Question 2: What are the priority areas that producer organizations should invest in with regard to ICT?
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Producer organizations, as they grow in number whether as support groups or members, should also try to consider investing in setting up databases so that it would be easier and more systematic as they mobilize and network for more support groups/members.
Databases would be a big help in locating existing and potential resources that would augment other means in the implementation of strategies that may be initiated or started by producer organizations for the benefit of their beneficiaries.
Producer organizations always tend to have database first to know who are their members and how many they are? Where do members live etc.. This is easy for local organization. This is more complicated for regional and Apec organizations. You are right there is a need for IC technolgy for that too.
These data base are also useful for the financial management of the organization.
A lot of cooperatives also have databases of input suplliers with their characteristics etc..
I agree with you Sir that database is easy for local organizations. However, some producer organizations find difficulty in having their database because they don't have computers. That's the usual reason that they are giving our office if they are being asked for the masterlist of their farmer-members. This hinders the immediate delivery of services. Our agency will not give any government intervention to farmers' organizations which are not duly registered with concerned government agencies and the masterlist of farmer-beneficiaries is required for monitoring puposes. - Joyce Wendam
True, # 4 'content/application,' (content management, delivery mechanisms, availability of relevant and localized content in an appropriate language, etc), as one of the key issues (Lalaine's post) because the manner ICT initiatives access, assess, and deliver content is necessary in the success of the project as it may influence the likelihood of its use by the farmers.
Content-related issues in ICT projects in agriculture include, for instance, initiatives that supply generic information (should be context-specific situations), low content relevance (which could be the result of language), poor awareness of users or inadequate understanding of local needs, etc. In addition, individuals relate better to content that is locally produced but because of the high cost of generating and managing locally relevant content, relevant and localized content may not be readily accessible, available or affordable , thus, the need for community involvement and partnerships with exsperts for content development (http://idv.sagepub.com/content/27/4/301.full.pdf+html).
The East and Southern Africa (ESA) Division of IFAD (Rome) is supporting the East Africa Farmers’ Federation (EAFF, based in Nairobi) for Strengthening the capacity of East African farmer organizations through knowledge management and institutional development. (project of 3 years, USD 1 200 000)
Following activity: Promoting an innovation culture: systematization and sharing may add something to our debate about identifying What are the priority areas for producer organizations.
Context:
Knowledge management and institutional development are core functions and priorities of the EAFF regional secretariat.
Through this Project, EAFF will link the different national members and support them in their own organizational development to ensure that information and knowledge is generated and shared within and across the national unions, associations and at farmer level.
- National farmer organizations’ strategic plans focus mainly on lobbying and advocacy, capacity building, value chain development, and communication and information dissemination.
- This Project will build capacity of national FOs to generate information and translate it into knowledge to improve their lobbying and advocacy, and integration in value chains.
- The project will complement the EC-funded Support to Farmers Organizations in Africa Programme (SFOAP), by deepening SFOAP’s impact in ESA, in particular in the areas of institutional strengthening and KM and learning.
- Projects in Burundi, Kenya and Tanzania countries where there is a great overlap between the FOs and the IFAD/ESA project areas, will benefit directly. Projects in other countries will benefit through knowledge sharing.
Promoting an innovation culture: systematization and sharing.
The objective of this component is to promote a culture of innovation in the farmer organizations at all levels.
- The project will assist EAFF in setting up and managing a lean innovation sharing facility. The project will help EAFF to put in place the systems, processes and mechanisms for knowledge sharing, and coach the concerned staff on how to systematize information.
- Selected staff will be trained in how to select, analyse, document and share innovative practices, technologies and approaches. Each year, the most promising innovations will be packaged and shared through a variety of communication tools, tailored to the needs of specific audiences. It is envisaged, for example, that EAFF will organize an annual innovation competition among farmers and facilitators.
- Facilitators, who will work directly with FOs and farmers, will scout for innovations and pass them on to the innovation sharing facility, which will then validate innovations, systematize them in a way that can be used and applied to other contexts and disseminate them at all levels.
- Tools and approaches such as write-shops and systematization will be made available.
Remark:
As several other contributions mentioned: apart from identifying the best tools to comminicate among farmers, capacity building at the level of national farmer organisation on how to manage them is crucial.
I also confirm what Jimmie said about (mobile phone applications) : Frontline SMS has increased a lot the efficiency of f.i. radio broadcasting for farmers. They most of the time only find by coincidence a program which is interesting for their cultivation. But receiving an sms alert about a forthcoming program makes them tune in. Farmer organisations are therefore to work closely with community radios.
I completely agree with you that innovation sharing or replication of best practices using ICt is one of the best avenues to promote ICTs to farmers.
Most farmers in rural areas have access to DVD players where it will be convenient to play best practices of other farmers to a group of people. Besides, videos are more interesting to farmers, especially if it will be translated in their native language.
The key for development actors is to understand the traditional process of farmer innovation in order to succeed in bringing ICT in line to support this.
Video solutions are offering increased opportunities to record and disseminate innovative agricultural technologies from and to farmers:
- Growing interest in extension
- Attention to farmer innovation
- More organizations want to enhance their impact at regional level
- Many service providers have expressed their interest in using quality videos
- About 85% of the respondents found local languages very important for farmer training videos. To ensure that videos are sharable and of use to the global community of extension service providers and farmers, producing many poor quality local language videos is not cost-effective.
- Organizations are willing to translate and use videos made in other countries if they are relevant and of good quality, and if video scripts are available. Lower quality videos serve intermediaries only and are rarely used to actually train farmers.
- The five priority areas for new video productions are: crops and trees, water management, plant health, soil health and farmer organizations.
- Farmers would watch videos on their own with their family or neighbours if video disc distribution mechanisms were in place. And they are willing to pay for video discs and video shows.
- Only about 20% of all respondents have never used video to train farmers and have never searched the web for agricultural videos.
- Many of those didn’t know where to look for videos, hadn’t found videos on the right subject or hadn’t found videos in their local language.
- Ideally, videos should entice multiple organizations to use them in multiple settings, facilitated or not, depending on the local context . Well-made videos can serve farmer organizations, extension services, radio broadcasters, and can be modified for use on mobile phones or in any other way.
- In terms of efficiency and scope to disseminate, it makes much more sense to translate one quality video into ten languages, rather than to completely reproduce the same video (or minor variations) in each single language.
Hi Stepman,
I commend Access Agriculture for offering this service, this is truly a nice idea. With the cost of DVDs and players going down, I think this can be useful to the farmers in our country, the Philippines (well, I'm thinking some of the farmers cooperatives have DVD players, or at least the mayor/governor in his/her office). I think it will be nice to volunteer to translate a video into Tagalog, but I prefer that some videos remain intact and have subtitles instead. Thank you for sharing.
Regards,
Harv
One area that a producer organization may invest in is a telecenter. According to Wikipedia, a telecenter is a public place where people can access computers, the Internet, and other digital technologies that enable them to gather information, create, learn, and communicate with others while they develop essential digital skills. While each telecenter is different, their common focus is on the use of digital technologies to support community, economic, educational, and social development - reducing isolation, bridging the digital divide, promoting health issues, creating economic opportunities, and reaching out.
Use of telecenters would enable a rural inhabitant, for example, to gain on-line access to distant productive assets and services, opportunities to learn better practices through formal and informal sources; to crucial market intelligence through informal networks that enhance bargaining power; to information on projects, financing institutions and options and support for the rural population; to expanded distant job opportunities and telework,; and to persons with similar interests willing to work for a common cause (http://www.itu.int/ITU-D/ict/mexico04/doc/doc/10_telecenters_e.pdf).
Yes Sir. There are some producer organizations which have invested in telecenters. For instance, in Uganda, the 3,800 members of the Busia District Farmers Association have a telecenter with various facilities, including seven Internet-ready computers, a printer, a fax machine, and a generator in case the main electricity fails (Naborne 2010). It was set up in 2008, with the Uganda Communications Commission contributing 80% of the costs and the members 20%. Farmers are trained to use the internet to identify markets and liaise with them directly, and they say they can find better prices and sell their produce in bulk. They pay a small fee to use the center.
Another example is the telecenter model of Huaral Valley in Peru, where farmers cannot operate without access to water for irrigation. The water comes from lakes in neighboring highlands, and there is a long history of social organization to ensure that water is distributed fairly.
The benefits of telecenters operated by farmer organizations - access to technical and market information from the Internet, for instance - do not have to be limited to literate farmers who live close by. The benefits can be amplified if telecenters are used to develop training materials for illiterate or far-flung members of the organization.
The telecters concept shows that literate farmers readily learn to use ICTs to access technical information and market prices. The farmers benefit from being able to contact other farmer groups and link with buyers (http://www.ictinagriculture.org/ictinag/sourcebook/module-8-farmer-organizations-work-better-ict).
Success factors identified for community e-centers in Malaysia include the following:
- Focus on people, organization, content, and processes rather than on technologies;
- Research the actual needs and socio-economic goals of the community;
- Provide ICTs and services via the CeCs which are relevant to community needs;
- Find local champions who can motivate and mobilize the community;
- Community participates capitalizing on local strengths and resources in the development (planning, implementation and operation, evaluation, monitoring) of the CeCs;
- Sound business plans and sustainability models ensure CeCs' continuing existence and growth;
- On-going monitoring and evaluation of CeCs' performance;
- Foster and develop smart partnerships (government, industry, NGOs, and community) for strategizing and translating CeCs' goals into action; and,
- Continue to train, and educate the CeCs' personnel and community. (http://www.ictregulationtoolkit.org/en/Section.3185.html)
ICTs can deliver potentially valuable information to end-users like market prices to poor rural farmers and medical advice to rural healthcare workers. However, market information is useless if there are no roads to transport goods, and medical advice is meaningless if there is no money to purchase medicines. As evidence from research on Botswana SMEs (small and medium enterprises) confirms, information is important, but it is only one part in a chain of resources (infrastructure, skills, money) required for the end-user to have the capacity to act (UNDP, 2001). (http://wsispapers.choike.org/ict_telecenters_dev.pdf) - Joyce Wendam
Thank you for this and the Uganda information Joyce. It's valuable to know in the Uganda case how the telecenter is supported with funds. Do you know how the Malaysian centers are funded?
The sustainability of telecenters has long been a topic of discussion. Over the years we have seen several models to cover operating costs, but few examples of self-sustaining centers.
Are there examples where producer organizations have invested in telecenters?
TELECENTERS FOR AGRICULTURE SECTOR
It would be a big difference putting up a telecenter for Agriculture sector alone. It would be like a manifestation of an earnest corporate responsibility for producer organizations. Though it would demand a careful consideration as it would entail huge financial funding in putting up one yet the benefits are a more informed farmers on the methods on farming; enhanced market range; intensified dissemination of agricultural information, to name a few.
http://extensionconference2011.cta.int/node/143
Kelly
I agree with Kelly, creating a telecenter may serve as a tool in improving information dissemination as there is a growing interest in the use of information and communication technologies to support rural development through basic rural telephone service, rural distance education, information and communication systems supporting producer groups by providing agricultural producers information on market prices, linking producers and others to buyers. However, It is more on the rationale for investment of producer organizations as there are other key issues to focus on.
I would agree with you in creating telecenter solely for agriculture. I would also recommend for technology commercialization.
adrian
This is one of the key points that came out in the GFAR-supported discussion (Global Forum on Agricultural Research) of information and communication specialists working in agriculture (www.dgroups.org/groups/inars) in exploring different dimensions and exchanging ideas and experiences on KM and sharing in agriculture- the recognition of the importance of telecenters in mediating communication between rural communities and information providers. For instance, India is exploring rural telecenters that offer a wide range of services from both the government and the private sector. The utilization of ICT is the growth area in improving agricultural markets, marketing systems, and commodity exchanges. Particular information being made available to farmers, for instance, empowers them to take better decisions and earn better returns on their produce. (Information Development, DOI: 10.1177/0266666909351634)
Hi Kelly,
Since most farmers in the Philippines have no access to the Net, then the TV is still a good source of information. This reminds me of Gerry Geronimo's tv show, Ating Alamin, which serves as a guide to alternative means of livelihood, including farming. I'm just not sure if the show is still broadcasting though.
Regards,
Harv
INTENSIFIED SCHOLARSHIP FOR AGRICULTURE PROGRAMS
With the ballooning population in the country, the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) of the Philippines recently launched Project JobsFit: The DOLE 2020 Vision where the specified most in-demand and hard-to-fill jobs in the country are listed. The top priority is in the Agribusiness such as Animal Husbandry, Agricultural Economist, Aqua-culturist, Coconut Farmer, Entomologist (Plant), Farmer (Fruit, Vegetable and Root Crops, Fisherman, Horticulturist, Plant Mechanic, Rice Tresher Operator-Mechanic, Veterinarian, and Pathologist. The department wants to impose that contrary to what most people believe, there are jobs available in the country for the graduates of these programs.
Producer organizations may also look into possibilities of creating scholarships in these programs; or universities and colleges may opt to offer such courses to meet the needs of the land. What I know is that only few take these kinds of courses because it is not well introduced to high school students. Only few universities as well, and solely in the provinces, offer these programs. My son doesn’t even have gardening at school, unlike during our elementary days, because the school replaced it with computer subjects so they are more exposed to this field rather than on the basic and I think much favorable learning that they could use for a lifetime.
www.jobopenings.ph/article_item-367/DOLE_Lists_Most_In_Demand_Jobs_in_the_Philippines.html
Kelly
The Department of Agriculture is also offering scholarships for students who would like to take up agriculture and agriculture-related courses funded under the Agricultural Competitiveness Enhancement Fund (ACEF). DA is granitng free tution, miscellaneous expenses, monthy stipend, book allowance and even thesis allowance to the qualified scholars. The scholars may enrol only however in accredited State Universities and Colleges (SUCs). This scholarship program has been existing for at least four years now.
But in our place, in Iloilo, we have one producer organization, the Tubungan Federation of Farmers' Association, Inc. (TFFAI), helping out fourth year high schools students in their locality to obtain a scholarship for a four-year agriculture course from a local state university (Capiz State University or CAPSU) through the Department of Agriculture (DA). This is under the DA-CSO/PO/SUC Partnership. The Farmers' Federation is paying for the miscellaneous fees of the scholars while the tuition is being granted by the SUC, 100% free. On the part of the DA, it serves as a link between the Federation and the state university, and grants agricultural programs and projects to the school like the Goat Production Project, research projects, etc.
That's nice to hear Joyce but it is not much disseminated to high school students. I believe that they are exposed to other courses than agriculture, where they are promised of a better future and life. But in agriculture, I seldom see ads encouraging students to take up programs in agriculture for college education. In my years of going to different high schools for career talks, I don't hear them willingly say that they would be taking up Agriculture as their course. It is also in this reason why only few take this course inspite of the many jobs that await them after finishing courses related to this.
Kelly
Thanks for your observation Kelly. Massive information campaign and dissemination is what we really need including dissemination of success stories of agripreneurs to attract high school students to take up agriculture courses. Career talks to various high schools should also be done as what you're doing. Thank you very much for those insights.
Good point Joy, in addition, targeting agricultural areas in conducting career talks and information dissemination by convincing rural people there is no need for them to leave their communities to seek for greener pastures what they seek for is actually right in front of them! This now solves not just food supply issues but overcrowding issues, etc.
Years back, students were told to get good education in order to be employed or get better jobs, the orientation changed when business schools mushroomed and now students are encourage to be entrepreneurs. This mindset shift can also be established soon.
So true Kel, advertisement for agricultural colleges or the promotion as a course in recruitment of students is not strong.
I guess too Kel, it is not a prefered course. The younger generation finds farming too slow to the quick buck of call centers and going abroad for greener pastures.
Through partnerships, universities could play a significantly broader role on the world's efforts to employ ICTs for sustainable development and poverty reduction. Take the situation in China. A group of major agricultural universities agreed to explore ways to support the nation's agricultural extension system. (see http://ip.cals.cornell.edu/ commdev/agunivproj.cfn).
How such universities can be partners is illustrated by a list of proposed activities that they could undertake.
1. Conduct localized eReadiness studies and expand them to include questions about the information needs of village and rural populations.
2. Convert their own research and "academic" knowledge into relevant and applicable information for agricultural communities in their provinces, and, in the process, become contributing partners to the China Gateway and the MOA rural information network.
3. Continuously survey and filter external sources of development information and make it relevant to particular agricultural or climatic zones.
4. Provide telecenters with student interns, information databases; and provide training for telecenter staffs, local organizations (such as health providers and extension), and the surrounding community.
5. Conduct research on ways to maximize and evaluate the benefits of ICT-for-development, including studies of innovative approaches to sustaining telecenters, and possibly linking them to the inevitable growth of ecommerce in the country.
Threaded throughout these agricultural university proposed activities is the immersion of faculty and students in the uses of ICT for development and poverty alleviation - with the expectation that in the future they can serve as ICT "champions" in their professions and in their communities.(http://wsispapers.choike.org/ict_telecenters_dev.pdf) - Joyce Wendam
This will be a good research as to how this activities are seen in countries like ours in southeast asia.
<NB: edited by facilitator>
I believe that ICTs can also work for producers, if they are used to network with other stakeholders.
In this case, the ICTs would be a tool to help the group connect with other producing groups, those in the market, groups that use the same inputs etc. When this happens, the producers become a formidable entity that can agitate for their needs, from whoever they need them from. It would also help the groups exchange ideas, and insights in the day to day running of their organizations.
From this, the groups can organise education especially on issues that directly affects them, connect with other groups and share and gain from their experiences.
I am thinkning in terms of especially information disemination for the rural farmers who are mostly illiterate. In other cases, it may be the issue of the language in which the information is in. When I think of Kenya, we have 42 tribes that speak their own disticnt languages, others are so far flung from the urban areas, the organization would have a better shot at diseminating this informatiuon as those in the group that understand English or Kiswahili - the national language can easily translate it for them.
I agree with you anne. Connecting organizations through ICT is a great approach to facilitate exchange of information, ideas, technologies and to facilitate trading (market matching, supply/input trade) among others. Even with a functional ICT system if users have a difficulty of interpreting information due to language/dialect barriers, the objectives of the ICT remains unattained.
Hence, among the things that organizations can invest on in terms of ICT is on training and capability building as regard communication using common languages/dialects, or may employ communication experts to do translations of important and relevant information into the local dialect.
It would be rational to complement electronically operated ICT systems with print and broadcast media where informations are disseminated using local dialects.
Hi Anne,
I think we can solve the language barrier by creating applications that do the translation themselves. If we can only gather all the languages of all your tribes and create a database of information then we can work on the apps. At first, we can translate them all to English then afterwards we can do direct translations from dialect to dialect.
Regards,
Harv
Yes, farmers (the older generation) may be less educated, yet, some members of their families who are sent to school can help their parent-farmers in ICT education or new technologies that could help them in their farming activities. This may sound ideal, but I know some far-flung people who are ICT-illiterates and depend on their children on being oriented/educated even on the simpler types of technology.
The community they live can be a starting point to set up small group that will provide orientations on the use of ICT in their everyday agricultural practices.
--- On Sat, 11/17/12, [email protected] <[email protected]> wrote:
From: [email protected] <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [e-Agriculture] Question 2 (opens 14 Nov.)
To: "sansu" <[email protected]>
Date: Saturday, November 17, 2012, 10:01 PM
What benefit does the use of ICTs bring to farmer-producers? Several studies have shown how beneficial these ICTs are among farmers in the different parts of the world.
Zambia’s National Farmer Organization (ZNFU) had developed an SMS-based Service messaging system which is an easy-to-use service that announces prices via SMS to mobile phones and the web. ZNFU introduced the system with support from the main mobile phone network provider in Zambia, several other local organizations, many farming cooperatives, the agribusiness chamber, and buyers and sellers. The mobile phone network provider organized the bulk messaging process to deliver the information to as many mobile phones as possible, and it offered several hundred half-price mobile phones to farmers. As reported, this innovation brought a significant change on how farmers and traders are dealing with each other and observed that traders are now taking the farmers much more seriously as trading partners. Another very interesting story also happened with the Burkina Faso Farmers who integrated the use of ICTs to share new production, processing, and marketing skills. The Federation of Agricultural Producers of Sissili Province (FEPPASI) now uses multimedia tools, such as digital photo and video cameras, to document the results of field trials and to create training materials. The FEPPASI headquarters and one of its regional offices are connected to the Internet. Both locations function as information centers where members can use the computers. GPS is used to map farms, and a family farm database has been set up. Information and documents are stored on the Synology server. Some benefits cited by Sissili farmers include finding contacts to sell their produce, managing techniques to produce more and others. Another good example of how ICTs enhance farmer organizations’ access to knowledge comes from a project in China (the Construction and Popularization of Agriculture Info-Service System), where a priority is to make modern ICTs accessible and useful for farmers. The project, introduced in Anhui Province, has three main features: an Internet portal, information assistants, and information dissemination models. It targets specialized farmers’ cooperatives, a primary force for agricultural development in China.
For a more thorough discussion of these stories please refer to this site:
(http://www.ictinagriculture.org/ictinag/sourcebook/module-8-farmer-organizations-work-better-ict)
Obviously, priority issue tackled here has to with strong desire or determination to maximize ICT integration. This determination was carried out through serious collaboration among farmers, leaders, and agencies. The rest of the other issues like financial, intellectual, capacity-building were bearable for so long as farmers set their hearts into their purpose, that is to improve their lot. Afterall, there is always truth in the saying, "if there's a will, there's a way."
Not much attention has been given so far in our discussions on business strategies for encouraging increased PO member and management adoption of mobile phone technologies at local level. I think the success of the Grameen Bank in promoting mobile phone adoption withìn its Grameen Bank groups is worth examining.
One of the business activities that Grameen Bank groups are encouraged to get involved in is the group purchase of a mobile phone, which they purchase from their pooled or accumulted group savings. The phone is then lent out to individual members or outsiders on a per-call basis and a fee is charged for each call. The fee income earned is then used to cover the monthly charge the mobilephone service provider charges for the phone service plus a little bit more to provcide additional income to the Grameen Bank group. Another business activity would also be the charging of mobille phone batteries where no electriicty exists, which could be done in a variety of ways, using a car battery, a solar powered charge, even a bycycle that runs a generator.
More information on this case can be obtained by accessing www.grameenphone.com
Could this approach be used in your country?
I agree with John, one of the key aspect is to identify sustainable business models. In our country target farmers finds it difficult to purchase mobile phones and maintain load balance. Finding organizations, such as purchasers of commodities, who would pay for services so farmers may receive targeted mobile agricultural value added services. Tapping into the demand for information and data on rural communities, offering third party organizations access to the mobile phone users or information on their profiles as market research or monitoring and evaluation sources.
I guess one strategy would be to combine agricultural content and expertise with the expertise and reach of mobile network operators. Agriculture needs to grow and be more productive to sustain demands while mobile operators in saturated urban markets see opportunities to grow in rural areas, combining these two ‘drivers’ benefits both farmers and mobile network operators. If this opportunity is seen by other sectors, commitment to support ICT would increase.
Hi John,
I think you're referring to the Village Phone program of Grameen, which I heard has improved the lives of farmers. Perhaps the closest approach to this program in the Philippines is the launch of wireless payphones by PLDT-SMART, one of the leading telcos here. They have even partnered with 7-11 to produce GSM Coin Payphones, which I find very convenient (although I haven't seen one).
Regards,
Harv
As Faye {2000} has pointed out, ICTs are offering even less developed countries a window of opportunities to leapfrog the industrialization stage and transform their economics in to high value-added information economies that can compete with the advanced economics on the global market. Technological innovation has contributed to globalization by supplying infrastructure for trans-world connections. According to Ajayi {2000}, the revolution taking place in information and communication technologies have been the central and driving force for the globalization process. Both developed and less-developed countries cannot afford to miss out on the opportunities these technologies are creating.
With these, I believe it is important to invest on ICT roadmap like Community e Center to partner with private, civil and local government units and provision of bandwith connectivity and of course sustainability of the project through trainings and seminars.
Interesting posts from everyone! To add on to the discussions, I believe producer organizations should focus on two areas:
1. Capacity development and learning - Producer organizations must invest in training and capacity development of their stakeholders and partners to learn how to use ICT as a tool. Capacity development and learning can be in three levels: Technical experts training community stakeholders and partners, community stakeholders and partners training fellow members, and community stakeholders and partners training those outside of their community. Through these three-level initiative, capacity development and learning initiatives are scaled up and people within and outside the community benefit from it.
2. Knowledge management - Producer organizations must also invest in processes and mechanisms that promote and/or enhance the five key processes of knowledge management: knowledge identification, knowledge creation, knowledge capture and storage, knowledge sharing, and knowledge use/application. Investments in the creation of venues for storytelling or devising simple ways of records storage and management can go a long way in preserving knowledge, enabling people to learn from it and using it in their everyday lives, and most importantly sustaining initiatives.
I realized that I didn't answer the main question in my previous posts. Here's what I think: linkage through ICT. The POs should help link the farmers to the different markets, LGUs/NGOs and the R&D centers. These different channels provide the essential elements for agricultural success: marketing and selling strategies, funding activities, and knowledge transfer. The agriculture system in the Philippines is somewhat fragmented, as shown in this cycle: Markets->R&D->LGUs/NGOs->POs then back to Market again. With ICT, the three are directly connected with the POs.
Harv