FARM-TRACE
Agroforestry Management Mobile Application
Executive Summary
Taking Root Enracine is a groundbreaking not-for-profit organization that uses the power of data and technology to improve reforestation while fighting climate change and poverty. Their latest product, Farm-Trace, is a mobile application for iOS and Android that collects and processes field data for farmers planting trees to reduce CO2 emissions.
Farm-Trace users are able to track and monitor various types of data offline, utilizing GPS and caching to allow them to maintain records of their management units. Farmers and administrators are able to conduct sales, take loans, make repayments, and trace perimeters of farm land.
A CMS system is also utilized to manage all content and ensure seamless use. The administrator is able to edit records, update fields, send notifications, and generate reports. Key features include map views, location-based results, profile editing, push notifications, alerts and reminders, and payments.
Challenge
Farm-Trace is a leading Carbon Cycling and reforestation company. With a significant amount of opportunities locating in Central America, Farm-Trace faces the obstacle of digitally enabling an area that is less in touch with modern technology.
Small farmers face barriers that prevent them from economically benefiting from growing trees on their farms. They cannot access capital at an affordable rate, they lack technical know-how, and suffer from dis-economies of scale. It is challenging for them to make ends meet, growing trees serves little purpose for them, and finding solutions are difficult.
In order to successfully develop their program and forward their business, FarmTrace must connect rural farmers with the technology to track CO2 emissions, farm sizes, and more in a simple manner.
Solution
The team at App-Scoop worked closely with Taking Root’s leadership team to identify the personas of their key users prior to design. By incorporating our research and learnings of best practices for regions with low technology use, we created a very simple yet intuitive interface to enable ease of use.
The new Farm-Trace mobile application helps farmers increase their yields, reduce costs, and connect farmers to premium markets by credibly bundling the social and environmental impacts of Taking Root’s work to their reforestation efforts. It allows farmers to log records and transactions, trace perimeters, and upload images in a streamlined manner.
Features
The Farm-Trace mobile application allows its users to maintain records of their farms in a simplistic manner. We developed the application in a form-based manner, requiring users to simply input key values or selecting variables from lists to maintain information. Farmers also simply turn on location tracking when walking around a farm perimeter in order to submit specific areas of farmland requiring tracing.
Each form has editable fields of various types, including custom text, drop-downs, radio buttons, and pick-lists. Users input the necessary data, as well as submit images or documents associated with each record. Users simply press on the sync button from the main menu to connect and update the server with any new information. When no internet connection is present, data remains stored on the device, and can be cleared by accessing the settings menu.
A dynamic map feature is also included in the application that displays the users current GPS location, along with any associated farms as visualized as an overlay. These farm perimeters are created by users by enabling GPS tracking and walking around the perimeter of a given plot. These perimeters are saved as polygons and are the key to driving the success of the platform as a whole. Users easily create these records and upload them with ease with minimal technical expertise, successfully addressing the challenges faced.
TEch Stack
Android App
Programming Language – Java
SDK – Android SDK
IDE/Toolset – Android Studio
CI/CD – Jenkins
Backend
Framework/ Technology – Existing