentorship and coaching to enable them develop their ideas and reach the
market.
He said since the
programmes started in 1986 and since then Costech has made a great
contribution in ICT innovation that aim to improve the country's
development.
No comments :
Post a Comment