AgLinks Feedback Synthesis
Tim Martyn
Overview
1. General improvements – user friendliness, look,
categorizing information, searching for information,
expanding on what is there, keeping it current and
facilitating social media
2. Donors – using value chain analysis to analyse project
interventions, summarizing, and sustainability.
3. Farmers – visual information, audio, info available on
mobile phones and access to practical tools
4. Industry – prices, regulations, standards, contacts,
transport and freight costs, and business devl. tools
5. Government – improved technologies, improved
inputs, ICT extension aids, statistical trends, case
studies, trade rules and negotiations
1. General improvements
PRESENTATION OF INFORMATION
• Change the font/size for text to make it biggest, easier to read.
Particularly over front photo so it can be read more easily.
(Hold cursor over the photo, stops scrolling?)
• Can we make the front page more colourful, with more
photos of a range of different products available? Can we
make it all fit on one page to avoid scrolling to the bottom to
get access to most recent information, etc.
• Arranging information via commodity, making it more
searchable by commodity is a great idea – SO WE NEED MORE
INFORMATION FROM YOU. More on all the important
commodities
• Make it easier to locate information by country. Perhaps a
drop down box accessible from the front page? Also a search
box on the front page could help.
• Include a date of publish for all the documents so we know
how recent they are (particularly for market reports, etc)
• Include an abstract or short description of each paper or
document
1. General (cont)
FACILITATING DISCUSSION , INPUT AND OUTPUTS
• Discussion forums on some of the ‘big issues’, about
problems encountered from the region, the sorts of
interventions that worked, etc. Host webinars to help
provide more information about these issues, and
create discussion. Could link to agriculture ministry
help desks where experts provide more information
and follow up.
• Separate out the ‘solutions’ from the big issues, and
associate with a ‘how to’ portion of the website to
provide positive guidance on the steps that
farmers/industry could take
• Develop a suggestions box which displays comments
and suggestions for the website, on the website. We
can leave this open for the next month or so while the
website is being developed. Use this to make our
improvements
1. General Cont
KEEPING IT CURRENT AND USERS UP TO DATE
• Latest news displayed on website – we have events
calendar, blogs, can also link the webpage to latest
agricultural newsletters (e.g. LRD, Spore, Agrikulta Nius
from Solomons or others) and stories in print media
• Send regular updates and links back to the website via
email (from contact list) and facebook (for those that
have become facebook friends of SPC)
• Can we make use of country contact points to help
facilitate information coming from countries – are
there communication officers in ministries who can
help with materials, contacts, events, news, etc?
1.General (cont)
SOCIAL MEDIA
• Use social media to run competitions to generate
new content for the site, i.e. writing case studies in
order to win prize (trip to come and present at a
regional forum)
• Can we have more training on use of social media for
encouraging connectivity and relationship building
between government, farmers, industry, others in
the value chain.
2. Donors/project partners
• CO-ORDINATION: Website could be used to provide
information on all the different projects that are working in
the region, which people can access. Website can also assist
with project co-ordination by ‘value chain mapping’ project
intervention by commodity by country
For Fiji we developed a ‘map’ of all the different projects
by the areas they targeted along the value chain, whether
improving inputs (soil, seeds) or post-harvest handling,
markets (market access). Can we help do this for other
countries, for other commodities?
• Ministries of Finance maintain lists of all the agriculture sector
projects, can this information be sorted/filtered by
commodity and intervention type, so that we can get value
chain or commodity chain maps of all the agriculture sector
interventions
• Could be done in association with the agriculture sector plans
and policies being developed in partnership with SPC and
other donors (FAO, etc)
2. Donors/project partners (cont)
CO-ORDINATION CONTINUED
• Also value chain concept can be extended
further to map contact database by a chain,
rather than just location. Once we have
contact list developed we can locate all the
actors for each commodity by country, or for
the region, and present that in a commodity
map (rather than a geographic map)?
2. Donors/project partners (cont)
COUNTRY SUMMARIES
• Could provide access to country factsheets,
key statistical information and industry
information, any other key issues. SPC PRISM
prepares regional statistical handbooks with
information on all countries, and many
country statistical offices produce national
factsheets with key information and trends.
These could be added to the website as part
of country profiles.
2. Donors/project partners (cont)
SUSTAINABILITY
• Given the amount of agricultural research,
market research and other information
available here, the costs of maintaining it all
on the website, are there ways of developing
revenue streams via this website?
3. Farmers
ICT’S
• Need to link into mobile phones, identifying that
connection issues may mean that farmers in remote areas
unable to access, so need to be able to send some
information via mobile phone. REMEMBER the website is
designed for smart phones as well so that it can be read on
all electronic devices
• ITC and Fiji AgTrade developing some great new mobile
phone based tools, which are farmer focussed, private
sector driven developments: mAlerts, weather, Makete,
etc. We will try and link to these via the website and
promote the replication of these in other interested
countries through our new PAPP project.
3. Farmers (cont)
VISUAL, AUDIO AND PRACTICAL TOOLS
• More information on gross margins, profitability ratios,
other tools to help farm as a business
• More extension guides, practical tools for farming
added here (probably many, many of these in
agricultural ministries around the region – please send
them to us!)
• Use of other mediums – audio ‘podcasts’ of farm
extension, video extension tools, other ways of
communicating technical information to farmers.
Graphical representation, cartoons and other visual
aids to help explain the issues. Farmers learn by
watching and hearing, not so much by reading
3. Farmers (cont)
LOCATION AND CO-ORDINATION
• Collect all the contact lists of all the farmer
associations and organisations out there, so
we can load these up, will be critical to making
this work. We need name, organisation,
location, commodity. GIS location would be
great
4. Industry
MARKET INFORMATION
• More information on prices. Interest in having access
to world prices, spot prices, market prices in Pacific
countries and the major trading partners. Where this
information is publically available we can link to this –
e.g. to AgTrade trade statistics database for Fiji, and
Fugalei market prices for Samoa and Tonga market
prices studies (links to Agriculture Ministry and
Statistics Office website publications); to world prices
for major commodities like coffee, cocoa, copra (links
to commodity association websites, like ICCO); to the
Pacific Trade Statistics database
(www.pacifictradestatistics.com) which maintains a
searchable database of Pacific trade flows by
commodity). PTI&C in Auckland also maintains market
prices website, link to that.
4. Industry (cont)
TOOLS
• More posters and practical guides on quality
standards could be produced and shared here,
help get into the hands of farmers and focus
them on market standards.
• More information on market access issues and
requirements, per product, per country: labelling,
biosecurity, food safety, rules of origin, etc
• Include business development services and
software, accounting tables, software to help
prepare a business plan, to help prepare for a
loan.com, etc
Industry (cont)
LOCATION AND CO-ORDINATION
• Lists of exporters and importers, what
commodities they are interested in, to expand
contact database
TRANSPORT
• Transport schedules – shipping schedules and
aeroplane schedules. Not likely to be able to
get these for all countries. Costs of freight
from different countries also commercial info
often; but major issues around freight, new
developments could be identified and shared.
5. Government
TECHNOLOGY
• More information on farm and processing
technologies. Need a new technology
component. Good examples of some countries in
the region utilising appropriate technology (e.g.
hydroponics, crop coverings, land management,
contour farming etc) can we have more
information on them, how they were used, their
impact, etc. Information on traditional knowledge
and technologies here could also be shared
through this website. DSAP, a previous project
funded by the EU, trialled a lot of appropriate
small-scale, sustainable technologies and case
studies on the design, and impact of these, could
be shared
5. Government (cont)
TOOLS
• Also could add more information on soil type
and crop suitability maps to help with
planning. These have been produced for some
countries (e.g. Fiji and Samoa), more
could/should be produced for other countries
• Posters and other visual tools on production
techniques great way of helping with
extension, need to produce more and upload
those that exist.
5. Government (cont)
ANALYSIS
• Case studies – success stories, learn more
from these. Can commission some more of
these (along the lines of Learning for growth
series). Perhaps focus on one country per
month, provide a new story or series of stories
from that country on what is happening there.
• Display more information on statistical trends
in graphs, to help illustrate some of the key
trends that have been identified. Help to
policy-makers.