Leveraging Artificial Intelligence-Powered Virtual Assistant for Information Retrieval in Indigenous Agriculture: Insights from Nigeria

This study examines the use of an AI-powered Virtual Assistant (VA) to aid information retrieval in the cultivation of indigenous vegetables in Nigeria. A two-phase approach involved a needs assessment with 240 youth and the deployment of a bilingual web-based VA using a Large Language Model. The results show a strong youth interest in the tool, despite infrastructure and financial challenges. The VA achieved a high Precision@3 score (0.87), indicating its potential to improve agricultural decision-making in low-resource areas. The use of the VA can improve access to timely and context-specific agricultural knowledge, thereby supporting climate change adaptation and contributing to global food security.