Clemson partners with IBM and AgStack to aid global food access.

• Date: 04 February 2022

Farming comes with a host of challenges, but a collaboration between the Clemson University Cooperative Extension Service and some major players in the tech sector seeks to help farmers around the world scale some of those walls with data.

Clemson Vice President for Public Service and Agriculture George Askew came up with an idea for Clemson's Ecosystem for Agriculture Technology Sharing, or EATS. IBM and AgStack Foundation, a Linux Foundation project, is helping turn that seed into the Digital Ag Recommendations Service, or Ag-Rec, a massive database that will house extension service recommendations for issues that farmers routinely face, according to a news release.

The Clemson Extension Service was founded in 1914 and acts as a repository of science-based agricultural recommendations shared through county agents.

Through Ag-Rec, Geotagging will allow the use of local market and climate data so that information is region specific, the news release said. Information contained in Ag-Rec will be freely accessible to app developers for incorporation into related apps.

"Food is an essential requirement for life, for everyone across the globe," Askew said in the release. "U.S. land-grant Institutions have information available through their cooperative extension services that can help people get the food and nutrition they need. This program will help get this information...