Impact of integrating digitalization and financialisation in agriculture among smallholder farmers in Nyanza, Kenya

The advent of digitalization in Kenya, promoted by the government, has led to significant advancement in Kenya's agricultural sector through the introduction of various digital technologies targeted at helping smallholder farmers. Among these innovations are the agricultural digital platforms built around network effect and consolidating various solutions into a single interface. These platforms utilize simple mobile phone technology that is easily accessible for smallholder farmers and are designed with a promise to make smallholder agriculture productive. The prevailing narrative suggests that smallholder farmers are poor and to alleviate them from poverty, it is essential to provide agricultural financial support for purchasing agricultural inputs necessary to improve their production. However, while these digital platforms have the potential to enhance productivity by providing financial assistance, they may also create dependencies and undermine the autonomy of smallholder farmers due to conditions often attached. For instance, the credit loans provided to the smallholder farmers being linked to the agricultural inputs at designated agro dealer shops limiting farmers choices. Moreover, they also have the potential of creating inequalities regarding who owns and benefits from the data generated by these digital platforms. It is therefore important not to idealize these digital platforms as purely positive developments without acknowledging the potential drawbacks. This paper explores the impact of integrating digitalization in agriculture and financialization amongst smallholder farmers using two case studies of One Acre Fund and Apollo agricultural digital platforms in Nyanza County, Kenya. By employing a political economy perspective grounded in critical agrarian studies, it examines how data is collected and utilized in these digital platforms while considering who stands to gain from it amidst various stakeholders involved, with a particular focus on smallholder farmers as the primary target in the ecosystem.