IIASA researchers win GEO Appathon

Growers’ Nation received the first place award in the GEO appathon out of 250 other entries. Each app was awarded points for categories such as app design, visual impact, ease of use, dataset use, potential societal benefit, focus on developing countries, and other criteria. 

“We are very happy and proud to have won the Appathon. We hope this prize will bring many people to use the Growers’ Nation app to grow their own healthy food,” says IIASA researcher Tobias Sturn, the lead app developer on the project. 

“It is a great honor for us to have been awarded this very prestigious prize. We think that the app has big potential for use by smallholder farmers, with the addition of more regional and local datasets as well as soil moisture sensors,” says Steffen Fritz, leader of a major ERC project which helped to fund the app. 

Read more: GEO Appathon announcement

About Grower’s Nation
The Growers’ Nation app was developed by researchers at IIASA in collaboration with Growers’ Nation, the University of Maryland and the United Kingdom Met Office.  It uses data on temperature, precipitation, elevation, slope, and other factors, available from the GEOSS portal, to help gardeners and small-scale farmers to figure out what to plant and when. It also allows users to share information and data with each other and with scientists. One goal of the app is to help reduce food insecurity in developing countries, by providing information to farmers to help boost crop yields and production, for example by encouraging farmers to plant diverse crops.  

Since the app was launched in September, over 300 people have used it. 

Read more: Growers Nation brings citizen science to the farm

About the GEO Appathon
The Group on Earth Observations (GEO) Appathon is a global app development competition which aims to develop new, exciting, and (most importantly) useful apps using Earth Observation data. The first ever GEO Appathon ran from 7th May 2014 until 26th September 2014 and was open to non-commercial individuals and teams from any background; although, the event itself is aimed at Earth Observation students, scientists and developers. All Apps will be judged and the top 3 winners will receive cash prizes with a top prize of $5,000, and GEO endorsement of the app. 

Read more: GEO Appathon Web site

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Last edited: 18 November 2014