---
id: ch6-kythera
type: spine
title: "DASK: one digital gateway for Kythera's farmers"
readingTime: 2
standalone: true
core: true
teaser: "An island e-market, agritourism bookings and a Greek-speaking farming chatbot named after Eleonora's falcon, all behind one front door."
voice: universal
parent: null
diagram: fig-kythera-voice
recallQ: "What does the DASK project combine on Kythera, and how does it tackle the digital-skills gap?"
recallA: "DASK combines a bilingual e-market for local products, an agritourism booking engine, a training centre and a knowledge base with a localised JackDaw chatbot that uses retrieval-augmented generation and Greek voice input. It tackles the skills gap through co-design workshops, hands-on training such as product photography in Chora, and a peer network of local 'Digital Champions'."
highlights:
  - "Develop-call project led by DASKALOS APPS with the Kytherian Foundation for Culture & Development and an environmental consultant"
  - "One bilingual gateway: e-market, agritourism bookings, training centre and knowledge base"
  - "The JackDaw chatbot is localised as 'Ο Μαυροπετρίτης των Κυθήρων' (Eleonora's Falcon), with RAG and Greek voice input"
  - "Skills come through people: co-design workshops, photography training and local Digital Champions"
status: accepted
concept: dask-kythera
conceptTitle: "DASK on Kythera"
parents: short-food-supply-chains
lang: en
lens: greece
depth: standard
formalism: none
visuality: balanced
lengthBand: standard
genre: story
state: core
carriers: prose|diagram
---

**DASK (Digital Agricultural Skills and Knowledge)** worked on Kythera and Antikythera in the Greek pilot ([Greece pilot](#c/greece-pilot)). It was funded under the Develop open call. The lead was **DASKALOS APPS**, working with the **Kytherian Foundation for Culture & Development** and a self-employed environmental consultant. Its goal in D6.3 is to close digital-skill gaps and connect traditional farming with modern agritech.

## The problem in the pilot's words

The Greek pilot's focus includes AKIS digital skills: the advisory and knowledge system that should carry new practice to farmers. The pilot's policy brief, written for Central Greece, names the gap: **"large segments of AKIS lack digital literacy"**, and household broadband coverage is **only 67%**.

## One gateway instead of four tools

DASK followed what D6.3 calls the **"digital terroir" philosophy**: a single digital gateway that puts the island's products, experiences and know-how together (see the next block). During a nine-month, three-phase work plan the team built a **bilingual (Greek/English) web platform** with four parts:

- an **E-Market** for direct sales of local products;
- an **Agritourism Experience** booking engine;
- a **Training Centre**;
- a **Knowledge Base**.

On top sits a localised [JackDaw](#c/jackdaw) chatbot named **"Ο Μαυροπετρίτης των Κυθήρων" (Eleonora's Falcon)**. It uses **retrieval-augmented generation (RAG)** and **AWS Transcribe voice input**, so farmers can ask questions in spoken Greek and get advice grounded in the knowledge base. The team described the retrieval-grounded architecture in a preprint on arXiv.

## Skills through people, not only software

The platform alone would not close a skills gap, so DASK worked with local producers, AKIS actors and the **olive-oil and honey cooperatives** through co-design workshops and a remote evaluation session. In Chora it ran a hands-on workshop on **product photography and online listings** for island products such as thyme honey, wine, craft beer and pasteli (Atlas of best practices, prp-104). It also set up a local **"Digital Champions"** peer network that gives farmers one-to-one onboarding.

The D6.3 excerpt used for this book covers DASK's objectives and activities; its quantitative results are in D6.3 and the project's final report. The design choice is the transferable part: a voice-capable chatbot in the local language, backed by local peers, lowers the entry barrier that the Commission brief (D7.3, Annex 10) calls uneven data literacy.

**Sources:**
- D6.3 Comprehensive Report on Funded Activities and Impact Assessment, §3.2 Project results and achievements (Develop call: DASK). [PDF](https://www.poliruralplus.eu/docs/437/D6.3_Comprehensive_report.pdf)
- D7.3 Policy Brief No. 1, Annex 3 "Advancing Smart Agri-Food and Agritourism in Central Greece", Key policy challenges. [PDF](https://www.poliruralplus.eu/docs/349/D7.3_Policy_Brief_No.1.pdf)
- Atlas of best practices, prp-104 "DASK Workshop in Kythera: Turning Local Products into Online Listings". [atlasbestpractices.com](https://atlasbestpractices.com)