Information and Agricultural Progress Blog

Under the name 'Information and Agricultural Progress', Ajit Maru's new blog gives his opinions on the "state of information and knowledge access to agricultural communities and its use."

His first postings look at 'infusing new information and knowledge in agricultural systems' and examine topics like ICTs and agricultural extension, research management information, research data, and scientific and technical information.

More on IAALD blog metrics and use

In September 2006, we published a posting on IAALD blog metrics and use. We were proud to record 7,851 unique visitors and 18,500 page loads in our first year. How are we doing now?

For this blog in 2007, 'StatCounter' recorded 36,000 page loads and 12,800 unique visitors (28,800 page loads and 10,800 visitors in 2006).

Our RSS feeds and email alerts (that combine the blog posts with del.icio.us tagged items) were viewed 78,800 times in 2007, generating 2,500 clickthroughs to news items (this is sure rise in 2008 as we already recorded 22,000 views and 3,000 clickthroughs!).

What are you reading? See the most viewed blog postings and feed items (at April 2008).

Where are visitors coming from?

ClusterMaps shows a truly global readership, except China, large chunks of Russia and Brazil, and some parts of Africa. Strong concentrations in North America, Europe, South Asia, Australia, and parts of Africa.

'Google Analytics' lists the top sources of visitors so far in 2008: USA (23%), Netherlands (8.5%), India (8.2%), UK (4.5%), France (3.5%), Italy (3.1%), Canada (2.9%), Philippines (2.7%), Kenya (1.8%), Colombia (1.7%), Germany (1.4%), Australia (1.4%), Nigeria (1.3%), Costa Rica (1.2%), Iran (1.1%), Ghana (1.1%), and Malaysia (1%).

This all seems to show steady, growing, interest in the issues covered, and an increasing willingness by some people to sign up to email alerts and RSS feeds. Another very noticeable trend is the massively increased visits to some blog stories that follow when an email message is sent out to IAALD members announcing recent postings.

IFPRI's Pete Shelton recently blogged on the impact of web sites, giving "a few potential indicators for measuring impact on the web while trying to provide my own impressions on their overall value and utility for measuring impact."

Tags: agricultural information blogging iaald

Top stories on this blog

What are you reading? What are the most popular blog and feed stories on this site? As part of our efforts to understand and track the use of this blog and its primary RSS feed, we dived into Google Analytics (see related posting).

The top twenty most viewed blog postings in 2007 and 2008 are:

• IAALD World Congress 2008
• e-Agriculture Week in Rome
• The agricultural information specialist of the future?
• Conference: Participatory Web for Development
• ICT and Agriculture sessions at WITFOR 2007
• Analyzing agricultural ICT projects in India
• USAIN 2008 Conference
• Planning Iran's agricultural Information System
• Lifelong learning with farmers in Madurai, South India
• Agricultural knowledge and development in a new age and a different world
• Web 2.0 for participatory development: Notes from Rome
  
• Mass media to disseminate agricultural technologies in Pakistan
  
• Rethinking the Agricultural Library
  
• The Agricultural Information Management Standards Web Site
  
• ICT Adoption in Agriculture - Perspectives from EFITA 2007
  
• Market information systems and agricultural commodity exchanges
  
• Defining 'e-agriculture'
  
• e-Agriculture should focus on Information over Technology
  
• IAAMSLIC 2007 Conference
  
• Understanding the use of agricultural websites
  

The top twenty most viewed feed items for the same period are:

• Le web agricole nouveau est arrivé
  
• Food, Agriculture and Nutrition @ SLA
  
• PMN Launches Agricultural Web Search
  
• i4donline agriculture news (RSS feed)
  
• IICA interconnected throughout the hemisphere via a Virtual Private Network
  
• Knowledge Management in development cooperation
  
• Framework on Effective Rural Communication for Development
  
• IICA conectado a través de Red Privada Virtual en todo el Hemisferio
  
• Archivos Abiertos para el Desarrollo: Nuevos enfoques de la Biblioteca Digital
  
• KM and Knowledge Systems for Rural Development
  
• FAO and GTZ workshop examines KM and communication for rural development
  
• New CABI Website and Online E-Zine
  
• Towards an architecture for open archive networks in Agricultural Sciences and Technology
  
• New FARA website launched at 4th FARA General Assembly
  
• Développement du Web collaboratif
  
• Join GFAR project to share information on agricultural organizations
  
• CTA strategic plan emphasizes efficiency and sustainability
  
• AGRORED Peru: Specialists endorse good practices in open access and open archives
  
• The Agricultural Information Management Standards Web Site
  
• Historias Tecnologías de Información y Comunicación para el desarrollo (Ecuador)
  

Interesting the see the differences - especially the greater views of non-English postings via the feed ...

Tags: agricultural information blogging iaald

Blogging web 2.0 and KM for agriculture and rural development

Sometimes you find an excellent new blog on aginfo and related issues and wonder how it didn't come across your radar before... Anyway, Web Tastings is by IFPRI's Pete Shelton and Stephan Dohrn - writing in their personal capacities. The idea is to "reflect on the usefulness and impact of the social web and its tools and approaches on development cooperation."

A recent post that caught the eye looks at measuring impact on the web - and some experiences from IFPRI.

Botswana College of Agriculture joins blogosphere

We recently came across the BCA Unofficial blog - an attempt to meet the Botswana College of Agriculture halfway. It is hoped to meet both it's academic and non- academic needs.

Tags: agricultural information botswana blogs

US National Agricultural Library launches its blog

The National Agricultural Library (NAL) has joined the web 2.0 movement! This month it set up a blog - InfoFarm - where it is hoped that NAL staff and partners will enter into conversations.

In her October 1 opening entry, NAL's blogger in chief Mary Ann Leonard explains why NAL set up the blog:

"We want to give this great national library a human, personal voice; to give you a fresh glimpse into what we do; and to give us a chance to hear from you."

Interestingly the email announcement of the blog includes a disclaimer which says that the blog "does not necessarily represent the official views or formal communications of USDA, of NAL, or of the array of organizations represented by NAL’s customers and partners." However, it "aligns well with library standards encouraging the open and free exchange of information in support of an educated and informed citizenry."

Tags: agricultural information nal blog

Blog on Taking Action for the World's Poor and Hungry People

IFPRI has set up a blog for the 2020 Vision Conference on "Taking Action for the World's Poor and Hungry People" (October 2007). Read what they said; see and hear what they said; share your comments.

An interesting dimension of the project is the Collaborative Bibliography where resources and links can be contributed directly or through social bookmarks (del.icio.us).

Tags: agricultural information ifpri blogs

CABI blog 'hand picks and carefully sorts' information

A newish blog "is the the place where the content specialists who put together CAB Abstracts highlight just some of the vast amount of research information that goes into the products that they make."

The blog from CABI - entitled 'hand picked... and carefully sorted' - is intended to be a signpost that, to quote Bruce Sterling: tells us what to access and what to pay attention to

Tags: agricultural information cabi blogs