Eight teams of young application developers, coming from six Caribbean countries took part in the Regional Finals of the AgriHack Talent competition at the Caribbean Week of Agriculture in Paramaribo, Suriname from 5 – 9 October 2014. During the various sessions at the finals, the participants received advice from experts in agriculture and ICT, and they also had to fine-tune the agriculture applications that they have developed.
The last sprint was to pitch and present their products before an audience comprising of participants attending the Caribbean Week of Agriculture and the Jury. On the evening of 9th October 2014, the winners of the 2014 AgriHack Talent Caribbean was announced during a cocktail organised on the occasion of CTA’s 30th Anniversary.
And the winners are:
First Prize
Team name : Node420 (Jamaica)
Product name: Node420
Product description: Node420 can provide real-time weather analysis for more accurate weather forecasts; this app includes a hardware that is an additional point of information for farmers who are interested in maximizing the productivity of their farm. Yield estimate forecasts are made based on algorithms that take several data sources into account
Prize: 5,000 Euros + six months of incubation
Node420 is supported by the ICT Hub called SlashRoots, which wins 3000 Euros to facilitate incubation for Node420.
This prize was awarded by: The Minister of Agriculture, Guyana
Second Prize
Team name: Crop Guard (Barbados)
Product name: Crop Guard;
Product description: CropGuard is an agriculture app that seeks to enhance food security by helping farmers to protect their crops through pest diagnosis, monitoring and control
Prize: 4,000 euros + six months of incubation
Crop Guard is supported by the National Council for Science and Technology of Barbados, which wins 3,000 Euros to support the incubation of their team for at least six months
Third Prize
Team name: UNICODE (Suriname)
Product name: Agri-Kari
Product description: Agri-Kari is a mobile application that will help farmers to manage their land and sell their products
Prize: UNICODE wins 3,000 euros + six months of incubation
UNICODE is supported by the ICT Hub Telesur Multimedia Innovation Laboratory (TMIL). TMIL which wins 3,000 to support the incubation of UNICODE for at least 6 monthsIn addition to the regional prizes, all the national winners (8 teams present at the finals) have also won 800 Euros, as national prize.
Congratulations to all winners and participants!
The AgriHack Talent Caribbean is organised by CTA and various partners to suport youth ICT innovations and entrepreneurship in agriculture. This activity is supported by the Agriculture, Rural Development and Youth in the Information Society (ARDYIS) project of CTA.
More on the AgriHack Talent Programme: http://hackathon.ict4ag.org/
Written by Nawsheen Hosenally
