AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT DATA VISUALIZATION
Impact data allow development organizations to convey the work they do--and do more of it.
THE PROBLEM
To justify philanthropic operations and keep providing important, life-enhancing services to populations in need, agricultural development organizations need to be able to demonstrate the overarching effects of their work. Unfortunately, data in this sector are not comprehensively tracked, making it hard to show a complete story of how farming and finance education programs are positively impacting communities and helping them streamline and scale farming operations.
The organization I worked with is an agricultural development nonprofit in Southern Africa whose programs help smallholder farmers improve their agricultural operations. My job was to help them layer their Tanzanian project impact data with regional socio-economic and agricultural indicators. Using Tableau, I created an interactive data mapping visualization that communicates their program impacts across the country. This visualization means potential funders are a click away from a better understanding of this world-changing work.
HIGH LEVEL TIMELINE
Establishing requirements, data sourcing, cleaning and exploration took 4 weeks.
KEY GOAL
Create an interactive and exploratory data dashboard with multiple marketing purposes.
MY ROLE
I independently completed this project and advised the organization on appropriate data structure and storage. I sourced publicly available agricultural and socio-economic indicators, cleaned the data sets, and used Tableau to manipulate and visualize the organizational and public data within the regions of Tanzania.
UNDERSTANDING THE USER
User experience and usability were key when designing this visualization. The client needed it to speak to a wide audience of stakeholders: internal decisionmakers, external funders, high-level international aid executives, and everyday website visitors.
I created a tool that includes both analyzed data and room for exploration based on a particular user's interest.
Using a two-tabbed story format, I created one dashboard with the organization's agricultural operations, a map that plots each across the country, and the measurable impacts of their philanthropic investments where available. For the second dashboard, I built out regional profiles of Tanzania, with socio-economic and crop output & revenue information in a dynamic format. Viewers can drill down on specific crops and regions to find out more about how the organization's investments in these areas have created opportunity and economic mobility.
SOME PRIMARY FEATURES
Versatile.
The dashboard has multiple purpsoses: drillable and customized reports saved as PDFs, high-level presentations in the international aid sector, and general marketing use as a website tool.
Static and dynamic.
Since internet connectivity in Sub-Saharan Africa is not always dependable, the client emphasized that all elements needed to be visible in one view. I prioritized the organizational dashboard and included all key components at a glance.
Sustainable.
Another product I gave the client was a clean data set with recent agricultural and socio-economic figures layered on top of their own. Instead of starting from scratch for future tools, the dashboard will automatically update, saving them time and money.