Session guide: Cooperation in national programmes
Reading note: Cooperation in national programmes
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DATE |
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TIME |
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FORMAT |
Plenary participatory lecture |
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TRAINER |
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OBJECTIVES.
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At the end of this session, participants should be familiar with: 1. The core components of a national information system. |
INSTRUCTIONAL MATERIALS
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Exhibit 1 |
Core components |
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Exhibit 2 |
Policies and plan |
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Exhibit 3 |
National agricultural library and archives |
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Exhibit 4 |
AGRIS and CARIS National Centres |
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Exhibit 5 |
Agricultural journals |
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Exhibit 6 |
Library network |
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Exhibit 7 |
Extension |
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Exhibit 8 |
Training |
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Exhibit 9 |
New communication technologies |
REQUIRED READING
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Reading note: Cooperation in national programmes |
BACKGROUND READING
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None. |
SPECIAL EQUIPMENT AND AIDS
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Overhead projector and chalkboard |
Core components
Policies and plan
National agricultural library and archives
AGRIS and CARIS national centres
Agricultural journals
Library network
Extension
Training
New communication technologies
The crucial issue to be addressed in this session is that information systems should be an essential component of the national agricultural research system (NARS).
Show EXHIBIT 1 and discuss the core components of a national agricultural information system. Discuss the desirability of setting up a National Agricultural Information Committee which can develop strategies for core facilities and network activities (EXHIBIT 2)
Generally, the library of the apex agricultural research body also serves as the archive, since it would have a large collection of publications, national and foreign, and also fairly sound data sets (EXHIBIT 3). It should
· provide a nationwide, prompt and responsive services for supply of photocopies and publications on loan;· develop a national network of agricultural libraries, with rational sharing of responsibilities and resources;
· organize training, advising on methods and techniques; and
· participate in regional and international library networks. NARS should have a strong voice in the governance of the national library.
Show EXHIBIT 4 and discuss AGRIS and CARIS centres in the national context. National AGRIS and CARIS centres need the cooperation of all institutions to ensure that inputs are prepared accurately, promptly and comprehensively. Precision in indexing requires scientific training. Observe that a well trained team of two can process 2 000 to 3 000 records/year. In large countries, input operations could be distributed over the regions, as in Germany.
What, could be the possible outputs of AGRIS and CARIS? EXHIBIT 4 lists these outputs as bibliographies, categorized lists of projects, subject-specific retrospective searches and indexed bibliographies, and sub-sets of the database.
Ask participants about the advantages of agricultural journals. National journals:
· provide endogenous publication vehicles inspired by national priorities;
· avoid problems associated with foreign journals; and
· are hospitable to papers written in the national language (s).
Journals may be multidisciplinary - managed by a NARS institution or university - or may be devoted to one discipline and managed by a scientific society (EXHIBIT 5). Discuss the experience of some of the participants in managing publication of journals. The discussion should bring forward not only the importance of a rigorous review process to ensure publishing only the best, but also the need to promote circulation.
Now discuss library networks (EXHIBIT 6). Even if resources were freely available, it would not be possible for a library to procure everything that is published. Besides resources being limited, it is prudent to buy what is most needed and give access to all other institutions, thus avoiding unnecessary duplication. Each library network should rationalize its holdings by both consolidating collections and recognizing subject specializations, placing active collections where research is most active in the subject. Library networks should maximize the cost-benefit ratio for expenditures on subscriptions.
Show EXHIBIT 7 and discuss extension linkages. Observe that research institutions need links to rural communities. Information flows both ways. Extension workers help farmers with basic knowledge, introduction to innovations, and problem solving. Extension workers help researchers with information and data on practices, signals about farmers, and innovations and problems. Research institutions can produce pamphlets and audiovisuals with subject matter having scientific validity.
Show EXHIBIT 8 and discuss the need for training researchers and information workers at national level so as to encourage greater participation from libraries, information science scholars, regional and international organizations and donors. The training programme should aim at imparting new information, building skills and sensitizing.
For researchers, training should focus on the writing of scientific papers and using libraries and information services. For information workers, training should cover basic issues, new technologies, system utilization (e.g., AGRIS and CARIS) and planning for new national operations. Conferences and seminars also have training aspects. They provide professional stimulation.
Conclude the session by discussing new communication technologies which can be acquired within the available resource constraints (EXHIBIT 9). They facilitate faster communication.
· National agricultural library and archive
· National AGRIS and CARIS centres
· National agricultural statistics programme
· Agroclimatic and land use databases
· Catalogues of germplasm collections
· National agricultural sciences journal
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Need for a national effort and coordination |
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National agricultural information committee |
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Membership |
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Secretariat |
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Objective |
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Collections |
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Services |
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Inputs Indexing Outputs |
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Advantages · Endogenous publication; vehicle inspired by national priorities |
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Type · Multidisciplinary (managed by NARS institute or university) |
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Aim at · Publishing the best (to build up recognized reputation) |
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Review and acceptance process · Rigorous |
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Promote · Circulation |
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Purchasing |
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Sharing |
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Rationalize holdings |
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Key variable |
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Research institutes need links with rural communities Information needs to flow in both directions Need staff with a first degree or diploma in agricultural science Staff with a farm family upbringing understand rural values, knowledge system, vocabulary, religious, social and economic frames Extension workers help farmers with - basic knowledge Extension workers help researchers with - information and data on practices Production of pamphlets and audiovisual material Research institutes help ensure their scientific validity |
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National training programme |
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Programmes for - scientific paper writing · Information workers (e.g., AGRIS, CARIS) - basic training |
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Indirect |
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· A lack of easy communication hampers research |
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· Choose the cheapest and fastest communication mode |
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· Constraints |
Policy making and planning
National agricultural library and archives
National AGRIS and CARIS centres
National agricultural science journal
Cooperation among libraries
Extension services
Training
Technology for communication
We are familiar with the concept of a national agricultural research system (NARS) which seeks to shape research programmes to address the important issues in the agricultural economy and to allocate resources to achieve optimum performance. However, without a parallel national agricultural information system, the process of decision making is almost certainly impaired: where information services are weak, all participants in the process (planners, researchers and producers) will be acting without the benefit of knowledge that could have a bearing on their efforts.
Core components of a national information system include:
· a national agricultural library (with archives)
· national AGRIS and CARIS centres
· a national agricultural statistics programme
· agroclimatic and land use databases
· catalogues of national germplasm collections
· a national agricultural science journal.
To discuss the management of statistical, agroclimatic, land use and germplasm data, we would require consideration of many technical factors, and these cannot be treated here. However, it is important to note that if we do not have confidence in the data available it becomes extremely difficult to plan research effectively, and research itself may be largely deprived of a very important socio-economic dimension.
The director of any one institution may not have the power to remedy deficiencies in the core facilities but, within the councils of NARS, each director can voice the needs and expectations of the institution and its staff. If the agenda does not allow time and scope for discussion of the information function, directors can call for the setting up of a national agricultural information committee, with broad terms of reference and high-level representation from the institutions.
It may be argued that scientific information is already the responsibility of national councils operating across all sectors of the national economy. However, when this is the case, the councils are usually made up of persons who have full-time professional involvement in the organization of information and the management of information services. Such cross-sectorial activity can be very useful in harmonizing practices and ensuring cooperation between one sector and the next, but such a broad-based council cannot really address the specific issues of the agricultural sector. Assigning responsibilities and resources for better agricultural information services needs the consent not merely of the information professionals but - more importantly - also of persons who represent the functions that benefit from these services (planning, research and development, training, extension, quarantine, etc.). The secretariat of a national agricultural information committee can be integrated with the secretariat serving other councils in the agricultural sector while, at the same time, drawing on the technical expertise available in the national agricultural library or the AGRIS and CARIS centres.
The following sections describe some of the operations that might figure in a national information programme: first those provided by the central core facilities, and then the more de-centralized activities that necessarily involve the participation of the country's various institutions.
The role of a national agricultural library is complementary to that of the national AGRIS centre. Although they are treated sequentially in this discussion, there are good reasons for integrating the two operations.
Depending on the organizational structures that have already developed and the relative strengths of different institutions, the national agricultural library might be located in a government department, a major research institute or an agricultural university. It may be largely independent, or under the aegis of an organization that has responsibility for national libraries serving all cultural and economic sectors. What is important is that it should be accorded the mandate and the resources to fulfil a national mission and to provide services to all bona fide users of agricultural information.
The principal responsibilities of a national agricultural library include:
· ensuring that all of the country's agricultural publications are collected, conserved and made available to users;· acquiring, to the extent possible, those foreign publications that relate to the country's agriculture;
· ensuring the safeguarding of national agricultural archives, and receiving on deposit the archives of institutions and other bodies that have gone out of existence;
· ensuring the safeguarding of national agricultural data sets and, where appropriate, receiving and providing access to data sets from institutions that are no longer able to maintain them;
· developing a network of agricultural libraries within the country and promoting a rational sharing of resources and responsibilities, and acting as supplier of last resort within the network; and
· representing the country and participating in regional and international networks of agricultural libraries.
A strong national agricultural library can provide leadership to institution libraries, including organizing training and giving advice on technology and methodology. The resources of the library must be conveniently accessible: if the nation invests in building rich central collections, these can be of immense benefit to the research stations, but only if the central library is inspired by the concept of sharing and is equipped to provide photocopies and loans in prompt response to requests. To ensure that this is so, NARS should have an effective voice in the governance of the national agricultural library.
As explained in Session 2 of this module, AGRIS [International Information System for the Agricultural Sciences and Technology] is a system managed by FAO, with the participation of most of the countries of the world. Each country reports the publications issued on its own territory, and the global database is compiled by merging these contributions. The database and other products of the system are then available to all participating countries. CARIS [Current Agricultural Research Information System] operates on similar principles and employs essentially the same methodologies but, in this case, the data relate to ongoing research projects and the scientists who are engaged in them.
If AGRIS and CARIS centres are to enjoy the respect and cooperation of their partners in other countries, they must report the national data accurately, promptly and comprehensively. It is in the interest of every institution and scientist to help ensure that this is achieved, because accurate records in AGRIS and CARIS earn international recognition for their research. Institutions should see that their publications carry unambiguous titles, author names, publishing details and date of issue. Short abstracts are very useful and, for publications in the national language, it is most helpful to supply English, French or Spanish translations of the title and abstract. Similar considerations apply to CARIS, and institutions should volunteer information when they wind up old projects or start new ones.
AGRIS and CARIS centres must, of course, have competent staff, and FAO organizes specific training programmes for national staff. Some of the data (the essentially bibliographic data) could be entered by persons without scientific training, but a good background in science is needed by the person or persons who will assign the indexing terms to documents and to projects. Precision in indexing is essential for the functioning of a system that adds more than 100 000 new records every year!
The number of staff depends on the number of items to be reported, and this may prove to be larger than is immediately apparent. For example, if the publication is a book of conference proceedings, AGRIS allows a separate record for each paper and, since the papers will be on different subjects, each will have its own set of indexing terms. Again this helps ensure that retrievals from the database will more exactly match the interests of an enquirer. The typical steps are:
· selecting items to be entered;· providing bibliographic descriptions (which may involve translation or transliteration of titles);
· indexing;
· abstracting (abstracting is voluntary); and
· either entering the data on a worksheet for later transfer to computer-readable form, or inputting directly at a terminal.
Whether done by one person or by several persons, the entire process takes about one work-hour in a well managed operation, but longer if abstracts are involved, and even longer if the abstracts need to be translated. Thus a well-trained team of two could produce about 2 000 to 3 000 records per year.
Because training is wasted (i.e., forgotten) if it is used only occasionally, most countries find it convenient to centralize input preparation for AGRIS and CARIS, although a large country has the option to de-centralize. For example, in Germany, which is a major producer of agricultural publications, the AGRIS territorial formula has been extended to the states that make up the Federation. Each state has its own AGRIS unit, and the national centre merges the records from the states for forwarding to FAO. This arrangement has proved effective because it places the AGRIS unit closer to the sources of publications, thus lessening the possibility that items will be missed and permitting easier consultations with publishers when problems arise.
AGRIS and CARIS centres are concerned with outputs as well as inputs. The products most often required are a periodic (typically annual) national agricultural bibliography out of AGRIS, and an occasional listing of projects out of CARIS. The national bibliography provides not only the material published in the country, but also material published elsewhere if it originated in the country or relates to its agriculture.
AGRIS and CARIS centres can also work with FAO to generate subject-specific outputs, either as an informal product for a few clients or as a fully indexed publication, for example, on a crop, disease or pest of vital interest to the national agricultural economy. Since 1990, AGRIS has been available on CD-ROM, thus permitting national centres to produce these outputs locally. A similar process is being developed for CARIS.
FAO has recently developed an elegant enhancement of Micro CDS/ISIS which facilitates input to AGRIS and CARIS, as well as processing outputs from sub-sets of these databases. The programme package can be obtained free of charge to bona fide users, and duplicated for use in local institutions. It thus gives every institution the possibility of managing its own small database which, in part, may consist of records downloaded from the big system, but which is then enriched by records prepared locally: for example, for internal documents or for those which, because of their age, source or character, are not now acceptable to AGRIS. The package is user-friendly and is available with documentation and training. It permits even small institutions to gain experience in the application of computers to information management.
The difficulties that often confront national researchers when they attempt to publish articles in foreign scientific journals were discussed in Session 1 of this module. Partly to avoid these difficulties, but mainly to provide a truly endogenous vehicle for developing-country research, some national institutions have started publishing journals of their own. We should distinguish between two different products:
· a journal published within a developing-country NARS, primarily as a vehicle for papers written by national scientists and with a subject scope that is multidisciplinary; and· a journal published by a professional society, either national or regional. In this case, the scope is defined by the discipline that the society serves.
Journals of the first type are managed by a major institution or faculty within NARS. This sometimes casts a shadow on their perceived standards ('Was that paper accepted because of its scientific quality or because of the author's high rank in the NARS?'). However, if such a journal engages independent referees to evaluate all submissions, it can overcome these doubts and earn international recognition for its standards. Some of the now prestigious journals in industrialized countries started out in just this way.
Unfortunately, there are fewer journals of the second type. Here the presumption of independence can be much stronger. The referees are leading authorities in their disciplines, and the review process can be quite productive while also being rigorous.
Often, one of the motives for launching a new journal is to provide an outlet for papers written in the national language, though many such journals are now bilingual, with English, French or Spanish as the alternative languages. They accept papers in either language and provide abstracts in both. In a small number of cases, the journals are multilingual, reflecting the language situation in a region or a particular cluster of countries.
The first requirement for success in any of these ventures is to have a national consensus to support it. Rival initiatives from different institutions are a sure recipe for disaster. The institution undertaking the effort needs adequate financial resources for the initial start-up period, and it would be wise to appoint a truly representative editorial board and include scientists from all the institutions that have major programmes in the subject field.
Institution directors should encourage their senior scientists to accept invitations to join the editorial board of a national multidisciplinary journal and, where appropriate, to join the editorial boards of journals set up as a result of serious and realistic efforts by national and regional professional societies. Directors should also encourage scientists to offer their articles for publication in national rather than foreign journals. Sometimes an author would prefer a foreign journal for reasons of prestige, but the long-term goal should be to engender respect for the national journal (and thus for the national research programme). This will not be achieved if the best articles are sent elsewhere.
Large scientific libraries are cluttered with single issues of journals that died with the first volume. A new journal must survive for several years before it is accepted as credible and before it receives enough paid subscriptions to cover its costs. In fact, a journal published in a developing country has a measure of comparative advantage if it survives those first few years. There are major libraries in industrialized countries that are obliged to acquire all significant material that relates to their field, and what is a fair price in dollars or deutsche marks can go a long way to pay salaries and production costs in a developing country. However, to tap this market, the journal must earn recognition. Initially, a few free copies should be sent to some of the world's major agricultural libraries (such as those that are members of AGLINET) and to abstracting and indexing services such as those of the Institute for Scientific Information and CAB International. Cooperation with the national AGRIS centre ensures that articles published in the journal are promptly reported to AGRIS. These actions lead to a more general recognition, and that is a passport to a larger market.
Reference has been made several times to the problems of having access to the world's agricultural literature, especially that which is embodied in journals and series. In a recent study carried out by the US National Agricultural Library, CAB International and FAO, respondents identified more than 11 000 journals and series that are devoted to agriculture and closely related fields. These came from 129 different countries, and even the richest libraries would be unable to build a comprehensive collection. Given a reference to an apparently interesting article, what are the chances that the journal can be found in the institution's library or at one of the libraries in the country? The probability can be maximized if the journals have been carefully selected because of their relevance and if, nationally, collective resources are carefully used to acquire as many journals as possible without avoidable duplication. Cuba has set up a centralized programme to achieve these objectives. However, many institutions would see the Cuban model as potentially bureaucratic and would prefer to retain a larger measure of freedom in choosing the journals for their own libraries.
A compromise is needed to preserve an institution's autonomy while ensuring that, nationwide, libraries cooperate and avoid overlap as much as possible. It is this that leads to the concept of a national network of agricultural libraries, in which each has access to the collections of others.
Of course, the network can operate only if each library knows what is available at other libraries. The essential tool for this is what is termed a union list of serials. All the available journals are tabulated, and under each title is noted which volumes are held at which library.
Both nationally and internationally, there is now considerable experience in the compilation of union lists, and the data can be recorded in simple computer systems. The very process of preparing the data requires each library to put its material in order, which anyway is a good housekeeping discipline!. Once the union list is constructed, updating the records becomes routine.
A first scan of a union list will reveal evident opportunities for economy and rationalization. For example, if one library holds early volumes of a journal while another has a current subscription, it is likely that the network would be better served by consolidating the holdings of this journal at one place. Obviously, if two or more libraries are subscribing to the same journal, it would be better to avoid the duplication and use the money saved for another journal that nobody has yet obtained.
A well developed national library can play a leadership role and recommend a measure of specialization by discipline. Thus, for example, if one institution's library accepts the role of developing itself as the national resource in agricultural entomology, collections in this discipline could be concentrated there, and its librarian provided with the tools (relevant abstract journals and sub-sets of AGRIS) for responding to enquiries from other institutions.
Network cooperation depends on easy communication and a photocopier in each participating library. For a truly remote station, easy communication may mean a four-wheel-drive vehicle to carry the mail, and messages may still take a few days in each direction. Clearly scientists will be assured of faster service where the libraries use telex or telephone, and, if the telephone system permits, even electronic mail (E-mail) and telefax.
There may be a danger that a national agricultural library will seek to dominate, take the lion's share of the national budget for journal subscriptions, and make institution libraries dependent for service and photocopies. Centralization of collections is probably an advantage in dealing with the rarer and less frequently used materials, but the other institutions should resist if the central library seeks to monopolize the current material in active use. The quality of an information service depends on the base from which it is provided: to use the example previously offered, the service in agricultural entomology will be more useful if it is provided from an institution that has not only the major library collection but also the country's principal team of scientists active in the discipline.
So the network should be balanced, each member library with its own area of special competence, and each acting as both provider and receiver. Established according to this principle, an agricultural library network is the best guarantee that a country obtains maximum benefit from its expenditure on scientific journals.
Depending on their structure, research institutions may or may not have direct responsibility for extension. Nevertheless, it is clearly in their interest - as well as in the national interest - that rural communities be linked to the research establishment and that the links allow information to flow in both directions. Directors of research institutions have an important role to play in the design and operation of national extension systems.
In most countries, human resources are not a limiting factor. Worldwide, colleges and universities are now producing large numbers of graduates with diplomas or first degrees in agricultural sciences. Many of them come from farming families, so they have personal experience of rural life, speak rural dialects and understand the knowledge and values that determine how farmers act. These human resources need to be mobilized to reach the rural population.
To do so, the extension service should be as close to farmers as possible. A city-based extension service is almost doomed to fail. Extension workers should spend very little time behind desks, and a lot of time on motor-cycles and bicycles as they travel from village to village and farm to farm. This indicates a network of many small offices rather than large concentrations of staff. If possible each office should have a telephone as well as transport to link it to sources of expertise.
In providing assistance and advice to farmers, extension workers may act in a number of areas:
· Basic knowledge In general, farmers already have the knowledge and skills required for the operations in which they are regularly engaged. However, when a farmer changes practices, buys a new machine or plans to grow a crop that is new in the community, the extension officer may be called upon to provide information.· Innovation The extension worker becomes involved as a go-between and interpreter when researchers cooperate with farmers to develop and test innovative technologies, and tries to spread the new technologies that prove to be superior to those in current use.
· Problem solving The extension worker seeks to be the farmer's friend. A mature extension worker may be able to offer solutions to farmer's problems based on previous experience, but, when a new problem arises, the extension worker may need to bring it to the attention of other colleagues, to a research institution, to a farm-credit organization or to any of many other agencies.
In providing assistance to researchers, extension workers may deliver:
· Solicited information For example, a researcher asks the extension worker to describe or collect data on farming practices and their consequences.· Unsolicited information For example, an extension worker encounters unusual situations, such as disease or pest outbreaks, or observes innovative practices initiated by farmers, and brings these to the attention of researchers.
Extension workers need to be supported by services that can produce pamphlets, manuals and field guides. Where resources permit, these can be reinforced by radio programmes and audiovisual material on video-cassettes. The participation of research institutions helps ensure the scientific integrity of all such products.
Each country needs to work out its own organizational structure for the development, operation and scientific support of extension services. However, unless the research institutions are deeply involved, they will be in danger of losing their relevance to the productive sector.
Obviously, it is difficult for an institution acting alone to organize the training required in the development of its information services. More opportunities become available if all agricultural research institutions work together to identify national needs and formulate a joint training programme. For each course within the programme, each institution can nominate participants according to local needs.
Some countries have institutions for librarianship, information science or communications science, and their cooperation can be sought in implementing the proposed programme. On behalf of NARS, requests can also be put to international and regional schools and agricultural organizations, such as IICA, CGIAR and AOAD. Some centres provide training opportunities in information work, as do FAO and several donor agencies. Generally, it is more useful for a country to define its national needs first and then to ask these bodies for their cooperation. Indeed, while the agencies that offer training do set up their own programmes, announce courses and invite registrations, they are better assured of the relevance of their work when the needs are a priori specified by the NARS. Some of the activities that might be included in such training programmes are considered below.
For researchers:
· Training in writing and presentation of scientific papers and reports.
· Training in the use of libraries and information services to meet general and specific requirements.
For agricultural scientists undertaking information work:
· Training in the basic principles and techniques of information science and communications science.
For all information staff:
· Refresher courses in information science and communications science.· Intensive courses in the application of a particular technology, e.g.. Micro CDS/ISIS, CD-ROM databases, etc.
· Training in the use of existing systems, including AGRIS, CARIS, commercial systems, etc.
· Training in the planning and design of national systems and programmes (e.g., a national table-of-contents service; the construction of a national union list of serials; the use of audiovisuals in extension services).
As discussed in earlier sections, professional stimulation is also provided for both researchers and information and extension staff by attendance at appropriate conferences and seminars.
Throughout these sessions, the importance of interpersonal communication as a means to gain access to available knowledge has been stressed. When we seek information, most of us begin by asking someone we trust, and we go looking in a library only if we have been not been able to get what we need from our colleagues. In developed countries, scientists make frequent use of the long-distance telephone, and the benefit of even a short face-to-face meeting is often seen to justify the cost of an airline ticket. However, these mechanisms for communication are now supplemented by new and relatively cheap technologies, such as E-mail and telefax. As the quality and extent of telephone systems are improved, these new technologies will also become appropriate for developing countries.
Typically, NARS may involve several locations in the capital city plus a number of research stations in the provinces. These need to communicate with each other, with the agricultural faculties in the universities and colleges, with various offices of the ministries and with extension services in rural areas. Domestic E-mail offers a new option if the telephone system is reasonably reliable. One needs a terminal and modem at each location, plus a central computer where each message is stored until it is retrieved by the addressee (s). Since messages can be composed before the connection is made, even quite long statements can be transmitted very quickly, and the duration of the telephone connection is typically much less than that needed for a conversation by voice, and the cost is proportionately less.
Internationally, the CGIAR system was quick to set up an E-mail network linking the IARCs, many of their outreach offices and many of the donor agencies. There are now nodes in a number of developing countries, and it is time to consider how a NARS could follow this pioneering experience and also use E-mail to send international communications: more speedily than by post and more cheaply than by telex or courier. Various networks are under development and, while it is true that someone has to pay for the costs, the amount mainly depends on the tariff in the originating country. So the telecommunication cost is payable in local currency and where there are hard currency charges, they may be negotiable.
The cost of telefax equipment has fallen considerably. Reliability has improved as the designers have sought to overcome the problems caused by 'noisy' telephone lines. Telex has almost disappeared from industrialized countries, because telefax is much cheaper and the text does not need to be specially keyed. Telefax, which is essentially a mechanism to provide a remote facsimile of a written message, is now becoming commonplace in developing countries. As with photocopiers and computers, telefax machines should be purchased from national agents who can guarantee service and consumable supplies, and they should be operated under relatively dust-free conditions.
Compared with the cost of much research equipment or the acquisition of another vehicle, equipment for E-mail and telefax is relatively inexpensive and goes a long way to provide developing country institutions with a communications capability similar to that enjoyed by institutions in developed countries.
Of particular interest is the recent burgeoning of the Internet, with its potential for cheap communication by E-mail, direct on-line communication in real time, active participation in special interest groups and bulletin boards, and the opportunity to seek information worldwide.
