With increasing weather variability affecting agriculture, real-time agricultural information is vital, from farmers to retailers, crop advisors to extension services, microfinance and insurance providers to downstream markets. The aggregation of localized information supports farmer's daily decision-making on inventory control, crop monitoring and opportunity analysis; this in turn benefits input providers and buyers.

aWhere, an American provider of agricultural intelligence data for farmers, commercial growers and policymakers, has joined the Business Call to Action with a plan to expand access to its daily weather and agronomic information service to millions of smallholder farmers (50 percent of them women) across Southeast Asia and sub-Saharan Africa by 2020. By 2016 aWhere will begin delivering aggregated agronomic weather data and intelligence to key players along the agricultural value chain, providing key insights for risk mitigation and investment strategies, as well as daily operating decisions.

By producing a high volume of valuable data for a wide range of customers, aWhere is able to provide weather and agronomic data to smallholder farmers for US$1 or less through its last-mile partners. This cost is recovered either through payments by the smallholder farmers themselves or by others along the value chain. Affordability is a critical component of aWhere's business model.