SmartCoop: Creating a smart sensing chicken coop for use in rural Africa

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Chicken and eggs are a major source of both nutrition and income in rural parts of Eastern and Southern Africa. Local bird breeds are often reared in family homes by women who a) directly consume produce or b) sell produce to urban markets. To date, most poultry farming is performed at small scales (<50 birds) but there is a great opportunity to sell more produce to wealthier middle-class people and help women and their families to earn more money. This 18-month project (SmartCoop) aims to support the scale-up of rural poultry production by combining two innovative technologies: self-building chicken coops (sold throughout Southern Africa by Inkukakaya) and bird sound hardware and analytics (developed by UK SME AgsenZe). Together, this project will yield a new class of chicken coop equipped with decision support tools to enable female growers to reduce mortality rates, increase production and upskill through delivery of both agricultural and basic business/commercially-orientated courses (via partnership with NOSA). We expect outputs of this project to impact individuals (increased protein availability and direct revenue), communities (through formation of a female-led co-operative) and nationally.