The rural information services in China supported by the government has four differnt partnership models. The Association-Cooperation models is one of those.

With support from the government, the Association–Cooperative consists of farmers in an area who are in need or interested in the same types of information. Due to the commonality of interests, they form either a specialized association or a specialized economic cooperative on a voluntarily basis that they then manage.

This type of group centers around one crop or animal or some other commodity in common. The association or cooperative provides members with information services before, during and after the production of a certain type of agricultural product with the intent of improving their production and increasing their income.

Although narrow in focus, the information service covers a range of technical, market and policy issues. Some associations and cooperatives also purchase production materials for members and offer marketing services for farm products.

The updated report on Agricultural Information Services in Rural China is at press, while the previous report can be found at www.fao.org/docrep/007/ad504e/ad504e00.htm

This is where favorable policies and an enabling environment have to be fostered, in order to facilitate the creation and use of a sustainable ICT-based advisory service.  There are many examples of ICT-based interventions in agriculture, health, education and rural livelihoods related projects in Asia. Yet how many of these have moved from pilot phase to a fully functional sustainable initiative? We know of very, very few.

However, the IKSL initiative in India is clearly an example of a successful partnership, which mFarmer has documented as a case study. IKSL is a joint collaboration between the Indian Farmers Fertiliser Cooperative Ltd (IFFCO), the largest farmer cooperative in India and Airtel, a mobile network operator.

The importance of public-private partnerships in such initiatives cannot be stressed enough.