Name: NAMUNJI JOSHUA MUNDIA PROGRAM: BSC SYSTEMS ENGINEERING SIN: 1201319253 PROGRAM: BSC SYSTEMS ENGINEERING

Zambia Agriculture Commodities Marketing Information System

Introduction Zambia Agriculture Commodities Marketing Information System is a digital market place whose main aim is to: Link buyers to sellers of Agriculture Commodities: Used as a system for stakeholders in the agriculture Trade to collect information about agriculture commodities.

Problem Statement In Zambia there is no electronic system formalized system dedicated to agriculture markets. As a result of the above: Exploitation of farmers by ‘brief case’ business people There is no system to link buyers and sellers of agriculture Commodities Farms face post harvest losses due to lack of agriculture information Lack of predictable market makes it difficult to invest in agriculture trade Lack of transparent price discovery mechanisms

Aim: To create an information system that is going to assist establish connection between buyers and traders of Agricultural Commodities despite the geographic location and to provide timely and accurate information about the price, supply and demand of each commodity to help them make better decisions and the system should be useful to all players in Agriculture Commodities Markets

Objectives: Design an algorithm that will match buyers and sellers of Agriculture Commodities Create a system that will bridge the gap between the mobile technology used by the vast majority with the web interface by using simple screen design paradigm using HTML. Create a module that will establish communication between buyers and sellers Have an interface to collect data and information for different stakeholders in agriculture Trade especially government, Companies and NGOs

Literature Review “ICT TO ENHANCE WAREHOUSE receipts and Commodity Exchanges in AFRICA” by Sophie Walker (Walker, 2010) is part of a series of paper that looks at how ICTs can used to improve agriculture markets. “The Devil is in the details: Understanding a Commodity Exchange” Eleni Gabre-Madhin (2006) highlights the function of a commodity exchange which help in the transformation of some of the functions into an electronic function that can be used in an electronic commodity exchange system. “Impact of Information Technology in Agriculture Commodity Auctions in India” (Banker, R., Mira, S., 2005) is a research paper that compares the use of ICTs in coffee markets as compared to the traditional physical markets. “Intelligent Electronic Trading for commodity Exchanges” (Lee, H., and Lee, R., 1993) provide an overview of the requirements to develop an algorithm that can intelligently match buyers and sellers.

Literature Review-Cont’d Daria Gage in the paper entitled “Revitalizing Zambia’s Agriculture Marketing Information Centers”, presented some problems related to collection and dissemination of Agriculture Commodity information, solutions to the problems and the benefits of the solutions to the problems outlined (Gage, 2011). The paper “Strengthening Agriculture Marketing with ICT” identifies and impediment to the use of agriculture information being the language that the message is sent (Neil, 2011). Clasen further suggest factors that make it possible for an Agriculture Commodity Marketing Information System to be successful and what factors can lead to the failure of Agriculture Commodities Marketing Information Systems (Michael Clasen and Rolf A. E. Muller (Clasen Michael, 2006))

Methodology The evolutionary model of development was used in developing the system. This method is also known as successive version model or incremental model. The reason for choosing the evolutionary model is because of the unstructured nature of the problem domain as many of the attempts to create similar systems have failed and the requirements are highly human interaction dependent.

Methodology Cont’d

System Analysis Methods of Requirements Engineering Document Review Observation

Success Criteria User Requirements Non Functional Requirements The systems should provide information about the price and place where a particular Commodity is based Users should be able to search for a commodity they need to buy or sell A form to post Commodities to buy or to sell. An information board where the price for commodities from a particular area are displayed on a demand basis. Non Functional Requirements Reliability Dependability Fault detection

Success Criteria Cont’d System Requirements The requirements outline below are the minimal required to run the system. Server Requirements Apache Server 1 terabyte Hard disk Drive 8 Gigabytes Memory Network connection with high bandwidth. User Requirements Personal Computer with Keyboard, pointing devices and Display System Internet Connection

Success Criteria Cont’d The Architecture

System Design Database Design

Search

Implementation

Implementation Kindly allow me to carry out a brief live demonstration of the system at hand. www.kabwesec.net/zacms

Conclusion and Recommendation for Further Work The system will reap maximum benefits if it is fully utilized. Further Work is required by adding and automated auction algorithm.