Farmers can be much more effective if they have up-to-date information, on prices, practices, and weather. With mobile phones and mobile Internet, they can get this information when, where, and how they need it. The promise of the Internet for agriculture has been a popular idea, and in Georgia, too, policymakers and donors have begun to explore the options. Some pilot projects seek to program specific platforms for farmers, in order to inform and engage them.

The Forum took place on 29 November 2016 in the framework of the EU-funded European Neighbourhood Programme for Agriculture and Rural Development (ENPARD) in order to discuss some the key challenges Georgia’s agricultural cooperatives face with regard to access to finance. Please see the conference programme and presentations (listed below).

On 29 November 2016, in the framework of the EU-funded European Neighbourhood Programme for Agriculture and Rural Development (ENPARD), an Interagency Forum on “Access to Finance for Cooperatives” took place at the Hotels & Preference Hualing Tbilisi. The purpose of the forum was to discuss challenges and opportunities that cooperatives face with regard to access to finance.

Under the Soviet system, farmers worked under strong central control; everyone knew what to do. Important economic decisions were not left to the market or decided by self-interested individuals. Instead, the government, which owned or controlled much of the economy’s resources, decided what, when, and how to produce. Along with providing necessary inputs, the state ensured that farmers had access to markets for their goods.

On November 8-9, the ENPARD team at ISET-PI participated in the 'Interagency Conference about Three Years of Implementation of ENPARD – Cooperative Development Component'. The conference was organized by one of the ENPARD implementer consortiums led by People in Need, a non-governmental organization, at Akaki Tsereteli State University in Kutaisi.