Innovate your Market: Digital Solutions for Food Markets

03/10/2024

FC4: Digital Divide & Digital Transformation

The COVID-19 pandemic represented an economic hit that endangered the sources of income for 300,000 entrepreneurs in the food markets and their families, but also enforced different social dynamics in a public space that used to be all about daily or weekly interactions and relationships between sellers and clients. The intent of  Innova Tu Mercado (Innovate your Market) is to accelerate the digital transformation of women entrepreneurs in the food markets in Peru, through an initial pilot in two markets: the Gran Mariscal Ramón Castilla and the Real Plaza Apromec - Ate Vitarte markets. 

If we women entrepreneurs receive specialized training then we can identify with them digital solutions to strengthen their economic recovery of food markets.

Actions to Test the Hypothesis: Workshops: Designed a methodology based on design thinking for six weeks to 28 women leaders of the markets  Collaboration: Worked with 25 undergraduate students from the Universidad del Pacífico. Collaborative solutions reached:  They presented user-centric solutions, in this case for first-time customers, regular customers, and other market entrepreneurs. These solutions were complementary among each other (just like the pain points that generated them) and built on previous advances made by the Peruvian Ministry of Production to close the digital gap found in food markets. “Geo-Mercado” (Geo-market) and “Encuentra a tu casera” (Find your seller): Two tools to improve traffic in the market and locating entrepreneurs based on preference o product category (adaptable to different markets).   “Tu Casera Favorita” (Your favorite seller): Site with seller information and current offers and sales. Tukasero.com: UX improvements for this existing website (designed and implemented by the Ministry of Production).

The original hypothesis—if we women entrepreneurs receive specialized training then we can identify with them digital solutions to strengthen their maket access and economic recovery of food markets—was proven. 

Most Important Learning Outcomes: As the six weeks went by, we discovered that our biggest challenge was not in the number of hours per week we had with the Warriors nor in virtual meetings; it resided in clearly defining who was the user for each digital solutions and fully understanding the user before jumping into potential solutions that might sound great in paper but don’t really address their pain points.  It’s not easy to be patient with a process that doesn’t seem to move as quick as we would like, but at the same time we didn’t expect how empathetic Warriors and students would be with each other when it came to learning about their difficulties during the pandemic.  The importance of acknowledgement and recognition: The Innova Warriors have been leaders of their respective markets way before Innovate your Market started. However, recognizing them as Innova Ambassadors, or focal points for digital transformation and the future of food markets, has been fundamental to ensure consistent involvement in the learning path and give a renewed push to the development of digital solutions.

Main obstacles were the digital learning path at the beginning and the requiered of data the Warriors needed to access the workshops.