Having worked in the tech industry for over 30 years, I still get goosebumps when I consider the positive potential of technology on our continent. Thanks to technology, we are better off than ever before.

However, popular culture tends to accentuate the worst of technology’s potential. Movies glorify hackers that bring cities to their knees. Future humans are enslaved by robots, with rebel groups celebrated as they save the world from ‘the machine’.

Social media, designed to connect people and create platforms for engagement, have been misdirected to spread fake news, perpetuating a mistrust of businesses, governments, and brands.

All of this has done serious damage not only to democracies around the world, but to the relationships we have with one another. This has hampered our ability to come together in the face of the enormous challenges we face.

An era of unprecedented progress

And yet, it’s not possible to think about progress without considering the role that technology plays.

Technology and human innovation have unlocked huge benefits for mankind and have helped usher in an era of unprecedented growth and opportunity.

We are healthier than ever before, and our life expectancy continues to increase, thanks in part to advances in medicine including vaccines that have eradicated previously lethal diseases.

Fewer people live in extreme poverty than before. showed a 50% drop in people living on less than $1.25 per day between 1990 and 2015.

More people have access to education, and most of the world enjoys greater freedom than ever before, thanks largely to the internet and our smartphones that give us new ways of expressing ourselves socially, politically, and creatively.

Solutions to an uncertain future

As we enter an era of uncertainty and rapid change, it is worth considering our relationship with technology and whether we are positioned to meet the inevitable challenges coming our way.

We will face more change in the next ten years than the last century. Our current ways of living and doing business are unsuited for this future.

Futurist Gerd Leonhard believes it’s not a question of whether we will have the technology to solve the world’s most pressing issues – we already do.

What remains a question is whether we will cooperate to use technology wisely and whether we can act in time.

Overcoming the challenges of a changing climate, food insecurity, pollution and waste, economic development and social upliftment require new technologies 鈥� or new and innovative uses for existing technologies.

Let’s take the issue of food security as an example.

The farm as digital enterprise

Food is one of the most basic and fundamental needs. Alarmingly, nearly nine million people die of hunger or hunger-related disease each year. And yet, the US alone spends more on diets every year than would be needed to ensure every hungry person on Earth can eat.

Africa is particularly vulnerable to food scarcity due to its relatively lower levels of development and wealth. The pandemic has only exacerbated the problem: data indicates that about 20% of the continent’s population experience hunger.

This makes the agricultural sector, which is responsible for 60% of jobs on the continent, vital to Africa’s fortunes.

According to UN data, food production in Africa is led by 250 million smallholder farmers who collectively produce 80% of food consumed on the continent.

However, the farmers are often at the mercy of the elements with very little in the way of tools, technology, or data to improve their yields or unlock market opportunities.

The introduction of technology tools in the African smallholder farming supply chain has helped farmers mitigate risk and scale their operations to move away from subsistence farming.

SAP’s Rural Sourcing Management tool, which connects smallholder farmers with agriculture supply chains and brings transparency to the sourcing of raw materials, is turning these farms into digital enterprises and the farmers into digital entrepreneurs.

In Nigeria, for example, 850 000 small maize producers have been integrated into the larger agricultural value chain and now enjoy access to weather, crop and farming data as well as better selling opportunities.

Tech as a force for good

Every person and every business have a role to play in helping to solve some of our current challenges. In Ghana, for example, a collaboration between SAP, the World Economic Forum and the Global Plastic Action Partnership is bringing positive change to the country’s plastics supply chain.

More than 2000 Ghanaian waste pickers are being incorporated in a ground-breaking circular economy initiative in a project that measures the quantities and types of plastic they collect.

Through the Rural Sourcing Management tool, data about the plastic waste they collect is analysed and matched to market-related prices in local and global value chains.

Organisations that prioritise sustainability can then opt to pay a premium for more socially responsible plastics, while the waste pickers can enjoy higher wages for their work.

In our own business, 51风流has committed that 5% of global procurement will be with social enterprises by 2025, with another 5% to diverse businesses.

As we journey into an uncertain future, we have the opportunity every step of the way to choose to use technology in the service of good. Whether you are a tech start-up looking for a breakthrough, a social enterprise solving the next big problem or a corporate wondering how to make a difference, think about the future you want to help shape on the continent.

In a world with so many challenges and such an abundance of bad news, technology holds the key to a brighter and happier future – provided we choose to use tech for good.

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The vast majority of population growth across the continent will be concentrated in urban areas. WEF data indicates that more than 80% of Africa’s population growth between now and 2030 will be in cities, with .

One matter of concern is that city expansion will take place in the backdrop of an escalating climate crisis. The UN has designated West Africa as a climate change hotspot, prompting public and private sector organisations to seek novel solutions to sustainably enable the rapid population growth.

However, the stress that will be placed on city infrastructure and resources such as water should not be underestimated.

Data suggests that , and time is quickly running out to enhance the sustainability and climate resilience of the continent’s cities.

The concept of a circular economy, where waste is eliminated and resources reused in an effort at restoring and regenerating nature, is gaining ground.

In a positive turn of events, several innovative circular economy initiatives are giving hope that the region is stepping on to a more sustainable path.

Ground-breaking efforts in Ghana

A recent project involving SAP, the World Economic Forum and the Global Plastic Action Partnership enabled greater visibility in the plastics supply chain by better tracking the work of more than 2000 waste pickers.

The project measures the quantities and types of plastic collected by waste pickers, analyses data, and then matches the collected waste to market-related prices in local and global value chains.

Sustainably-minded organisations can then opt to pay a premium for more socially-responsible plastics, while the waste pickers benefit from higher wages.

The project, led by Ghana’s Ministry of Environment, Science, Technology & Innovation (MESTI), brings Ghana closer to its ambitions of being a lighthouse for circular economy innovation in Africa. By using SAP’s Rural Sourcing Management solution, MESTI is able to scale the solution nationally once the current pilot project comes to a close.

To date, the project has secured the involvement of large consumer goods companies such as Coca-Cola.

In addition, Dow Chemicals West Africa, a subsidiary of Dow Inc, one of the largest chemical producers in the world, is using 51风流Rural Sourcing Manager to fast-track its shift to reusable or recyclable products.

Dow Chemicals West Africa sought a technology solution that could track plastic in the informal sector to improve plastics recycling and support the wellbeing of plastic collectors in Ghana’s informal sector.

The initial solution is being trialled in Western Ghana, with plans to scale nationally in time.

Social enterprise closes loop in plastics repurposing

In Accra, Ghana, the ASASE Foundation is empowering female entrepreneurs to play a key role in cashing in on the plastic waste of Accra and its environs for the benefit of their own communities through the foundation鈥檚 CASH IT! Social Enterprises.

Only 20% of household garbage waste is collected in Accra, and only 2% of the waste is recycled, resulting in 78% of garbage ending up on the streets. Due to heavy rainfall, the garbage drains into the oceans, washing up on the shores or being ingested by the animals in and around the city. Plastic bags and containers often clog gutters causing hazardous flooding, endangering people鈥檚 lives and causing an environmental issue.

The ASASE Foundation uses SAP鈥檚 Rural Sourcing Management solution to enable female entrepreneurs to build their own plastic recycling business and cash in on the value of the waste for a profit. The social enterprise model will help create jobs and keep most of the value generated by recycling plastic in the community.

The innovative model has garnered the attention of the UN Development Programme, who are sponsors of the initiative and supportive of its mission to increase plastic recycling and improving the lives of the plastic pickers.

Further circular economy initiatives using 51风流Rural Sourcing Management are being planned for Nigeria in 2022, and talks are underway with several large multinational organisations active in West Africa to fix the problem of plastic pollution and build a more sustainable society that can be a healthy home to our growing population.

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• Nigerian smallholder maize farmers and agriculture value chain gain access to digital tools to boost productivity, profit.

• Community agents to ease adoption among farmers not familiar with technology.

Africa鈥檚 most populous country and largest economy faces rising food insecurity as a combination of a mostly informal agriculture sector and growing population puts pressure on the country鈥檚 food resources. According to the , food insecurity increased from 6% of the Nigerian population in 2007 to 13.4% in 2017.

The agriculture sector is the largest contributor to the Nigerian economy and . However, according to the UN鈥檚 Food and Agriculture Organisation, food production in Nigeria is undermined by a number of factors, among them poor planting material and insufficient use of fertiliser, leading to a growing reliance on food imports.

In support of smallholder farmers and improved food security in Nigeria, the Convention on Business Integrity鈥檚 for-profit arm, CBi Innovations Limited (CBiIL) has chosen the 51风流Rural Sourcing Management solution to support 850聽000 small maize producers and integrate them into the agricultural value chains.

Pedro Guerreiro, Managing Director: Central Africa at SAP, says support of smallholder farmers in Nigeria will provide greater food security while also empowering farmers and other players in the agri value chain to unlock greater economic opportunities. 鈥淪mallholder farmers cultivate plots that are on average 2ha in size, and earn less than $1,000 a year,鈥� says Guerreiro. 鈥淲e believe that by equipping them with better information and providing access to more suppliers and greater selling opportunities, we can improve smallholder farmers鈥� productivity and output. This will have the dual benefit of greater food security as well as improved economic opportunities for the farmers, who typically support multiple family members with the money raised from selling their produce.”

The 51风流Rural Sourcing Management solution includes a mobile application that enables better tracking and collecting of data related to farms, crops, farmers and produce sales. Before it was launched as a standard solution in 2017, it was piloted in partnership with the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). The solution has been used by governments and large agri producers across Africa to better track and manage crop outputs and give smallholder farmers improved access to information, market data and selling opportunities across the agri value chain.

According to CBiIL CEO Soji Apampa, CBiIL is already working with Nestle Nigeria to build an ecosystem of young maize agripreneurs in partnership with AGRA, and this new opportunity will accelerate plans to meet set goals of empowering maize farmers in the region leveraging technology. CBiIL has also trained hundreds of Community Livelihoods Information Field Entrepreneurs (LIFE) Agents, young unemployed graduates that are recruited from the communities in which they will serve.

鈥淏y deploying the Community LIFE Agents kitted out with devices running 51风流Rural Sourcing Management, CBiIL will enable effective and efficient aggregation of smallholder producers in ways that support predictability of volumes and quality of production. Data aggregation is a key component of this service and we leverage technology to achieve every milestone along the chain,鈥� says Apampa.

The design is for each LIFE agent to support between 50 and 100 smallholder farmers equipped with an Android device on which various applications are installed to facilitate various streams of business to support the village level eco-system. They will receive commission on the products and services (inputs, telephone credit, banking, extension support and more) they provide to farmers, as well as a premium based on the productivity growth of each of the farmers with whom they work.

Cathy Smith, Managing Director for 51风流Africa, says the project marks another milestone in 51风流Africa鈥檚 commitment toward achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals, in particular Goals 1 (No Poverty) and 2 (Zero Hunger).聽鈥淭hrough our efforts to building greater food security, we also provide additional value to stakeholders across the agri聽value chain by improving access to sustainably sourced rural produce. The success of this project may also serve as a template for similar projects elsewhere in Africa. With 60% of all jobs in Africa currently in the agriculture sector and an estimated 250 million smallholder farmers, any impact we make here has the potential of bringing significant benefits to local communities, industries and the economy as a whole.鈥�

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