4.0. Summary of Presentations

The presentations from the various sessions in summary format are included in the following order:

Presentations by official representatives of China and FAO/UN
Expert presentations in order of countries represented
Invited resource papers in order of countries represented
FAO secretariat papers

4.1. Presentations by Official Representatives of China and FAO/UN

A. Zhang Baowen, Vice Minister for Agriculture, People’s Republic of China

Zhang Baowen welcomed the gathering on behalf of the Ministry of Agriculture. He traced the history of distance learning since 1840, and the importance of distance learning in improving the scientific, technological and cultural levels of human kind. The advantage of distance learning to improve agricultural production by delivering education and training to agricultural populations located in remote areas was emphasised. The unique advantages of distance education are that it is not subject to the limitations of space and time, it has vast coverage and distance transmission, it can accommodate a great number of learners and it can meet the educational needs of large rural populations.

Zhang Baowen’s address noted that women are an important driving force for economic development and social progress. However, due to many historical and social factors, women’s right to education has not been properly respected, and the potential of women is far from being fully tapped in many developing countries. The situation of rural women is even more serious as they remain disadvantaged and less educated compared to men. This is an unfair social phenomenon, which does not disappear with advances in information technology.

It was stated that the utilisation and development of distance education would effectively address the problem of education and training aimed at rural women. Distance education can serve to fulfil the education and training needs of rural women, who have low education, and training by providing them with information on science and technology. Distance learning programmes can also be used effectively to provide information to improve their living conditions and quality of life and to strengthen their consciousness for self-development.

The Chinese Government’s national policy is to promote the equality of men and women for social development. The government attaches significant attention to the utilisation of various educational resources; especially distance learning resources, to carry out its educational and training programmes for women. The law of education of the People’s Republic of China, clearly stipulates that people’s government above the county level should develop satellite television education and other modern education means, and the related administrative departments should give priority and support to these efforts.

The central government supports the China Agricultural Broadcasting and Television School (CABTS), founded in 1980, by providing channels and broadcasting through China Central Television Station, Central People’s Radio Station and China Education Television Station to transmit agricultural programmes nation-wide. The government also has made provision of funds for the production of various educational programmes. The governments at various levels also support science and technology education and training programmes in agriculture directed to rural women. These various efforts have improved the capability of rural women and improved their living conditions.

The State Council promulgated the “Development Outline of Women and Children in China from 2001 to 2010” with clear requirements for education and training aimed at rural women. At the National Working Conference on Women and Children, Premier Zhu Rongji of the State Council clearly emphasised the importance of women’s education, both large scale and lifetime. He reaffirmed the commitment to CABTS’s efforts to improve rural women’s access to education and information.

B. Zhu Xiaozheng, Representative of All China Women’s Federation

The All China Women’s Federation (ACWF) representative stated that distance learning is an important channel for people to acquire knowledge and receive training. The statement emphasised the important significance of developing distance learning for the improvement of the scientific, technological and educational level of rural women. It would be a means to assist rural women to shake off poverty and seek all round self-development. Women in China make up over 70 per cent of the total illiterate population, and rural women make up a large share of this illiterate population. Though much improvement has been made in the status of rural women’s education, there remains a need to meet the social development requirements of women. As a method of educating rural women, who form a large portion of the labour force, it is important to use distance learning to improve their science and technology education. The All China Women’s Federation consistently has regarded the improved quality of women’s active participation in socialist modernisation construction as its own responsibility. Some local federations have combined the distance education of rural women with their mainstream activities effectively. The emphasis should be to mobilise the enthusiasm for learning of all women federation workers at various levels and of rural women.

C. FAO Official Presentations

Gammal Mohmed Ahmed, FAO Representative China

Gammal Mohmed Ahmed, FAO Representative for China, delivered the opening message on his own behalf and that of R.B. Singh, Assistant Director-General and Regional Representative (ADG RR), FAO Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific. The FAO Representative welcomed the participants and praised the FAO and CABTS for organising the meeting; he particularly noted the timeliness and significance of the expert consultation. He highlighted the disadvantaged status of the rural women, though their contribution to food production is extensive. He quoted a World Bank report that if women received the same amount of education as men, farm yields would rise by between 7 to 22 per cent. He reiterated the FAO commitment to gender equity and equality, and emphasised the importance of the FAO gender plan of action for 2002 to 2007 as a key to achieve the goals.

G.M. Ahmed read the special message from R.B. Singh, ADG RR, and FAO Regional Office. The ADG RR’s message indicated that rural hunger and poverty were the major barriers to improved development gains and living level prospects of people in the region. In the context of new technologies and globalisation, information and new skills are required to improve assets and income access among rural poor to reduce hunger and to improve their ability to increase availability and access to food. He highlighted the disparities in educational achievement among girls and boys and the lag among rural women in education. This would be a waste of human capital that the region cannot afford. The gender disparity in learning opportunities presents a concern to FAO that depends on rural human resources to achieve sustainable food security and elimination of hunger.

The ADG RR’s statement indicated that distance learning could be an effective educational approach to reach the learners in remote regions and rural areas. Various distance learning and agricultural universities have demonstrated their effectiveness to develop human capital in general and in the agriculture sector in particular. Given the current lag in human capital development in the rural areas, however, the scope for distance learning to serve the rural communities is vast. The message emphasised the critical importance of converging the resources and their respective expertise in the two systems to develop programmes that serve the rural learners, particularly women and girls. He also recognised that the traditional way of working independently as unique and discrete systems of education can pose constraints to collaboration. ADG RR’s statement ended in a hopeful note that the gathering of representatives from Open University systems and agricultural university systems in FAO’s organized consultation has demonstrated that there is scope for communication, cooperation and collaboration for common cause. The message called on the consultation to create a policy framework to improve collaborations among agricultural universities to increase access to learning among rural women and girls, and particularly to relevant informal education. The message charged the participants to foster pragmatic regional efforts to strengthen the FAO initiative to improve learning for rural women to achieve the dual goals of sustainable food security and women’s empowerment.

4.2. Country Expert Presentations

The summaries of expert presentations are included in the UN country order as follows: Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, India, Mongolia, Pakistan, Philippines, Sri Lanka and Thailand.

A. Bangladesh

Harun ur Rashid
Community Development Library

The underlying vision of distance learning programmes is to touch the lives and change the attitude and behaviour of both people and society. These changes will develop a constituency that is informed, knowledgeable, and self-aware and is capable of taking effective actions for sustainable social and economic development. The objective of distance learning is to provide sustained access to key information and knowledge to society in a meaningful way.

In Bangladesh the government, Bangladesh Open University and some NGOs are working for rural women in the field of education and to some extent distance learning. Among the NGOs, BRAC, Dhaka Ashen Mission, Friends in Village Development in Bangladesh and Community Development Library (CDL) are notable. CDL has been providing knowledge and information on issues that are pertinent to rural community life, particularly to rural women, through its 26 Rural Information Resource Centres.

The challenges of providing distance learning for rural women in Bangladesh are policies, continuation of programmes after donor withdrawal, political commitment, resource mobilisation, culture and customs towards women in education, infrastructure, and appropriate course content/software.

The following strategies could be adopted to meet these challenges and make distance learning successful: networking at home and abroad, development of forums, advocacy, social mobilisation, community ownership, capacity development, developing youth leadership particularly adolescent girls as next generation leaders, and establishing multimedia resource centres.

The multimedia resource centres can work as unique means for collecting and disseminating information and knowledge to and from rural communities. This exchange can bridge the existing knowledge gap between urban and rural societies.

Regional cooperation on the development of effective strategies for empowering rural women through distance learning can minimise the duplication of efforts and maximise the benefits to a large extent.

B. Bhutan

Choki Lhamo Dorji
Ministry of Agriculture
Royal Government of Bhutan

While Bhutan possesses a very rich cultural heritage, its social attitude with respect to gender and sex reflects current western liberalism more than oriental conservatism. The tradition of equality between the sexes in the country has resulted in the evolution of a very open society.

Of the 600,000 inhabitants, 49 per cent are women and 62 per cent of the women work in agriculture and they own 70 per cent of the land. Men and women contribute to agricultural economy together. While some tasks are allocated by gender, both men and women may perform other tasks and take over each other’s work. The head of the household is not a gender-specific domain; rather it is the more capable person and very often the wife or the eldest daughter, who assumes this responsibility. Unlike most of the other developing countries, Bhutanese society is mainly matriarchal, and traditionally women enjoy considerable freedom. Under the law, women are treated as equal to men. Given the required education, qualification and training, women have equal career opportunities as men. However, despite the apparent equality, they are still subject to many constraints that undermine their full potential and ability to participate equally in development, constraints such as lack of access to proper education and markets, and most of all to information that hinders their optimal usage of available resources. Therefore, this is where the Government comes in with various interventions. The Royal Government of Bhutan has or is taking various initiatives through basic distance education (DE) programmes such as non-formal education or vocational training that is mainly focused on women, awareness creation of various ICTs, making information available through journals, newsletters, and radio programmes, and setting up of women organisations such as that of HIMAWANTI-Bhutan, a grassroots women’s organisation.

New developments in information and communication technologies have been recently introduced to Bhutan. The Royal Government of Bhutan has realised information technology as a very powerful medium of communication and is therefore taking initiatives in facilitating it at the national level. But for now, the extension workers, in the absence of proper IT facilities, play a very vital role in disseminating information, conducting training and creating awareness at the grassroots level. Therefore, the extension workers are, in the absence of proper ICT facilities, still very much the “agents of change” as far as Bhutan is concerned.

C. China

Guo Zhiqi
Vice President
China Agricultural Broadcasting and Television School (CABTS)

In light of the fact that rural women in China are a large population with a rather low level of education, CABTS must pay more attention to the education and training of this disadvantaged group and conduct formal education and non-formal education through distance education in rural areas. Through government programmes such as “Green Certificate Training Programme” and “Training Programme for Youth Farmer in New Century”, CABTS has effectively conducted vocational education and technical training oriented to rural women. As a result, the cultural and educational level of rural women and the status of women in society and the family have been continuously improved while women’s participation in state and social affairs administration also has been continuously strengthened. Most rural women actively dedicate themselves to reform and to modernisation. Rural women have contributed greatly to the development of agricultural production and the rural economy. With joint efforts with other organisations, the agricultural broadcast and television has effectively conducted career education and vocational training aimed at rural woman.

CABTS needs to encourage rural women to take part in vocational and career education so as to upgrade their cultural and educational level. CABTS also must implement continued education after vocational education and promote the progress of lifetime education among women. It also must implement “Green Certificate” education and improve the professional skills of rural women. It also needs to organise technical training activities for young women and to train high quality rural women labours.

It is a strategic measure to educate and train rural women through distance education, to tap rural human resources and to improve the scientific, technological, cultural and educational quality of rural women. In order to achieve this goal, to transform this disadvantaged group to an advantaged group, efforts from all sectors of society are needed. The government needs to exercise forceful regulatory roles to formulate policies and to provide necessary materials and funds to support the endeavour. It is to continue to make good use of the agricultural broadcast and television school and to rely on its solid organisational training network in order to conduct flexible and effective training and education to rural women. The international community should provide support to the education and training of rural women in China.

D. China

Tong Yu’e
Expert on women’s education
Department of Sci-Tech and Education of MOA

In China a basic agricultural education system has been developed. The rural educational system is the following: At the national and provincial levels, there are 64 agricultural universities. At the prefecture level, there are 365 agricultural technical secondary schools. At the county level there are more than 3,000 agricultural professional middle schools and broadcasting and television agricultural schools, and there are also 440,000 different kinds of training centres. This system provides a good chance for farmers to gain all kinds of education. Since 1979, 400 million farmers have been trained through different channels and 1.4 million farmers acquired qualification from agricultural technical secondary schools. Yet the educational level of the farmer is still low. At present, the semi-illiterate and illiterate farmers account for 92 per cent of illiterates in the whole country. In the labour force, the farmers with junior college degree are only 0.105 per cent; the farmers who went to school less than 5 years account for 61 per cent. For the young generation in the farmer family, only 46 per cent of junior school students can enter the high school, and only 7 per cent of high school students can enter higher education level. Most of the graduates from junior and high school stay in the rural area to engage in agricultural production.

In China there are several ways for farmers to get vocational education. Education for a degree or certification can be from agricultural technical secondary schools, agricultural broadcasting and television schools, agricultural schools, and Green Certificate projects. Training in special technology without certification includes training courses conducted through different national programmes, local training courses in the crop production season, and training courses on demonstration sites. Information transfer by multimedia includes broadcasting and television, telecom such as consultation through telephone, computer network, tape recorder, video tape recorder and VCD and farm fairs.

In China, the Department of Sci-tech and Education in the Ministry of Agriculture is in charge of the farmers’ vocational education. In order to improve the farmers’ vocational education, the Ministry of Agriculture launched three national farmer vocational educational projects. They are Green Qualification Engineering project, Young Farmer Training project and Electric Wave Enter Farmer Houses project.

Rural men and women have different labour division in the farm family. In general men deal with outside things and women deal with inside things within the family. Women have a triple role in rural society. In order to improve the knowledge, skills and know-how of farmers, the Ministry of Agriculture gives special attention to farmer professional education. In order to ensure that farmers gain professional education, a law is being drafted that stipulates that the government will take measures to help rural women acquire professional education. National projects (Green Qualification Engineering, Youth Farmer Training Project and the Electric Wave Entering the Farmer Family Project), also take rural women as a target group.

In theory, attention is paid to rural women’s education, but in fact, the results are not satisfactory. In the agricultural production area (crop production and animal production), women account for 60 per cent of the labour force, but they account for only 30 per cent of participants in all kinds of training courses (except those specifically designed for women only). So there is a big gap between the demands of women to acquire training and the supply of the training available to women. The existing institutions cannot meet the needs of rural women.

The facts show that women play important roles in agricultural production, they are responsible for crop production and animal production. They also make a lot of decisions by themselves. So, special attention should be given to women. Improving their skills and quality of management will benefit the whole family and the whole society. In theory and policy, women should be given greater priority. In practical terms special measures should be taken to help women access information and technology. Because of the triple roles of women, they lack time to participate in the training courses, or it is impossible for them to move far away from home o join the training courses outside. So when we conduct the training courses, we should think about women’s characteristics, to invite more women to join the training course and also make the contents suitable to women.

E. China

Zhou Linhua
Jiangsu
Provincial Agricultural Broadcasting and Television School

Jiangsu Province is located in China’s southeastern coastal area. In Jiangsu Province, people engaged in agriculture have an average education of 6.1 years, with rural women receiving still less education because of some traditional factors. There are 0.5 million illiterates among the agricultural labour, 70 per cent of whom are women. In China, agriculture is a weak sector, and farmers are an underprivileged group, the dominant majority of which are women. Governmental organisations at various levels and social institutions of different kinds all give due emphasis to the education and training of rural women, taking it as an important task to help them learn and achieve. In this area, Jiangsu Agricultural Broadcasting and Television School been helping the government and contributing in the following aspects: help the government with the training and education of the rural women; direct rural women to participate in market circulation on the basis of special cooperative economical organisations; organize rural women to participate in various professional contests to improve their economic competence; direct rural women toward non-agricultural productions to spur the improvement of rural economy and expand the space for rural women’ s development.

There is still gap between what has been achieved and the requirement of agricultural modernisation. Support and cooperation from different sectors of the society are needed the do this project well. First, rural women need help to renew their ideas. They need to learn new science and technology to improve their economic competence so that they will be able to keep up with the development of rural economy and the overall development of the society. Second, more training bases are needed to strengthen the training of rural women. Advanced training should receive due attention; leading rural women should be helped to learn about modern agriculture and market economy. Third, such training should take on a local orientation and try to expand on the basis of general participation by the rural women. Finally, rural women should be encouraged in the urbanisation of the rural area. In some places, such as southern Jiangsu Province, rural women could be organised into teams to protect trees, to offer cleaning services and to offer voluntary family help so as to improve the well-being of each family, each village, each town, and each community.

F. China

Lu Xuelan
Sichuan Provincial Agricultural Broadcasting and Television School

Rural women in China are about 80 per cent of the national female population. Their political and economic positions and level of development, to some degree, reflect Chinese women’s social status and the level of liberation. Along with the incessant development of rural economic reform, rural women’s economic contributions are increasingly obvious. Today, they have been at the fore of agricultural production, and the level of their science and technology qualities directly relates to the level of their agricultural development. Women become the main object in the peasant educational system; women’s science and technology training are the focus of peasant education. The Agricultural Broadcasting and Television School, as a main body of agricultural long-distance education, has used its unique school-running advantages to become the most appropriate educational mode in Chinese rural areas and the main force to educate rural women. It has trained a large number of rural practical female talents, leaders of getting rich through science and technology and of family planning since it was established. However, at present some problems in rural women’s training limits the development of women’s training work. For example, females are still ignored in peasant science and technology training, and the proportion of their training is obviously lower than that of men. Training funds are badly lacking. Agricultural long-distance education that undertakes the heavy burden of women’s training still has many limitations in its development.

G. India

Sarvdeo Prasad Gupta
Director of Communication Centre
G.B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology

India has a vast potential to contribute to the uplift of rural women and girls through its established institutions. These institutions include 31 state agricultural universities (SAUs) and state open universities, distance education directorates of conventional universities and one national Open University. The national Open University also has responsibility for design, development and production of instructional material as well as for establishing standards of education and examination and the outreach of agricultural education. Such educational efforts can be strengthened through faculties in agriculture, home science, veterinary science, agricultural engineering, horticulture and allied areas, and through 194 radio stations, about 900 TV transmitters and a large volume of printed materials from each state agricultural university. These immense potential resources could be used to reach about 90 per cent of the rural population through distance learning along with new ICTs like audio and video teleconference and Internet communication. These efforts can be strengthened by the 30 years’ dissemination of information from Pant Nagar, the first agricultural university, and 10 to 20 years’ experience by other SAUs. Through the network of Krishi Vigyan Kendas, open universities and Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), rural women and girls can benefit by providing non-formal education on agriculture, animal husbandry and horticulture along with information on women’s empowerment, their participation in community level programmes, decision-making, social development programmes and family resource management. The rural girls and school drop outs can benefit through the Rural School in Air and the TV school in Air by providing three to four months’ specialised knowledge and by organising degree and diploma oriented programmes in cooperation with open universities and the National Open University.

H. Mongolia

Oyunchimeg Dugernyamaa
Ministry of Education

Mongolian women traditionally have enjoyed greater status and independence compared to many other Asian sisters. In spite of the lack of infrastructure, under the centrally planned Soviet style system, health care and education were of a high standard. As a result, the literacy rate for men was 98 per cent and for women was 95 per cent.

Distance education is the best tool for giving education to rural women who did not manage to attain high level of education. Non-formal education and distance education (DE) are very new ideas for Mongolians. These ways of learning were recently initiated through the Gobi Women’s Project (1996) by UNESCO, and funded largely by DANIDA. The main aim of this project is to provide information and learning opportunities to one of the most vulnerable groups in Mongolia and to assist them in enhancing their income. The project has had great success in promoting DE through the use of radio, self-study materials and tutor support. The project and its outcomes played an important role in enhancing the capability of rural women as well as scientific and cultural quality, thus promoting the development of agriculture and the rural economy through income generation.

Aimed at providing basic learning for the rural population, UNESCO’s “learning for life” project has been an active programme since 1997. With the combination of print, radio, local learning groups and visiting teachers, concentrated on family-based education for the rural and nomadic population. The focus was on enhancing knowledge and skills, broadening the attitudes towards life, and improving the quality of life and levels of incomes for the learners. Much of the collaboration was taken up with other organisations both at the central and local levels.

Distance Education is one of the vehicles for developing non-formal education (NFED) for its potential in reaching remote learners via learning materials. DE is capable of reaching large numbers of remote learners and in providing a structure to support isolated learners wherever they are, thus increasing access and equity in education provision. However, the potentiality of DE is sometimes underestimated and not realised for such reasons as unrealistic expectations of cost savings (leading to initial under funding by decision makers) and neglect of learner supports (seen as an optional addition rather than integral component).

Distance Education has considerable potential in further realising the diverse learning needs of the Mongolian people, though the operational difficulties due to weak communication infrastructure are high and the choice of options limited.

I. Pakistan

Mussaret Anwar
Director, Institute of Mass Education
Allama Iqbal Open University

Rural women lag behind in all aspects of their lives as compared to either their counterparts in urban areas or to men in Pakistan. Rural women are deprived of education and economic opportunity because of cultural conservatism and patriarchal attitudes of society. There is a dire need to educate the rural population in general but rural women in particular in order to improve the quality of life of the families and the nation as a whole.

Allama Iqbal Open University (AIOU), the only distance education institution in the country, has performed a tremendous task of educating the rural population, especially rural women. It has offered courses from literacy to the postgraduate level and teacher education to cater to the needs of different segments of the population. The AIOU has implemented innovative programmes in the field of non-formal education for the educational and economic uplift of rural women. This programme has earned international recognition through a UNESCO award of NOMA and Raja Roy Singh. AIOU also to its credit has the status of being the first Open University in Asia.

The government of Pakistan also has been trying to implement projects and programmes for the social and economic uplift of rural women since the independence of the country in 1947. The Ministry of Education, provincial education departments, agricultural institutions and universities are involved in education and agriculture extension work in the country.

Non-government organisations (NGOs) and many social work organisations also are involved actively in making the rural population skilled and literate. However, there is still need of a close collaboration among all stakeholders, public, private, NGOs and community. A close collaboration at the regional level to benefit from each other’s experience can help educate women and can foster personal, social and economic empowerment of rural women.

J. Philippines

Felix Librero
Chancellor
Open University of the Philippines

The paper synthesises the experiences in the Philippines in the conduct of school on the air (SOA) or radio for rural women. These “schools” initially were experiments done by the rural educational radio broadcasting station of the University of the Philippines Las Banos from 1960s to 1970s. The SOA format was adopted by the Department of Agriculture from the 1970s to the present at the national level.

Lessons learnt from these SOAs indicate very strongly that distance education through radio is a viable alternative means of providing educational services to rural listeners when there are supported by supplementary materials in other media formats, when there are constant follow-up activities in the field, when the broadcast format fits the listening preferences of the listeners and when the learners have a high level of motivation.

Combining the lessons learnt from the Philippines and recent trends in distance learning, the paper proposes that FAO-RAP undertakes to organise and implement a distributed distance learning network (DDLN) which is a consortium composed initially of countries represented in the meeting. An educational or training institution that shall be responsible for the development and implementation of specific non-formal courses or formal degree programmes designed for rural women in the region shall represent each of the countries.

As the courses/programmes shall be offered in the distance mode, they shall be accessible to the women’s sector anywhere in the region. Participants shall, however, remain in their respective countries and actively participate in the tutorials that shall be conducted by the network members and institutions under the auspices of FAO-RAP. Existing FAO courses currently are offered only in face-to-face modality.

K. Sri Lanka

Gamini Kulatunga
Senior Lecturer
Department of Agriculture Engineering
Open University of Sri Lanka

The Open University, as an institution of open and distance learning, must be receptive to different perceptions of meaning, to the multiplicity of learning contexts, to the different ways people learn, and especially to build the capacity in learners how to learn. In developing self-reliance of the rural communities all these attributes of a distance learning institution come into sharp focus. In dealing with adults, the basic concepts of pedagogy have to be replaced with andragogy, the approach fostered by Knowles (Knowles, 1980). In dealing with the rural poor, the ‘banking’ system of education has to give place to Freire’s approach of “praxis” in education (Freire, 1970).

The paper describes the efforts and experience of the Rural Research Unit of the Open University of Sri Lanka in developing a method to reach out to the poor to understand and address their technology needs. The most intractable difficulties encountered are in accepting different interpretations of “reality”, the different behaviour of groups accustomed to “given” knowledge, and especially groups accustomed to receiving benefits from the centre. The professional reluctance to allow ideas to develop without intervention from the centre, the reluctance to allow group discussions to occur spontaneously, and the propensity to repeat what one is familiar with were some of the major obstacles we had to face. How the disciplines that we specialise in makes us “disciplined” to such an extent that we cannot see other approaches and the need for a “cross-discipline” approach that ‘crosses out’ all disciplines are some of the issues we would like to reflect upon.

The experience has sharpened our stance that the centre has to give way to the periphery if any meaningful dialogue and sustainable interaction among the rural communities are to take place. We believe that distance learning could meet this challenge better than most other systems. Our plans and methodologies are described in the light of this experience so that we could learn from others and share their experience at the same time. The case study selected for illustration is the introduction of improved stoves for domestic cooking using biomass. This issue deals with rural women and food in an indirect way, which is the theme of the current session.

L. Thailand

Paisan Pollawan
Bangkok Non-Formal Education Centre 4

It is a reality that rural women in Asia and the Pacific perform hard physical work. The same can be said for Thai women. Thai women have been doing practically all the work by themselves. Rural women in Thailand account for about half of the population of 62 million and most are engaged in agriculture. Distance education has helped Thai women greatly. Distance education in Thailand is offered in two levels. First, non-formal education (NFED) is organised for the primary level, lower and upper secondary levels and also for vocational education and skill training. The other is at the higher education level. Thailand has two open universities, namely Ramkhamhaeng University and Sukhothai Thammathirat Open University, which uses only the distance education mode of learning.

The NFED services cover several target groups in all parts of the country as follows: children, women in the labour force, agriculturalists, hill tribes, local leaders and other special groups. These programmes and activities are basic education (functional education and continuing education) and informational service. NFED is regarded as a vital tool to improve quality of life. However, distance education programmes for illiteracy require a teacher in combination with media. In the basic level the teacher is necessary, then the learner will have the teacher’s 18 assistance. Following the basic level, learners can learn themselves. It is hoped that the distance learning regional strategies in Thailand can help rural women’s learning to manage and support family, village, sub-district, district, province and region.

4.3. Resource Papers

The resource papers are included in UN country order. The invited resource person from the Philippines presented two papers. Since the resource person was the Chairperson of the FAO Consultation held in November 2000, she was invited to also present the summary of the last meeting.

A. India

Multimedia education for agriculture and rural development professionals: rural women

Sneh Wardhwa
Ministry of Agriculture
Government of India

Rural women form the most important productive workforce in the economy of developing nations including India. Despite such significant contribution of women in the production process, women still face many barriers to benefit from development and to contribute fully to it. This inequality has an impact on the lives of most women who are often segregated from the mainstream of empowerment, education, employment and rights.

To promote women’s participation in all aspects of agricultural development, special projects and schemes for women in agriculture are being implemented. Many of these projects implement a multimedia, cross-disciplinary, goal-oriented approach to provide agricultural support services to facilitators, trainers and women farmers. All these projects essentially aim to motivate and mobilise farmwomen to be organised into groups and to access agricultural support services such as technology, extension, inputs, credit and marketing interventions that are being channelled through these groups.

The sustainability of these groups is a major problem and to address that critical concern, a multimedia education programme through distance learning for rural women was launched in January 2001 with “Women Empowerment through Self-help Groups”. The project is a certificate programme to train the trainers, facilitators, supervisors and functionaries of women’s programmes in rural areas. The programme envisages training 230,000 facilitators and 11,600 supervisors.

Women’s Empowerment Through Self-help Groups is a collaborative programme of the Department of Women and Child Welfare, Indira Gandhi Open University and Indian Satellite Research Organisation. The content of the research programme has been designed to enhance women’s ability in decision-making, resource management, income generating options and empowerment. Self-instructional print, audio, and video material with tutorial support through teleconferencing and radio counselling are some of the media interventions being practiced through this programmes. The programme has a blend of satellite and advanced multimedia approaches with grass-root activities.

B. Malaysia

ICT potentials for distance education

Mohd Razha Rashid
School of Distance Education
University Science Malaysia
Penang

Distance education (DE) evolved very closely with advances in ICT. DE started as a strategy to extend vocational and academic education to remote learners by delivering prepared and printed learning materials by correspondence. DE, since the IT revolution in the last two decades, has integrated a variety of ICT options in delivery of teaching-learning material. Concurrent with ICT evolution, DE has evolved from the first generation course material delivery via mail (correspondence) to second generation delivery mode of multimedia (print, video and audio tape, and computer-based learning material), to the third generation of tele-learning and finally to a fourth generation type generally referred to as flexible learning with interactive multimedia internet access and computer mediated communication.

The integration of advance ICT in distance education that can cater to large numbers of learners with all the pedagogical, interactive and instructional design requisites incorporated has become the measure of effectiveness and efficacy of DE. As an example, the Centre for Distance Education in the Universiti Sains Malaysia (CDE USM) is a testimony to the evolution of ICT integration into distance education. The Centre is now ranked the largest in the country and is accepted as the leading institution of DE higher learning, standing on a par with other conventional universities.

However, ICT does not make DE. In concept and practice, ICT is a pedagogical form that emerged from a social intervention protocol that implements an equalising mechanism under the socio-political notion of democratisation of knowledge through systematic teaching and learning across all socially constructed barriers of class and gender and the geographical divide of rural and urban. ICT therefore is just a facilitator for delivery of knowledge and should not to be regarded as the measure of DE itself. What gives DE value is the knowledge bundle, packaged as courses (in any media), delivered to remote learners (anyone who can read and write) who have a certain degree of mutual connectivity, supervision and assessment. In the end DE gives the participant some form of socio and economic gratification that places the learner a step away from the socially imposed divide.

DE in its intended concept and form can be executed, with or without ICT instruments. CDE USM has implemented DE for thirty years without ICT but has produced thousands of socially and economically gratified learners.

Application of ICT at the Centre for Distance Education, Universiti Sains Malaysia, is by design and not by necessity only because USM, being the parent institution can afford it. Affordability of any institution to embark on ICT innovation for DE entirely depends on government commitment to such an initiative with appropriate fiscal and strategic allocation of resources.

C. Philippines

An overview of the expert consultation on distance learning resources for rural women

Cristina D. Padolina
Philippine Higher Education Commission

The FAO Expert Consultation on Distance Learning Resources for Rural Women was held in Bangkok, Thailand, in December 2000 with the primary concern of expanding access of rural women and girls to technology information and knowledge, and education, in general, in order to improve their social and economic circumstances. The consultation explored the opportunities and constraints in employing distance education and in applying information and communication technologies to improve the educational advancement of rural women and girls.

The consultation identified some characteristics and learning needs of rural women and girls. The potential of using distance education was explored and the following strategies were identified: mapping of distance learning resources; collaboration among agencies in the design, development, and implementation of distance learning programmes; transformation of existing materials and programmes. The establishment of partnerships at the institutional, technical and policy domains was recognised as an important strategy. The consultation also recommends that FAO define a coherent and strategic approach to the use of distance education for rural women and girls.

Several initiatives were recommended: (1) support a forum of experts from open and distance learning systems and agricultural education institutions; (2) develop a regional strategy; (3) support a resource mapping project for the region; (4) explore extra-budgetary sources to support activities; and (5) organise a regional event to address the use of ICT in distance education for rural women and girls.

D. Regional linkages for improving rural women’s access to distance learning

The improvement of rural women’s knowledge base is crucial in realising their full potential as well as in contributing to national development. Distance learning has been recognised as an important means of reaching the marginalised sector of rural women. Considering the increasing access to information and communication technologies in the Asia-Pacific region, distance education has a great potential to reach out to rural women in the region.

Countries in the region have wide and varied experience in distance education. It is important that these experiences and expertise are shared; one way that this can be accomplished is through consortia and networks. In addition, consortia may be means by which institutions can achieve objectives that they cannot attain individually. Participants in consortia or networks may be educational institutions, media, print, publishing, radio, television, telecommunication organisations and interest groups. Possible areas of collaboration are sharing of experiences, expertise and facilities, joint course and programme planning, shared delivery systems, joint marketing of courses, credit transfer and franchising.

Some consortia and networks already existing in the Asia-Pacific region which can be utilized for distance education for rural women are (1) networking initiatives of the Southeast Asian Centre for Graduate Education and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA) such as the University Consortium, in particular, the Distributed Learning Project within the consortium, the Southeast Asian Sustainable Agriculture Knowledge Network and the ASEAN Integrated Pest Management Knowledge Network; (2) Asia-Pacific Advanced Network (APAN) that may be used for high-performance broadband application for research, information sharing and training; (3) Asia-Pacific Women’s Information Network Centre and (4) the 21 universities. Crucial in sustaining consortia or networks are the following: clear objectives for building a consortia, common interest and mutual goals among members, collaborative sharing of resources and expertise and the strong commitment of members.

Some recommendations to further pursue regional linkages to improve access among rural women to education through distance learning are the following: (1) continue resource mapping activities not only in searching Web sites but also to create new ones in a coordinated way; (2) explore the use of existing consortia and networks even as we explore others that traditionally have not been used for distance education of rural women; (3) encourage institutions to develop programmes for rural women and (4) improve skills of rural women in the use of new information and communication technologies.

E. Sri Lanka

International linkages to promote distance learning for rural women

Uma Coomaraswamy
Vice-Chancellor
The Open University of Sri Lanka

Despite concerted efforts taken by all concerned it is becoming increasingly clear that existing formal educational systems and programmes are ill equipped to cope with the massive education needs of the rural poor, most especially women. In order to empower women as equal partners in development, distance and open learning systems present an alternative to the traditional modes of education. In adult education programmes diversity of the learners with regard to their age, literacy levels, formal educational background, physical location, health, ethnicity, culture, language, their socio-economic background as well as varying motivation levels pose challenges to distance education.

The immediate implication is that learning strategies in distance education programmes must match the process of learning and must include a significant element of interactivity enabling partnership in the process of learning. Programmes must take into account the pedagogy of adult learning and gender. Learners must feel motivated to acquire literacy and to participate not only in determining the content of learning but also in shaping their own development. “Bottom up community dialogue” has become increasingly central to the successful integration of open and distance education programmes and to the wider development of civil society. Many approaches or models, which have used distance education media for out of school programmes, aimed at adults and school push-outs are available. Most of them have enjoyed varying levels of attention and use over the last 30 years. Distance education models have a proven record of being able to reach large number of learners.

A range of problems can be identified which affect distance education regardless of the level at which it is being offered. These policy considerations are the lack of access to information and communication technologies, sustainability, high start up cost, polarised attitudes toward technology, lack of infrastructure, lack of technological capability in an organisation, lack of trained human resources, high illiteracy, lack of local content and language barriers.

The Common Wealth of Learning implements, in partnership with national institutions, activities that would enhance indigenous capabilities, knowledge, skills and expertise to design, implement and improve distance-learning activities. In addition to this collaboration with governmental and non-governmental bodies, it has formed corporative arrangements with several international development agencies and organisations. They include the Common Wealth Secretariat, World Bank, Economic Development Institute of the World Bank, FAO, UNESCO, UNICEF, UNIFEM, UNDP, ADB, World Space Foundation, International Literacy Institute (University of Pennsylvania), and Canadian International Development Research Centre. Other International linkages included USAID, UNDP and FAO.

4.4. FAO Secretariat Papers

A. Rural women as clients for distance learning programmes

Revathi Balakrishnan
Regional Rural Sociologist and Women in Development Officer
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific

The primary focus of this consultation is on rural women as clients for distance learning. Hence it is critical to review the status of rural women as clients for regional distance learning programmes in the context of persisting barriers to gender equality, particularly in rural and agricultural communities. The current global dialogue over poverty highlights the idea that people are poor and powerless due to reasons of lack of income as well as information to improve their options to overcome poverty. As the world economy and social interactions become increasingly connected, the poor confront new obstacles as complex external factors of trade and communication impact on their livelihood strategies. Hence, income poverty can also be due to information dispossession. Such dispossession of information is a barrier to access knowledge - an important ingredient of human capital - an asset both for household and national economies. Though women contribute to agriculture production, their returns on labour are not high and thus they face the risk of income poverty. In the region, rural women face the disadvantage of lacking adequate education and access to information. Rural women are also disadvantaged in informed functional capacity, an ability to understand the complex market exchanges and laws and rules that increasingly regulate the economic and social transaction to achieve economic gains and to advance their social status. Many social and economic reasons limit investment both by the family and at the national level in the education of rural girls and women.

From a broader context, the allocation of resources for education and infrastructure is inadequate compared to the magnitude of disparity in educational achievement in rural areas. This disparity in allocation of resources stands true both for traditional as well as distance learning education. FAO studies suggest that distance-learning programmes have limited offerings that focus on rural learning needs, particularly for women. Information and communication technologies have not diffused widely in the rural areas. The advances in agriculture technology also will create a technological knowledge gap among rural women.

Given the large rural population that can be potential clients for distance learning programmes, agricultural education and Open University systems could join forces to serve the rural clients. There is a good scope to foster symbiotic relationship between these two systems to expand and strengthen learning opportunities for rural women clients. The regional strategy on distance learning for rural women should focus on developing delivery modes and content that would improve rural women’s access to learning to advance their social and economic levels. The World Bank presents three policy instruments that show the most promise for promoting gender equality in education. These are, reducing prices and increasing physical asset to services, improving the design of service delivery and investing in time saving infrastructure.

The first two policy instruments, placed in the context of regional distance learning resources, complement the objective to develop distance-learning strategies for rural women clients. In regard to time saving infrastructure, it is possible to take advantage of the existing distance learning and extension outreach infrastructure to serve the rural women clients while over time other advanced technologies may diffuse to rural areas.

B. FAO-CABTS collaboration: Strengthening distance education for agriculture and rural development in China

Malcolm Hazelman
Senior Extension, Education and Communications Officer
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific

The paper provided an overview about an FAO Technical Cooperation Programme (TCP) project, which is under consideration by FAO. The TCP project aims to address needs within the distance education system of the China Agriculture Broadcasting and Television School (CABTS) of the Ministry of Agriculture of the People’s Republic of China. On a national level, the TCP project is seen as a means to address national concerns that are major causes of low agricultural productivity and low income among small-scale producers and workers in rural China. The latter relate to inadequate levels of educational access, quality and equity. The fundamental problem to be addressed through this proposed TCP project is the unacceptably low and uneven levels of development in rural China.

The basic aim of the TCP project is to strengthen CABTS, a very important national training institution in China which provides educational and training opportunities for rural communities throughout China, including women and thereby, to enhance agricultural productivity and reduce rural poverty across China. The most promising avenue for strengthening CABTS is providing technical assistance to facilitate the institution’s adoption of “digital delivery methods” (computer-assisted instruction, computer conferencing, online learning) for distance education.

The three basic outputs the project aims to deliver include:

• a strategic plan for digital delivery of education for agriculture and rural development through the CABTS system;

• staff training programme at five levels: senior management, managers and administrators, instructional designers and production technicians for learning materials, instructional staff, and an online learning network involving key stakeholders from each of the four levels identified above; and

• a range of new teaching materials, in digital formats, to respond to identified needs in the area of agriculture and rural development.

The project will last for a total of 21 months, and require a total of $350,000 in FAO inputs with counterpart funding to be contributed by the Government of China. The TCP proposal is designed to be a catalyst to substantial follow-up action by CABTS with the support of the Government of China with synergies pursued through collaboration with other international agencies. Both FAO and CABTS regard the TCP project, when implemented, as enhancing and improving the capability and capacity of CABTS to improve their educational and training offerings and opportunities targeted at rural small-scale farmers and communities. Via the project, the problems of ensuring access, quality and equity for education and training opportunities would be addressed which should in turn enable improved income and the standards of living of the rural people, including women.