Accra: The AI-powered agricultural finance platform goes live following pilot that generated over 8,500 farmer queries in three months
Development Bank Ghana LTD (DBG), Opportunity International (OI), and the Ghana Incentive-Based Risk-Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (GIRSAL) have jointly launched Boa Mi, an AI-powered agricultural finance platform integrated into WhatsApp, at the DBG ICT Sector Financing Roundtable held in Accra. The platform, named after the Akan phrase "boa mi", meaning 'help me', aims to provide smallholder farmers and agricultural extension agents with instant, evidence-based agronomic guidance. It also offers loan officers at financial institutions real-time agricultural portfolio intelligence, all through the convenience of WhatsApp. Currently, Boa Mi operates in English, with local language versions in development, and is available at no additional cost to users.
According to Ghana Web, the platform supports both text and voice interactions, enabling farmers to ask questions and receive guidance in their preferred format. Initially developed under the working name 'Farmer AI', Boa Mi underwent a pilot phase among rice farmers, generating over 8,500 advisory queries within three months and achieving a user satisfaction rate exceeding 75 percent. This pilot phase resulted in the highest adoption rate of any Opportunity International Farmer AI deployment across Africa. Building on this success, the platform is now expanding to cover six additional agricultural commodities and increasing its network of Participating Financial Institutions. The content provided by the platform is Ghana-specific and commodity-specific, validated by GIRSAL's agribusiness specialists to ensure it meets the unique needs of Ghanaian farming conditions.
Randolph Nsor-Ambala, Chief Executive Officer of DBG, emphasized the platform's significance by stating, "Ghana's agricultural sector has been sending one clear message for a very long time; 'help me'. 'Boa Mi' is Ghana's answer." He further added that the platform, built by three institutions familiar with both sides of that message, has been proven in the field by real farmers and is ready to scale.
Agricultural lending in Ghana has historically been constrained by a two-sided information gap, with farmers lacking timely agronomic guidance and Lending Institutions having limited access to real-time crop and portfolio intelligence. Boa Mi addresses both challenges by providing farmers and agricultural extension agents with instant answers to agronomic questions related to pest identification, crop management, weather-related advice, and input recommendations. These services are delivered through WhatsApp in plain language, with voice support available at any time.
For financial institutions, Boa Mi acts as a digital de-risking tool that aids in credit assessment, monitors active agricultural borrowers during the production cycle, and provides early warning of portfolio risk before it leads to loan default.
Timothy Strong, Head of Agriculture Finance at Opportunity International, highlighted the platform's potential impact by noting, "The world needs to grow more than twice as much food by 2050, and smallholder farmers are key to reaching that goal. Ghanaian farmers currently produce only 20%-30% of their potential yields. Boa Mi changes that by putting regionally specific, validated agronomic knowledge directly into their hands."
Samuel Yeboah, Chief Operating Officer of GIRSAL, also commented on the platform's capabilities, stating, "Good agronomic advice is tailored to specific crops, seasons, soils, and locations. At GIRSAL, we help bridge farmers' knowledge gaps by providing validated technical information while also reducing credit risk for financial institutions. Every recommendation on Boa Mi is customized for Ghanaian conditions, taking into account ecological variability."