Wednesday 21 October 2009

What has 1 billion YouTube watchers to do with African Agriculture

Mr. François Stepman is Communication Expert for the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa. He gives an idea of the popularity of ACP agriculture, by presenting some statistics on the number of videos existing on Youtube on this particular topic. Judging by the figures offered by Youtube, the conclusion of our interviewee is that there is a long ways to go towards making agriculture ’sexy’. (Briefing “ACP Rural Development: why Media matters?”: interviews of participants post of 05/11)

He was interviewed during the ACP/EU Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA) international seminar on the "Role of the media in agricultural development in ACP countries” (Central, East, Southern and West Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific). The seminar was held in Brussels, Belgium from 12 to 16 October 2009.



A search on key tags reveals following figures:

  • Total YouTube videos: 2,9 billion
  • Total videos on American portals: 9,5 billion
  • 70 % of the watchers are American
  • 50 % is under 20 age
  • 70% of the online population watches 73 minutes online video/month

How well is African agriculture represented...?

  • 300.000 videos are about Africa
  • 1.560 are about Africa + agriculture
  • CGIAR has 49 videos
  • CTA 22 vides
  • FARA uses blip.tv with presently some 50 video interviews on line.


Dorienne Rowan Campbell of the Networked Intelligence for Development in Jamaica explained at the CTA conference on Media and Agriculture that NID is using YouTube videos to show farmers innovative climate adaptation techniques!




Video website YouTube revealed on 9th October it had passed a new milestone by serving up over 1 billion video streams a day. The news comes three years to the day that Google bought the hugely popular site for £1bn, at a time when it was only serving 100 million streams a day. According to YouTube statistics the site now provides 42 million video streams every hour or 700,000 every minute. To celebrate the landmark figure the YouTube logo has been altered to reflect the number of videos being watched each day.

Hereunder follows an overview of some powerful YouTube videos which can be used for extension purposes. Click on the title on the video to watch it on You Tube.

Sustainable Agriculture (Part 1) - African film about farming for the environment
Film made of real farmer in the rift valley of Kenya, Africa who is doing small things on his farm to be environmentally friendly and to benefit his crops. Filmed in Swahili with English subtitles.

Sustainable Agriculture (Part 2) - African film about farming for the environment
Film made of real farmer in the rift valley of Kenya, Africa who is doing small things on his farm to be environmentally friendly and to benefit his crops. Filmed in Swahili with English subtitles.

Outsourcing Agriculture to Africa Part 1/2
What is farm outsourcing?
What is new about these investments?

Eritrea - Greening Eritrea (Part 1)
Eritrea's mangroves show way to fight hunger

Eritrea - Greening Eritrea (Part 2)
Eritrea's mangroves show way to fight hunger

How to Feed the Hungry in Africa (bill mollison)
Bill Mollison surveys some of the permaculture projects he helped to establish in Africa. Features include: (a) a grade school with a schoolyard garden that produces food for the children's lunches and provides a tool for teaching the techniques to the students, most of whom come from farming families. (b) an african plant guild (c) compost pile and beekeeping

Restore Africa Part 4a:Irrigation and Farming
Irrigation and Farming methods.

Hope is a precious thing
Take a look inside a Ugandan school where Caritas is helping to teach students sustainable farming practices.

Senegal Agriculture Project
In an effort to stave off malnutrition and help provide food security for villagers in Senegal, Africa, Operation Blessing has launched an agriculture project that is transforming 20 acres of land into a fertile farm. It will also become a training facility where Senegalese from all over the country will be instructed in efficient agricultural methods they can take back to their communities to start similar farms.

Agriculture Training
Agriculture team teaches local villagers how to produce nutritious crops

Farming for a Future.
Alex James, farmer and former Blur band member, travels to Burkina Faso, West Africa with Christian Aid to find out about radical farming techniques developed there to counter the harsh effects of climate change.

Promoting sustainable agriculture in Nigeria: The PROSAB story
This video-zine tells the success story of IITA's PROSAB project - Promoting Sustainable Agriculture in Borno State - a collaboration between IITA and the state government in Northern Nigeria.

Ifijenia Kamtaza - Soya Farmer, Malawi
Armed with the new agriculture techniques she learned from local staff of the Clinton Hunter Development Initiative, Ifijenia Kamtaza, a Malawian soya farmer, is not only improving her harvest and turning more profit - she's helping her whole family. With the money she has earned in the last year, Ifijenia will be able to send her daughter to boarding school and make improvements to her home.

Ghana Rainy Season 2
Agriculture is crucially important for most people in rural Africa. This video shows a number of the farming steps taken to grow yams, cassava and maize in northern Ghana. You can even watch EWB volunteer Nick Jiminez struggle to be a farmer.

Taking The Heat Part 1
Canadian Foodgrains Bank video: African agriculture and climate change

Taking The Heat - Part 2
Canadian Foodgrains Bank video on climate change and African agriculture

Transforming Africa from subsistence to commercial Agriculture


Why NERICA? - Pourquoi NERICA?
The New Rice for Africa (NERICA) is bringing hope to millions of poor people in Africa.
This music video explains it all !

Wala Village
5-day stay in Wala Village, Tolon district, northern Ghana.

The NFU visits Kenya as part of FARM-Africa charity work - voiceover by Countryfile's John Craven
Sarah Whitelock, visited Kenya and saw first-hand how FARM-Africa projects are making a real difference in helping small-scale farming communities produce more food.

Bee Keeping and Sunflower Production
FARM-Africa works with poor African farmers, helping them to produce more food for their families. We want to make sure future generations don't have to depend on handouts of aid.

Increasing Cassava Production
FARM-Africa works with poor African farmers, helping them to produce more food for their families. We want to make sure future generations don't have to depend on handouts of aid

Sweet Potato Project
FARM-Africa works with poor African farmers, helping them to produce more food for their families. We want to make sure future generations don't have to depend on handouts of aid

Programme hatching for improved indigenous chickens
FARM-Africa works with poor African farmers, helping them to produce more food for their families. We want to make sure future generations don't have to depend on handouts of aid.

Bean Rot Control and Management
Food Security agriculture MATF Farmers sustainability environment Africa grassroots outreach nonprofit food crisis

Grains and Legumes
Nestlé implemented a sustainable agriculture strategy to target specific priorities in Central and West Africa.

Miracles with fertilizer microdosing
Applying small amounts of fertilizer with the seed at planting time to improve yield.

Millions Fed: Combating Cassava Mosaic Disease
Cassava has long been a staple crop in Africa, used for both food and income by most poor farmers. Learn how farmers and scientists have worked together to bring it back from the brink of destruction.

Farming in the sand and going solar
Day four: When the desert swallows your farm how do you grow? And how can a light bulb change a family's life? Mary Griffin reports from West Africa.

Sunflower pressing
This video shows Fred Mweetwa explain on how to grow sunflowers and the conditions necessary to do so.

Drip Irrigation Improves Africa Food Production
Farmers across West Africa are improving food production with a low-cost, low-tech method of irrigation that uses gravity to deliver water right where plants need it.

Mobile phone vital for Cameroon farmers
African agriculture is said to have undergone many metamorphoses but the penetration of the mobile phone in that sector is certainly the most revolutionary step ever.

Money From Honey
Polish agriculturalist and beekeeper Stanislaw Gebala came to Africa seven years ago to teach beekeeping to rural farmers.

Interview with Louise Clark about video sharing between farmers in Nigeria
Louise Clark shares an fascinating example how farmers in Africa share videos about agriculture practices such as rice cultivation to gain higher income.

Self Help Africa - an introduction
A short video which shows how Self Help Africa is changing lives in rural Africa.

Cleaning Beans
Masotho woman cleaning beans by pouring them into the wind


South African Farmer on Biotech Corn
A South African small-holder grower, her life was changed when she adopted farming innovations never used before in her community.

Mozambique: Fighting climate change
19 year old Elisa attends an agricultural school in Mumemo, Mozambique; where young people are taught about sustainable agriculture and how to care for the environment

Ox-plough demonstration in Barlonyo, Northern Uganda
Example of bottom-up development project by Action Aid Uganda. Ox-ploughs and oxen are distributed to small-holder farmers, therefore increasing the speed and efficiency with which they can plough the land. The end result is an increase in food production

Maize Innovation in Rwanda: Increasing farmers' livelihoods
Maize innovation Platform celebrates its first birthday in Rwanda's Eastern province. Maize is an important staple crop in Rwanda with the potential for export if production can be significantly increased.

The World Bank - Climate Change - Niger
The desert has been creeping into West Africa's Sahel for the last 30 years. Declining rainfall and overuse has taxed the land and brought drought and famine.

Rapid multiplication of cassava: Part 1 of 2
A training video on rapid multiplication of cassava stem

Rapid multiplication of cassava: Part 2 of 2

A training video on the rapid multiplication of cassava stem

Pump Aid: The Elephant Pump
Pump Aid's Elephant Pump was developed and tested in Zimbabwe by Pump Aid and is based on a 2000 year old Chinese rope-and-washer design. It is cheap, simple and durable. It can be easily constructed from materials available locally and can be maintained by local communities. This clip shows footage of a pump being built and describes the process by which the pump is constructed.