Project AGRID

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Project AGRID

Establishment of an Online Agricultural Knowledge Grid to Support Improved Food, Income and Livelihood Security for Farmers in India Concept Note for Consideration by the NAIP under Component -I: ICDS

Contents 1 Introduction 2 Background and Context 3 Statement of Purpose and Principle 4 Goals 5 Objectives 6 Methodology 7 Outputs 8 Outcome 9 What the AGrid is NOT 10 Links to National Programs

[edit] Introduction

Agriculture is becoming knowledge-intensive. Knowledge can often substitute for land and water and other natural resources. Farmers (the term in this document includes large, medium and small farmers, pastoralists, tribal farmers and landless laborers) need to have access to specific, relevant and timely information on production, trade and credit. There is

• a need for a novel information support service that is based on customizing generic information to suit a specific farm or a local income generating activity;
• the need for vocational education in a flexible, open/distance learning mode (ODL) that is emerging strongly;
• a need to render off-site, off-campus learning support on a continuing basis for students in agricultural his/her education to enhance opportunities for fulfilling employment;
• an unmet demand for capacity strengthening of extension personnel at various levels to provide more effective services to the emerging knowledge demands in farming;
• need for capacity strengthening services for teaching faculty that will allow them to build, manage and sustain the grid of content to support the learning and information needs of a diverse range of stakeholders.

[edit] Background and Context

There are significant new opportunities and interest in promoting vocational education and life long learning for farmers in India. There is increasing interest in strengthening the agricultural extension services at all levels, to enhance the linkages between extension, universities and research institutes, and to facilitate effective dialogue between farmers and researchers. A key consideration is to augment and strengthen the capacity of the extension workers to absorb and re-use new knowledge that is continually made available.

A number of State Agricultural Universities (SAUs) and the Extension Division of ICAR have launched substantial new programs in outreach. Online or technology-mediated information sharing, instruction and learner support has emerged as a trend in some SAUs such as the Maharashtra Animal and Fisheries Sciences University (MAFSU), and the Tamil Nadu University of Veterinary and Animal Sciences (TANUVAS), while open and distance learning (ODL) programs have been active in the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University (TNAU) since 2005. The Kerala Agricultural University (KAU) has established the Virtual University for Agriculture and Trade as an innovative outreach project. The Yashwantrao Chavan Maharashtra Open University (YCMOU) has maintained for a long period a school of agriculture with instruction delivered in the mode that is standard for Open Universities (OUs). Internationally, a quick survey reveals that a host of reputed universities in the USA, Canada, the UK and Australia have set up highly effective online or distance learning programs in agriculture at every level: certificates of study, diploma/license, and from Bachelors’ degrees to Doctoral programs.

Among the institutes of higher learning in technology, there is much interest in promoting technology-mediated information management programs for farmers. The KISSAN-Kerala portal of the Indian Institute of Information Technology and Management, Kerala (IIITM-K), carried out in partnership with the KAU and the State Directorate of Agriculture (with good links to the mass media), is an outstanding example. The Digital Ecosystem for Agriculture and Livelihoods (DEAL), a project of Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kanpur, has developed a novel approach to building agricultural portals (web sites that can deliver a wide range of services). The IIT-Bombay has developed an advanced platform for questions and answers (Q & A) between farmers and experts that will also accumulate the knowledge for re-use in future. The Media Lab Asia under the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology (CIT) is active in promoting innovative projects involving information as well as instrumentation in support of improved productivity and livelihoods. The International Institute of Information Technology (IIIT) Hyderabad has developed the e-Sagu project while the private sector Agriwatch has been active in using the web to reach out to farmers. The Mission 2007 alliance and the Ministry of CIT’s Common Services Centers (CSC) program aim at setting up 1,00,000 rural centers where local families can access networked information services. Thus, it is clear that a number of actors, resources and contextual developments that favor the setting up of online content resources already exist.

In two roundtable consultations organized in February and June 2006 (at ICRISAT, supported by the Commonwealth of Learning -COL), a group of Vice-Chancellors, Deans/Directors of SAUs and senior faculty from the IITs and institutes of higher education in Information Technology (IT) agreed that there was a need to form a grid of e-content in agriculture and allied sectors. The grid should be designed such that it serves the content needs of a wide range of stakeholders and should provide learning support to a variety of learners. This is called AGRID. The core technological aspects of the proposed grid, which is a grid of information and learning portals from various organizations have been described by Srivathsan et al. (2004) and these form the initial specifications

[edit] Statement of Purpose and Principle

The mission of the AGrid Consortium is to contribute to improvements in the livelihood, income and food security of farmers through provision of new generation knowledge, learning and information services, and to offer enhanced capacity strengthening and continuing education services to course developers, extension personnel, university students and rural learners.

The AGRID will be implemented by a consortium of partners who will willingly join and sustain it. The principle will be one of cooperative content creation, validation and re-use subject to normal considerations and respect for the intellectual property of the participant institutions.

[edit] Goals

• Formation and sustenance of a consortium of SAUs, IT resource institutions, ICAR institutes and Divisions and other relevant agencies to participate in the development of a multi-institutional grid of e-content for improved farming and livelihoods.
• Promoting technology-mediated open and distance learning in agriculture to make vocational education accessible to large numbers of rural youth and women.
• Developing capacity strengthening and continuing education programs for teachers, extension personnel and agri-entrepreneurs.
• Building a life-long learning program for farmers for enhanced livelihood security and economic well being, with a special focus on rural women as learners, using the power and advantage of partnerships with the self-help groups (SHG’s).
• Carry impact assessment studies at all appropriate levels and locations and build a system to internalize stakeholders’ feedback.

[edit] Objectives

• Set up a content grid covering 10 participant SAUs and ICAR institutions. The action will begin locally at the participating institutions.
• Strengthen support infrastructure such as web studio and Learning Management Systems (LMS) and Learning Content Management Systems (LCMS) in all the participant institutions.
• Develop and validate 2000 hours of vocational ODL material, 500 hours of Continuing Education (CE) and equivalent of 1000 hours of extension material.
• Enable access to the grid from all the college campuses, field research stations, ODL contact centers and Krishi Vignan Kendras (KVKs) using standard Internet connectivity.
• Increase the enrollment in three years in ODL or extension engagement programs and initiate action with a focus on bringing in more women learners.
• Organize specially designed faculty capacity strengthening programs in delivering tech-mediated learning at various levels, and generate 500 hours equivalent online learning material.
• Develop a protocol to allow well-considered outsourcing of administrative and tech management work to capable Government/Private agencies
• Develop 10 IT-mediated rural information outreach centers per participating institution in partnership with the CSC and Mission 2007 Alliance and test innovative learning and knowledge sharing processes with the stakeholders through them.

[edit] Methodology

• The consortium partners with an appreciation of clearly defined roles and responsibilities will carry out this project. All infrastructure improvements will be based on the incrementality rather than outright creation.
• The SAUs have multiple roles: content creation, validation, instruction and information delivery, and assessment of impact.
• The IT resource institutions provide design, testing, deployment and capacity strengthening/training services for faculty and senior extension personnel. They also take the lead in developing standards and specifications for content sharing and exchange.
• The grid practice will be based on the concept developed by IIITM-K and will be further developed through practice.
• The computer Local Area Network (LAN) in every campus headquarters will be augmented and institutional portals will be designed in a grid-ready form. Key content-related technologies (LMS included) developed by IIT-Kanpur, IITM-K and IIT-Bombay will be included in the grid development process.
• All Internet connectivity will be sourced from the public domain (such as ERNET and similar agencies) because of lack of access to dedicated high-speed networks.
• Practice of digital repositories of information and learning objects will be followed and global standards such as International Metadata Standards (IMS) will be adopted for ease of search and sharing across the participating institutions.
• The repositories will have tools to enable rapid customization of key information at any level, and to deliver such information in print medium or similar others to the learners and users. This will be the key aspect of delivering information to the rural learners and stakeholders in a context specific and relevant manner.
• Strengthening of faculty capacity in production and validation of shareable e-content through online and real-time sessions with relevant experts will be a significant activity.
• Capacity strengthening of ODL personnel in needs assessment, instructional design and monitoring learners’ progress with support from domain experts in ODL will be another key activity.
• Facilitating the rapid production of learning materials for use by mass media using the grid-linked repositories as the source will be attempted.
• Enhancing the capacity of extension personnel to address the challenges of diversification/improvement of rural livelihoods by use of online learning and information objects in real-time and online sessions will be a core activity.

[edit] Outputs

Very detailed reports jointly as well as individually produced by various partners will be made available in the public domain.

• Improved infrastructure comprising strengthened LAN, web studios and delivery systems at the SAUs and connectivity in contact centers and KVKs
• New diploma, license and certificate programs covering thousands of new rural and other learners.
• Highly integrated access to learning and extension material covering different languages.
• New continuing education programs for teachers, agri-entrepreneurs, and extension personnel

[edit] Outcome

• The knowledge grid will be a key contribution to further strengthening agriculture extension services.
• Significant improvement in local/rural capacity in information management leads to higher levels of productivity, income, improved access to the markets and better utilization of public and citizen services at the local level.
• Large-scale reduction in the cost of production of development oriented education and information material because of cooperative content creation.
• Unprecedented new opportunities for graduates in agriculture to provide knowledge-based services to a wide range of clients.
• Rapid customization and localization of generic content will be a key support in disaster preparedness also because a large number of women learners would have been facilitated.
• A reasonably sized cadre of leaders in information management at various levels starting from the rural extending to the University.
• New synergies built between IT resource organizations, the SAUs, extension agencies, media organizations and different national programs.
• New aspects of knowledge management involving Public-Private Partnership would emerge and will be valuable in other sectors in rural development.

[edit] What the AGrid is NOT

• The AGrid is a collaboration platform for content creation, validation and delivery to a variety of learners. It is NOT involved with granting degrees/certificates.
• The learning and information material available via the AGrid will be governed by the intellectual property considerations of the contributing institution. AGrid does not provide material for commercial use by third parties.
• The AGrid is not a substitute for institutional web sites/portals. It facilitates their effective integration.

[edit] Links to National Programs

• Complements the ICDS portal building program of ICDS segment of Component –I under the NAIP of ICAR
• Tools developed on this project can be readily adopted for use in information and knowledge management activities under Components 2 and 3 of NAIP.
• Derive strength from the NAIP-supported network infrastructure strengthening project
• Links to ongoing projects of Education and Extension Divisions of ICAR (the library project is an example).
• The ISRO project for setting up 7000 Village Resource Centers
• Ministry of CIT, GoI, program to set up 1,00,000 common service centers in rural areas.
• Practices such as DEAL and AGROPEDIA of IIT-Kanpur, aAQUA of IIT-Bombay, InDev Gateway of CDAC.
• The ongoing activities supported by the Min. of CIT on digitization of books and documents under the Million Books project.
• Efforts of the National Knowledge Commission to enhance the quality of education using technology mediation.
• The NPTEL project anchored in the IIT system provides an example; this project has created 5000 hours of learning material in digital video format.