The BBC has a story about how google saved Kenyan farmer Zack Matere’s potato crop, and helped him find customers. Must be lots more similar experiences out there involving different aspects of agrobiodiversity. And, with the high-speed undersea cable poised to go live, no doubt there will now be many more from East Africa. Thinking of getting the mother-in-law on the tubes. She needs to sell her tea, potatoes, cabbages, what have you. Not sure, however, if the tubes will be able to take it. And she does have her mobile…
Good story but a slight cavil. It wasn’t Google that “helped harvest a bumper crop” but the source of information he found on Google – wherever that was from. And of course, if the crops had failed I doubt whether the news story would have said “Google responsible for disastrous harvest.”
Fair enough. But that’s a headline I’d pay to see!