Can big data increase food production?
If data can be used to predict the presidential outcome between Trump and Clinton, what potential could this hold for agricultural production? The answer is in our hands.
Photo by the European Space Agency
As people were tweeting about Clinton and Trump presidential debate, I was in my study room busy mining tweets.
Though Clinton seemed to have performed better in the debate, the tweets could tell that Trump will win the election.
I made a post on my Facebook account but my Facebook friends thought I was wrong. But it was not me talking, it was data!
If such a simple task can predict the future, what if we can apply the same knowledge to agricultural production? I bet we could be the most food-secure generation that has ever existed.
Appropriate use of available data can help us visualize and make critical simple decisions that can accurately predict and determine the future food security and even provide warning signals.
But how do we make data widely and easily available in the first place?
Every second, thousands of bytes of valuable data are generated from several sources such as: posts from twitter, text messages, satellite images among others.
The collection of massive volumes of data has been made possible by the growth of social media, mobile technology, android applications, Google and the many other modern tools.
If these data sets are utilized well, there is enormous potential to stir innovation and creativity in agricultural production.
Most research organizations have already been collecting data for a long period of time. What if we encourage massive sharing of this data?
I can’t even picture the kind of predictive analytics and visualization this could bring about.
Development and sharing of R and Python libraries makes it easy to become a data scientist as more people are able to access and analyze varied data so as to determine various situations and make more informed decisions.
Photo by Georgina Smith / CIAT
I wish that we aspired to share data in the same way we aspire to publish our research results in high impact journals.
Unfortunately, our data is still in our C-drives and the few that we are willing to share are placed with restrictions or charges for the users before they can gain access.
I encourage organizations conducting research in agriculture to share their data freely and massively.
As we share the data, we can have a clarification on what the recipients can do with the data.
This could be useful for those who want to make publications or for those who are looking for data to practice or kick off their training in Artificial Intelligence (AI) or Machine Learning (ML).
Data is nothing without users.
Sometimes we are too cautious in sharing our data. This may be because the data is not sufficiently accurate to be shared, it may cost too much to clean and transform the data, or, their may be a fear of harming the image of your organization by publishing low-quality data.
However, by sharing your data, comments from users will help in improving the quality of your future data.
One idea is to share the code that was used to transform your raw data into cleaned data and then share the two versions of the data. We should, perhaps, be more tolerant of our data appearing in various platforms.
There are two possible ways of ensuring shared data gets to the right user at the right time.
First, we can make our data technically open.
By this, we mean making data available in machine-readable standard formats where data can be retrieved and meaningfully processed by a computer application.
Examples of data file formats that can be used include Json, XML, RDF, spread sheets, comma separated values, text document, plain text, scanned images, HTML among others.
Technically, open data means that the data is easily accessible to its intended audience. For example, if the data is intended for programmers, it should be available within an application programming interface (API).
The second way is to make the data we share legally open.
It should be licensed in a way that it can permit commercial and non-commercial use of the data without restrictions. It is important to attach proactive license such that users don’t have to request using your data as long as you are acknowledged.
As a young data scientist I strongly believe that if we can share the data we hold in our laptops, and take advantage of the daily generated data, we can have more nutritious food in our plates.
The answer is all in our hands.
Chris Mwungu
Research Associate for the Climate Change Adaptation and Farming Systems, International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT)
Nairobi, Kenya
Chris Mwungu is a Research Associate at CIAT. He has a passion for using big data to enhance effective decision making in agricultural production.
Blog Competition Entry
This article is published as a part of our publicly open big data blog competition. If you have enjoyed this reading this entry, you can vote by liking, commenting or sharing.
Nice work Chris. Indeed Big data must be utilized to inform development decisions rooted in practical evidence for sustainability and general welfare improvement. Agriculture sector needs this! We all need it!!
Great and futuristic views.
data should be open, especially on mutually beneficial topics such as Agriculture.
Big data for food security. We need self sufficiency and i feel with this kind of information it can be achieved. Good work.
Well said Maurine.
Nice piece brother Chris.
Data sharing can indeed contribute to achieving food security in the world.
Big data is what the world needs to feed its people. It is not only applicable in agriculture, but also health, nutrition, and urban planning, among others. Corporate organizations, governments and NGOs will be smiling when it is made available.
They say data is the new oil.
This oil must be made available in order for it to provide energy to power our agriculture,health and other aspects of the economy.
Wow…Good job Chris!
Thank you Mercy for your support.
The piece is insightful and intriguing
Thank you Allan for reading the blog and finding it intresting. Please share it with your friends!
Good insight though to what benefit would it earn if our mindset and attitude is planted with negativism! Quite a number of researchers have indeed shared their data, and in somewhat ironical proceedings, it does not go beyond the sharing. Lets open our mindset to be innovation oriented, share the scientific data and then make a meaning about it.
Very true Maurice and many thanks for your comment. We can be a food secure generation if and only if data is shared and useful patterns generated from it.
Great insights Chris! The true potential impact of bid data in tackling food security is yet to be discovered, and we need committed people like you to work towards that
Thank you for your comment, Mariola. My dream is to make African people food secure using big data. Yes we can!
Big data has so much potential but only if it can be mined and be able to get something out of it,which is proving to be a challange in Africa where many people including farmers aren’t fond of keeping data records and the lack of ease of sharing the data itself when we really need to share the data and get something out of it.Subsistance form of farming that is dominant in Africa also proves to be a hindrance but with time perhaps things will change
Thank you Donald for your support. Big data for impact!
Awesome article Brian👏👏
we should all work to grow the use of precision farming and the application of wise data.
Data is the new soil. Let’s fertilize the soil by sharing…
Chris, Big data is not about the data. Its thinking beyond data.
Sandra.. Remember the 3 V’s.
Volume is one of them and therefore big data is about BIG data.. The bigger the sample size the better the performance of the model.
Thank you for your comment Sandra. Indeed there is a big debate revolving around the definition of big data. My concern is to encourage scientists to share their data so that it can be utilized by other fellow researchers in conducting predictive analysis and informing effective decision making. However, I also support your idea. Big data is also thinking beyond data. It also requires the ability to use the data you have and generate interesting and hidden patterns that can inform decision making or serve as a warning.
If a platform is created and or farmers shown how to share their data and helped in securing their ideas legally, many will learn fast and improve in their agricultural production. I hope you do not stop here but continue seeking for a remedy. Thumb Up!
Thank you for your comment, Dan. Indeed this is just the beginning. I know it is possible to increase farm production using big data.
Great mind here, Chris
Everybody knows that we need data to improve our model, it’s not new. What do you propose Chris? You only expose a problem that everybody is aware of.
Everybody: Let’s share data!
Me : Who’s first ?
Everybody: ~silence~
You have a good point. As much as we all know its an existing problem, Chris is actually encouraging us to be the pioneers and champions of sharing data.
Yes. Now you’re talking.
We need to share data.
People aren’t open with sharing data ..And we can’t blame them..maybe they are afraid of the quality of their data or due to other reasons.. What the writer of the blog is trying to tell us is that we should encourage them to share no matter what.
Thank you for your comment, Micheal. Just as Sandra argues, we can be the champions or pioneers of encouraging massive sharing of data.
Great note chris, in the evolution of data science, share information is something quite important.
Great informative piece
Very insightful Chris, I believe that this is very possible
Thank you, Eunice, for your comment. Yes, it is possible.
Good work Chris Mwungu, keep it up!!!
Wow! Great piece. I didn’t know search data can be formulated into an informed decision making. When I grow up I would like to be such in data analytics
From the above data,it is evident that data can greatly contribute to food production.
Big data is the way to go!! It has almost factual that there is exhaustion of structured data globally . As Stephen Hawking alluded, in times to come, the world will not able to feed its growing population.
Therefore, the underlying factor is to find the way to fill that gap. Agriculture is one of the clear evidence of reducing the gap. While i agree so much has been done using the existing data, there is quite a lot of undiscovered patterns within most the data which haven’t been shared or used at all. Among them is the Unstructured big agricultural datasets which Unsupervised machine learning can assist in finding the pattern and find solution to global feeding problems.
If we all share together our resources , it will be much more easier to solve the global phenomenon.
Thank you for your comment, Cyrus. They say if we don’t have data we are not in business. With data, we can predict famine, drought, floods among other global challenges.
This is great.Especially the part about AI.
Those who are interested in such technology should get a good platform to learn
Awesome article, great insights especially in the agricultural sector
Great piece, its time we started sharing data
inspiring and jnformative
great piece…..Big data key to food security
Great piece….. Big data key to food security and a mitigation tool against adverse climatic conditions.
Yeah. It is very true. Data sharing should be encouraged at all levels.
Wonderful piece
Access to information is power and making this accessible is empowering the society at large . Nice piece
This is a great piece. Actually having a lot of data without sharing the same may not bring any significant effect as far as agricultural production is concerned. With sufficient regulation and information to users with respect to the scope to which users can use such information. This article is great
Sure Chris data should be shared. Can someone act on this, start with one, 2……..and what will happen to agricultural production will be amazing.
Information is Power, sharing data will empower users to achieve excellence, timely.
That’s very true,,,,, making data accessible through sharing will help agricultural economists and other professionals in the agricultural sector to come up with evidence based policies!
You can have data without information but you can’t have information without data.
Great thinking.Sharing of data will definitely help solve a lot of economic issues including food shortage.
I support the idea of sharing the data as it helps the departments or systems achieve the intended objectives.Just like the way the whole human body functions effeciently when all the Organs are physically,mentally,emotionallay & physchologically fit.
# share data with individuals scientists and Organizations
Great piece and I think answers to the key questions you ask will lead us to get some pragmatic solutions & insights to achieve the SDGs 2& 3.
…… “What’s is data without users?”
Thank you for your comment, Mensah. They say data is nothing without users and without data we cant be in business. The two go hand in hand.
Great composure Miyinzi. Data shouldn’t sit on the shelves
Wonderful editorial. Thanks Mr Chris for writing so vividly on how we can use big data sharing as a leveraleverage to increase agricultural production and food security in our community
This is Amazing Chris. I like the idea. Believe you will win this.
Open data comes in volumes, variety and that is the essence of big data. Being able to harness knowledge from all these sources is important in driving innovation and creation of new policies/products in any sector. There are so many societal problems begging for our attention and availability of data will enable us find solutions to them. Food security is one of the critical issues the world needs to focus on.
“Data is nothing without users” this is an intriguing challenge to us researchers. Data provide evidence and more widely it is shared the more impact it is likely to make, and subsequently, guide policy to mitigating any anticipated negative effects.
Thank you for your comment, Dr. Beatrice. Learning from you, data is nothing without users. Having data and using it appropriately is a good step towards making our lives better.
Great article on using big data to enhance effective decision making
There is nothing Important than our food supply.
It is good news that Big Data is moving into agriculture in a big way, Sensor on the fields and crops , GPS units on tractors to monitor transportation ,the drones which patrol fields and report back.If these data can be shared or rather made available ,it can be used by data analysts and insights from these data can really help in increasing food production.
Thank you comment, Brian. They say you can have information without data but you can’t have information without data. Let us be the champions of this great initiative – massive data sharing.
sharing data in a scientific world allows so many significant things to happen, it increases data circulation and use within the scientific community by encouraging better transparency, enabling reproducibility of results, and informing the larger scientific community. This, in turn, can greatly benefit the public as better and more widely disseminated information can lead to informed decisionmaking for environmental planning .
Nice ….from the piece i have known how data can help us to eradicate food shortage.
awesome!
Yes indeed organizations conducting research in agriculture need to share their data freely and massively. Very nice article!!!
Great piece, big data for impact