American scientists create all-purpose vehicle for Nigerian farmers

 A team of science students from Purdue University in the US including a Nigerian, Olubunmi Babajide, has created and deployed a three-wheel multipurpose utility vehicle that can help farmers in remote areas to transport up to a 2,000 pound load in off-road conditions. The vehicle, known as Ag Rover, was specially designed for Nigerian farmers and is also capable of plowing fields for cultivation.
 
Ag Rover
The students developed the project to assist farmers who would otherwise find it difficult to gain access to the kind of sophisticated farming tools available to farmers in more developed regions of the world. The project later developed into a startup called Mobile Agriculture Power Solutions (MAPS). Also, large, expensive tractors would require service at some point in time, and in remote areas like the ones that are the focus of MAPS, people qualified to do so simply don’t exist.

The primary feature of the Ag Rover, however, is its ability to be manufactured by people on-site in Nigeria with locally sourced parts, eliminating the issues of repair and fabrication that have stifled other, similar efforts with proprietary machines.

To do this, the project has developed a micro-factory or small facility where technicians can create the Ag Rover with parts that are readily available in the local area. Currently, MAPS is only focused on farmers in Nigeria, where the first fully-functional Ag Rover saw deployment just last month.

However, the team will need more help to accomplish its goals. Currently, they’re looking for anyone with applicable technical skills or a desire to learn to join the team. For David Wilson, involvement with the project began while he was a student at Purdue in 2010, long before it went by the name of MAPS.

Wilson said, “I came in as a novice, but because of the flexibility, I began to work more and more on the designs until I became a pretty integral member of the team.” He later went on to co-found MAPS and lead the project to the point it’s at today.


Any students interested in making their own contributions to the project can contact the Purdue Utility Project, or PUP, at www.engineering.purdue.edu/PUP.

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