African Pharmaceutical Regulatory Affairs | 02 April 2010
Longitudinal Adoption Analysis of Mobile Money Apps Among Smallholder Farmers in Eastern DR Congo
K, a, m, a, s, h, i, M, a, b, i, a, l, a, ,, M, a, n, d, i, m, a, T, s, h, i, l, o, m, b, o
Abstract
The adoption of mobile money apps among smallholder farmers in Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has been limited despite their potential to improve agricultural productivity and rural livelihoods. A systematic search strategy was employed across multiple databases including PubMed, Web of Science, and Google Scholar. Studies published from to were included based on predefined inclusion criteria. Mobile money app adoption among smallholder farmers increased by 34% over the decade, with significant variations in uptake between rural and urban areas, influenced primarily by technological access and farmer education levels. Despite initial low adoption rates, mobile money apps have shown potential for facilitating agricultural transactions and improving financial inclusion in DRC’s farming communities. Further research should focus on developing tailored training programmes to enhance digital literacy among farmers and addressing infrastructure constraints to support wider adoption. Model estimation used $\hat{\theta}=argmin<em>{\theta}\sum</em>i\ell(y<em>i,f</em>\theta(x<em>i))+\lambda\lVert\theta\rVert</em>2^2$, with performance evaluated using out-of-sample error.