The Minister of Agriculture and Land Reclamation El Sayed el Quseir, and the Minister of Communications and Information Technology Amr Talaat have signed, via videoconference, a cooperation protocol for implementing a joint project to develop the ICT infrastructure at the Ministry of Agriculture and Land Reclamation.
 
The two-year protocol aims to capitalize on ICT applications to develop the electronic services rendered to users in the agriculture sector, with overcoming administrative obstacles, separating between service providers and recipients and monitoring the performance of service-providing departments.
 
The ICT Minister underlined that the protocol is within the framework of the role of the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT) in supporting the State sectors to achieve the digital transformation and adopt and harness advanced technologies to develop government work performance and serve areas of development.
 
The protocol aims to employ ICTs in data management and analysis systems and remote control techniques, to render more advanced services to users in the agriculture sector. This in addition to utilizing Artificial Intelligence (AI) to develop work system and build the capacities of the personnel of the agriculture sector in this area, thus contributing to improving decision making, increasing productivity and conserving resources, added the ICT Minister.
 
Talaat said that the protocol comprises creating an e-portal for the Ministry of Agriculture and Land Reclamation’s content, including information on the automation of the services provided to customers and beneficiaries, and the implementation of the national initiatives targeting raising efficiency in maintaining food security, and confronting climate change, capitalizing on AI.
 
The protocol, in addition, entails working on boosting the rationalization of irrigation water consumption through analyzing various data using AI, resulting in a more accurate periodic update of the information on agricultural lands and their water needs and helping predict the seasonality of water demand, thus making planning more effective. This in addition to creating a mobile application to provide automated services, developing a strategy for agricultural data management, designing and carrying out capacity building programs in AI and data science, using the necessary applications to manage teams electronically, and raising the human calibers’ efficiency in using the electronic services system.
 
For his part, el Quseir stated that the protocol helps achieve the digital transformation and automate the different agricultural services for agriculture-related activities, as well as leveraging MCIT huge expertise.
 
The protocol also supports the plan of the Ministry of Agriculture to build a digital work system that will revolutionize the provision of services to farmers and citizens, and create proper and updated databases. El Quseir highlighted that successful decisions require accurate information, and this is what digital transformation helps provide, rather than relying on manual collection.
 
Moreover, the protocol will help keep the Ministry of Agriculture’s e-portal updated, develop agricultural guidance, and provide all the information that farmers need, as AI applications are key to achieve governance of work at the Ministry of Agriculture. This comes in light of the efforts to move to the New Administrative Capital.
 
According to the protocol, efforts will be made to make optimal use of the agriculture sector’s resources through conducting joint research between the two ministries, with the help of international companies and institutions specialized in knowledge and expertise transfer in this field.
 
The signing ceremony was attended by the Deputy ICT Minister for Administrative Development, Digital Transformation and Automation Khaled El Attar, and the Head of the Central Department for Applications and Government Services at MCIT Alaa Elhays.