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Agriculture

Innovating with Autodesk: myAgro Partnership Adds Expertise

myAgro is proud to partner with a wide range of organizations and companies from around the world whose support makes it possible to deliver life-changing service to tens-of-thousands of smallholder farmers every year. Earlier this spring, myAgro welcomed eight staff members of partner organization, Autodesk, to our headquarters in Thiès, Senegal. The “Autodeskers” were taking part in a pro-bono immersion consulting project—Autodesk staff lend their expertise to non-profit organizations like myAgro to build specific capacities that drive impact.

During two weeks, myAgro’s team worked with Autodesk to refine our mechanized Precision Planter program, which equips farmers with a mechanized planting tool that micro-doses seeds and fertilizer. The result is that farmers plant their farms 17 days faster with the Planter than without, reducing the cost of labor during planting season by 40%—a single Precision Planter generates $3,500 in impact during the course of five years of use.

With the help of Autodesk, myAgro sought to make our Precision Planter even more effective. Using human-centered principals and Autodesk software, our teams were able to improve the technical design of the planter as well as myAgro’s marketing and sales strategies that help us communicate the benefits of utilizing the Planter to expand the reach of its impacts to more farmers.

Enjoy the video below to see this unique collaboration in action!