Nouveau site Internet du CTA / New CTA website

Welcome to the new CTA website! / Bienvenue sur le nouveau site Internet du CTA !

It is not merely a facelift, but an all over body job. The improvements to the site include a new federated search engine, an improved Google map feature to showcase our partners and a new thematic feed from the site - http://www.cta.int/en/

Il ne s’agit pas d’une simple rénovation, mais d’une transformation de fond en comble. Un nouveau moteur de recherche fédérée, une nouvelle présentation des cartes Google afin de référencer nos partenaires et un nouveau contenu thématique sont autant d’améliorations apportées à ce site - http://www.cta.int/fr/

Agricultural knowledge exchange in Russian language

Planning has begun for a conference in Moscow with the working title: "Agricultural Knowledge Exchange in Russian Language". The proposed days are 1-2 October 2009.

As well as FAO and IAALD, the partners include the Russian State Agrarian University - K.A. Timiryazev Moscow Agricultural Academy and the Central Scientific Agricultural Library of the Russian Academy of Agricultural Sciences.

Interested? contact Michal Demes at FAO (Michal.Demes AT fao.org)

Ways to blog ...

In a post 'Science blogging is the new email', one participant in the Science Blogging 2008 conference in London gives a really interesting categorisation of blogging:

• conference blogging (also includes event blogging)
• edublogging
• metablogging (blogging about blogging, by far the largest discipline)
• research blogging (blogging about scientific experiments, the smallest discipline)
• investigational blogging
• evolution blogging (a large subdiscipline)
• news blogging (blogging about science news)
• watercooler blogging (small pieces of interesting or funny thoughts/pictures)
• summary blogging (summarizing other blog posts and linking to them)
• diary blogging (blogging as a personal diary of self-expression)
• hoax blogging

It would be interesting to see if we have other types of blogging in agriculture...

Examples of conference blogging are the recent AFITA-IAALD-WCCA Japan congress where we listed ways to access some content and stories from the congress. Another is the series of Brussels Briefings on ACP-EU rural development, where blog stories are combined with short video interviews.

Anyone got examples of other types of blogging ...?

ICRISAT e-library services for agriculture in semi-arid tropics

The ICRISAT Library has developed a web-enabled e-library that hosts and links to the digital library resources on agriculture in the semi-arid tropics (SAT). Scientists inside ICRISAT use their desktops to visit this 'SAT e-library', navigating to reach the right information and download the selected items for their use.

These e-library resources are now open to partners and others through the website http://elibrary.icrisat.org.

The SAT elibrary offers access to resources developed by ICRISAT Library, but also to those relevant resources available on the internet, including:

1. SATSource Online bibliographical databases: The in-house bibliographical database holds 71,000 records on ICRISAT's crops especially information on disciplines, techniques, and methodologies useful to Global Themes (a) Biotechnology, (b) Crop improvement, (c) Agroecosystems, (d) markets, policy and impacts;

2. Serials Database - Union Catalog of serials in 15 CGIAR centers;

3. CGVLibrary - The CGIAR Virtual Library provides access to more than 160 quality resources on agricultural research, including electronic journals, databases on the Internet, in addition to the on-line libraries of the CGIAR.

4. SAT Electronic Library News - A monthly electronic Newsletter brought out by the Library to communicate research and research related information to the agricultural research community. Besides a section of current research literature on different crops, it also includes New Accessions in the ICRISAT Library, Forthcoming Conferences, Open Access articles, etc.

5. Google Search Tips - Online tutorial that helps users conduct effective searches in Google

... and more

Feria de difusión de conocimientos para el desarrollo agrícola: convocatoria de propuestas

Biodiversity International, el programa ICT-KM del GCIAI, la FAO, el FIDA y el PMA organizan conjuntamente una actividad de tres días de duración titulada "Feria de difusión de conocimientos para el desarrollo agrícola y la seguridad alimentaria", que se llevará a cabo del 20 al 22 de enero de 2009.

El objetivo de esta actividad es exponer ejemplos de buenas prácticas de difusión de conocimientos en el ámbito del desarrollo agrícola y la seguridad alimentaria.

Sírvase redactar un resumen de su proyecto o iniciativa. Indique su mejor solución para:

• trabajar en entornos geográficamente descentralizados
• recoger y difundir conocimientos cuestiones e ideas locales (autóctonos)
• tratar las cuestiones culturales y de género
• conservar los conocimientos cuando se retiran los trabajadores
• establecer relaciones o redes
• facilitar prácticas de colaboración
• comunicar internamente

El plazo para presentar las propuestas termina el 15 de octubre de 2008.

Si desea más información sobre la feria, visite el sitio: www.sharefair.net.

Foire du partage des savoirs pour le développement agricole : appel de propositions

Bioversity International, programme du GCRAI ayant trait aux technologies de l’information et de la communication ainsi qu’au partage des savoirs (ITC-KM), la FAO, le FIDA et le PAM organisent une manifestation de trois jours intitulée « Foire du partage des savoirs pour le développement agricole et la sécurité alimentaire » qui se tiendra du 20 au 22 janvier 2009.

Le but de cette manifestation est de présenter des exemples de bonnes pratiques de partage des connaissances dans les domaines du développement agricole et de la sécurité alimentaire.

Rédigez un court résumé de votre projet/initiative. Comment effectivement:

• travaillez-vous dans des environnements géographiquement décentralisés?
• réussissez-vous à saisir et à partager les connaissances, les problèmes et les idées locales (autochtones)?
• traitez-vous des questions culturelles et des questions touchant à la parité hommes-femmes?
• conservez-vous les connaissances après le départ des employés?
• établissez-vous des relations ou des réseaux?
• facilitez-vous des méthodes de collaboration?
• assurez-vous la communication interne

La date de clôture des appels de propositions est fixée au 15 octobre 2008.

Pour en savoir plus www.sharefair.net.

Knowledge Share Fair for Agricultural Development: Call for Proposals

Bioversity International, the CGIAR ICT-KM program, FAO, IFAD and WFP are jointly organizing a 3-day event entitled "Knowledge Share Fair for Agricultural Development and Food Security" on January 20 - 22, 2009.

The purpose of the event is to showcase examples of good knowledge sharing practices in the field of agricultural development and food security.

Please write a short story about your project/initiative. How do you effectively:

• Work in geographically distributed environments?
• Capture and share local (indigenous) knowledge, issues and ideas?
• Deal with culture and gender issues?
• Retain knowledge when workers leave?
• Build relationships or networks?
• Facilitate collaborative practices?
• Communicate internally?

Call for submission closes on 15 October 2008.

For further information, please visit www.sharefair.net/.

Advocating AgInfo communication and management

The Global Forum on Agricultural Research just published a short document on Advocacy to improve information sharing and exchange in agricultural research for development.

The advocacy agenda comprises:

• Increased and improved investment in ICM at the research Institute, research organization and research system level.
  
• Capacity development, especially skills in generating digital content, managing and disseminating it at the Institute and Research System level.
  
• Greater coherence and integration of agricultural information systems.
  
• Improved governance of information flows to ensure equitable access to agricultural related information globally

Aginfo directories and web rings: News from GFAR

The latest issue of the GFAR Newsletter includes updates on recent Global Forum activities on information and communication management.

With FAO, GFAR is working on a distributed approach based on metadata exchange to build different types of global Directories, or Registries describing organizations, projects, projects outputs (documents) and experts, as well as news and events.

As part of the CIARD Initiative, GFAR is also leading the establishment of a Global ARD Web Ring - a “voluntary coalition of web spaces that share information related to agricultural research and innovation for development.”

Promoviendo el intercambio y la descentralización del conocimiento agrario en el Perú

AGRORED PERU es el metasistema de información agraria diseñado para la gestión de la información y el conocimiento agrícola en el Perú.

Desde su creación, AGRORED PERU ha realizado eventos anuales para orientar y planificar sus actividades, contribuyendo a la formación de los profesionales que conforman las entidades de la red en los nuevos conceptos de gestión de la información y el uso de herramientas avanzadas. En este año 2008, AGRORED PERU acomete la tarea de desarrollar la plataforma de intercambio de información y el buscador acotado que servirá de base para la consolidación del sistema de información agrario en el país.

El Taller tuvo como objetivo general, Planificar las actividades del año 2008 considerando la consolidación institucional de la red de información e implementando la solución tecnológica de administración de contenidos desde las bases de datos de cada una de las instituciones participantes poniéndola a disposición del público por medio de la Web.

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