Making of RKMP Shaik Meera

7/31/2019 Making of RKMP Shaik Meera

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Making ICT Mediated Knowledge Management to work:

A Case of Rice Knowledge Management Portal in India

http://www.rkmp.co.in

Shaik N.Meera1

ICTs are not really about the computer, the Internet, and telephone lines. They are aboutinformation and communication. This makes the issue of content a very important priorityas we try to use the new technologies for community development and alleviation ofpoverty. Until early 2002, the main focus was on building or strengthening the digitalreadiness of developing nations to help people get connected. For example, the principalresponse to the digital divide has been to make available computers,telecommunications links, and Internet Service Providers where these facilities were thinlyspread or absent completely.

What appears to be emerging is more of a concern about the digital information divide.In most developing countries, agricultural institutions have not moved to a level where newand consistent information services to farmers and other stakeholders are offered basedon quality and contexts. This necessitates us to develop strong Agricultural KnowledgeManagement strategies that are built on huge agricultural content (Data- information-Knowledge).

Now we are beginning to see increasing attention to the content and services that ICTs candeliver digital communication (email), portals for health and development, and servicesidentified as eCommerce, eGovernance, eBanking, eAgriculture, eHealth, eLearning and soon .. Content is King!

In this changing scenario, Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) wishes to promotethe use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in agriculture bydeveloping national level knowledge management portals. As a first step towardsachieving this objective, an exclusive portal on rice viz., Rice Knowledge ManagementPortal (RKMP) is developed by ICAR under the NAIP project. The portal is built by theDirectorate of Rice Research, Hyderabad in association with 8 consortium partners, twoconvergent partners and 20 AICRIP partners. This serves as an information highway forrice sector in sharing rice knowledge through latest ICT tools including mobile telephony. Italso helps agricultural departments ongoing activities in reaching out to the farmersthrough extension advisory services, in most effective way.

The RKMP has several global firsts in terms of comprehensiveness and utility. Perhaps,this is the most comprehensive and one stop shop source for credible, validated,relevant and contextual information on rice to this scale. Built on web 2.0standards, this portal caters to location specific information needs of many stakeholders(policy makers, farmers, extension professionals, researchers, traders, NGOs etc.,) on 24X7basis. IP based customization helps individuals to browse through location specificcontent. Providing content in local language is another striking feature of this portal.

1. NEED AND PURPOSE

The new agricultural paradigm will have to be recast to take advantage of the wealth ofknowledge available to achieve multiple goals of sustaining the food security, income, jobs,etc. The ICTs along with Knowledge Management (KM) strategies have significant role toplay in evolving such a vibrant agricultural system.

1 Consortium Principal Investigator RKMP (correspondence : [email protected])
http://www.rkmp.co.in/http://www.rkmp.co.in/


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In India, rice is the major cereal crop grown in about 44.6 million hectares. Indiarepresents all kinds of diversity under which rice is grown across the globe. No other cropis as versatile as rice. Rice crop is interwoven in the cultural, social and economic life ofmillions of Indian and it holds thekey for food and nutritional securityof the country.

Rice production scenario in the

country during the past decadepresents a gloomy picture ofcompound growth rate of just 1.7per cent despite the highestproduction figures (93.3 MT) postedduring 2001-02. In near future, landunder rice is likely to be reducedfurther and could stabilize at about40 Mha. Relative contribution ofirrigated rice to the total productionis likely to remain same though, onone hand, area under irrigation is

likely to increase throughpopularization of boro rice in theeastern part but, on the otherhand, likely to be reduced byurbanization, industrialization andcrop diversification due to reducedprofitability and threat tosustainability in rice-wheat area. Tomeet a production target of 125 Mtby 2025, all inclusive of foodrequirement, seed for cultivation,

storage in buffer stock and a sharefor exports, productivity in irrigatedarea needs to be enhanced by 1.5tons/ha and in rainfed lowlands byabout 1 ton/ha. A careful SWOTanalysis presented in vision 2025document of DRR revealed thatthere is an opportunity for bridgingthe yield gap by improving theaccess to the rice knowledge.

Enormous knowledge has been

developed about this crop andthere is a need to share thisknowledge for the betterment ofour society. Indian rice research and rice development programmes have been recognizedas successful model endeavors all over the world. However, given the burgeoning task offurther enhancing the production and productivity of rice, the existing information sharingmechanisms appear to be insufficient.

2. KNOWLEDGE FLOWS/KNOWLEDGE FLOW MATRIX AND INFORMATION NEEDS

Organizations that jointly and/or individually contribute to the development, distributionand use of rice knowledge in rice sector may broadly be classified as Rice policy makers(P), Rice research & extension organizations (R), Credit Institutes like banks (B), Farmers(F), Input supply firms (I), Rice marketing firms (M), Rice processing firms (Pr), Consumers

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Box 1: Project Details

Project Title: Development and Maintenance ofRice Knowledge Management Portal

Vision

Our vision is to serve wide range of stakeholders andhelp in better planning to realize higher productivityand production of rice through improved knowledgeand skill sets.

Objectives of RKMP Project

To develop and maintain Rice Knowledge

Management Portal to strengthen research, extension,farmers, and private subsystems, partnerships andnetworks, through better flow of rice knowledge andinformation contributing to the overall ricedevelopment in the country

Specific Objectives:

1. To develop structure and content for RKMPcomprising research information systems,extension information system, serviceinformation system, farmers informationsystem, general information system and e-learning platform related to rice

2. To pilot these information systems foruploading, sharing and harnessing riceknowledge amongst rice stakeholders

3. To build the capacity of the stakeholders inusing the Rice Knowledge Management Portalfor effectively transforming rice knowledgeand information as a viable factor ofproduction.

Funding by NAIP


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(C) and External organizations (X). In most of the cases, due several reasons, there is notknowledge /information and data sharing amongst these organizations (See Fig 1).Moreover, building a strong linkage among these organizations is called for, in the recentpast.

Fig1: Diagrammatic representation of Linkage Matrix in Rice (Adapted from TugrulTemel, 2004)

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Box2:B

enchmarkAnalysis

In

order

to

understand

and

assess

the

existing

rice

kno

wledge

dissemin

ationportals,theircurrentsta

tusintermsofmetrics,averagedaily

views,information

craved

by

netiz

ens

on

these

portals,

information

requirem

ents

ofvarious

stakeholders

in

Rice

sectorviz.,Resea

rchers,

Extension

workers,NGOs/KVKs,Traders,Farmers,policy

makers

etc.a

benchma

rkanalysiswascarriedoutb

ydwellingofsecondaryinformation

anddata

setswiththefollowingobjectives,

To

analy

ze

knowledge

needsofvariousstakeholdersin

rice

sect

orwith

respectto

ExtentofintegrationofinformationandKnowledgeneedsofstake

holders

atvariou

shierarchicallevels.

Accuracy

ofknowledgeperceivedbyth

ericeworkers

Existing

systemanalysis

on

knowled

ge

quality,systemquality,

service

quality,

Use,

user

satisfaction

and

net

benefit

derived

by

various

stakeholders

Sustainabilityoptions

2.Tode

lineatearoadmap

fordevelo

pmentofextensiveand

exh

austive

Rice

Kn

owledge

Management

Portal

auguring

the

informatio

n

and

knowledgeneedsofvariousRicestake

holders

Output:

A

documentwith

comprehe

nsive

listofinformation/kno

wledge

needsas

towhatricestakeholdersrequireandinwhatformat.

It becomes imperative to strengthen the capacity to enable rice workers to create, manageand share information for the benefit of all stakeholders. This includes scientific,technology-related information (for research and research management and for extensionoutreach), market information for the agencies and farmers, generic information for thepublic and comprehensive information for better decision making for the policy makers.

There is a need to catalyze the mobilization of a critical mass of researchers, extensionistsand farmers into leap-frogging the knowledge barriers to modernization of agriculture inIndia. It is with this vision; the Rice Knowledge Management Portal (RKMP) was developed.

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3. UNDERSTANDING KM IN THE PRESENT CONTEXT

After having known what are the information needs of rice sector (See Box 2) and a

complete knowledge flow matrix, next focus was on understanding what KM processes,

tools and strategies to be deployed into making of RKMP. The data, information and

knowledge differ from one region to other. Knowledge that includes data and information

within a particular context varies considerably between the contexts and emerges from theflows of information around the system. When a scientists' knowledge moves into an

extensionists context, it is relegated to information and it is the practitioner/user that has

to do the work of making this information into new knowledge. Agricultural Research

knowledge is just another piece of information to be incorporated into the knowledge of an

extensionist. Of course this works the other way. When we think of multiple stakeholders

in the agricultural value chain, the interaction between the data, information and

knowledge gets much complicated (Shaik N. Meera, 2010). Using the traditional

knowledge flow mechanisms, it is not possible to facilitate different processes (from

collection to decision making) at various hierarchical levels. The KM practices using ICTs

are emerging fast as viable solutions.

Knowledge management generally refers to the sharing of knowledge inside and from an

organisation to the outside. This involves generating, capturing and disseminating

knowledge. Researchers have pointed out two kinds of knowledge: tacit (context specific

personal knowledge embedded in individual experiences, and, thus, difficult to share) and

explicit (that can be easily articulated and transmitted). Knowledge management deals

with both the experience and understanding of people in organisations (mostly tacit) as

well as information artefacts such as documents and reports (which are explicit) available

within organisations and outside them. While explicit knowledge is easy to share or

transmit, sharing tacit knowledge is difficult, although not entirely impossible. Tacit

knowledge plays an important role in providing meaning to explicit knowledge as well ascontributing to the development of new knowledge. ICTs can support the transformation of

tacit knowledge to explicit and vice versa (See Table 1).

Table 1 . Example of processes identified to support Knowledge transformation

Tacit to TacitE-learning, Video conferencing, Blogs,Synchronous collaboration (chat)

Tacit to ExplicitAnswering questionsAnnotation , Theme and status Papers

Explicit to TacitVisualisation

Browsable video/audio of presentations

Explicit to ExplicitText search, RLOs, i3R

Document categorisation, CMS

The efficiency of future extension efforts will be determined by how effectively these KM

practices are incorporated into the existing extension system. The Rice Knowledge

Management Portal (RKMP) tried to translate valuable data and information into useful

knowledge for the extension workers working in the rice sector.

4. PROJECT IMPLEMENTATION

Portal is not a simple web site! It is a lot more and provides at least a modicum of dataservices. The design is done as a combination of repositories, data containers, work flows

(that facilitate document creation and review), folders to receive dynamic data, servers tohost audio/video clips, news blogs etc. While efforts are on for development portal design

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and development and hosting by DRR, the content development strategies is implementedsimultaneously. Portal is less of softwares, but more of content. In the contentdevelopment strategies, the development of six kinds of information systems is taken up inan intensive way. A brief description of workplan is provided here.

Defining the functional requirements for a portal, that addresses information needs of 700rice scientists, 1,10,000 Public sector extension officers, 225 civil society organizations,600 Farm Science Centres, 4.26 lakhs stakeholders etc., was going to be a herculean task.

Since RKMP was envisaged to be content portal rather than collaborating portal, it wasdecided to involve the partners with a focus on content development.

The project is implemented in a consortium mode. Each consortium partner has specificroles to play based on their core competency. DRR lead the consortium. ICRISAT andCDAC are technical partners focusing KM models and font technologies respectively. Otherpartners are called content collaborators/ partners, whose primary responsibility is todevelop local content in collaboration with the AICRIP centres, SAUs and other stakeholders

from the states within theirjurisdiction. A conceptualmodel for contentdevelopment for one state

is given below.The design, planning,coordination, execution,technical expertise, andhosting and maintenanceof the proposed RiceKnowledge ManagementPortal were taken up bythe Directorate of RiceResearch, Hyderabad inassociation with its

collaborating institutes.The information support isprovided by the selected stakeholder in rice sector of the country.

Fig2: Conceptual model for content development for one state

Research Information System is developed by DRR in consultation with CRRI and all AICRIPcenters spread across the country. The static information is developed by digitizing theexisting AICRIP and other data sets that have relevance to the present research systems.Skilled helpers are employed for four months to digitize the relevant data. The portaldesign will have inbuilt ability to provide indexed research results, and researchprioritization data.

The dynamic dimensions are developed by incorporating the management informationsystem in the existing AICRIP setup. An online discussion is launched with the available e-mail IDs of rice researchers across the country.

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Fig3: Conceptual model for development of Research Information System

Extension Information System: The content for EIS is developed for fifteen major ricegrowing states of India. Huge amount of extension information/knowledge is collected anddocumented for EIS upto state level.

Fig4: Conceptual model for development of Extension Information System

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RIS

DRR AICRIP

Analysis of WorkflowsFor MIS

Outsourced

Content

Products

Development Design

for MIS

Digitizing the existing

(relevant) AICRIP and

other data

Validation

Software Integration

Content Aggregator

ICRISAT-

EAR, i3R

To Portal

Design

Features

DRR AICRIP

FAQs and

Approach Papers

News Aggregator

(RSS Feeds etc.,)

DRR-RKMP Content Upload Lab

Portal

K-

Base

Portal

K-

Base

EIS

Content

Collaborator

Outsourced

Content

Products

Content Packages

and RLOs for EIS

and FIS

C-DAC

(Font Technologies

and Translations)

Local language

Content Packages and

RLOs

Content Advisor

Consultant

(Validations and

Contextualizing)

Content Aggregator

ICRISAT

Topic Maps

ICRISAT-

Expert Answers

on Rice (EAR)

OFT and FLD

Information

DRR-RKMP Content Upload Lab AICRIP Centre

Stakeholder

Workshop


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For effective content generation and customization, the country has been divided into sixregions and each region had one or two Content Collaborators responsible for organizingthe content development workshops for each state involving concerned AICRIP Centresand all the stakeholders. For example, IARI has taken care of Punjab, Haryana andUttarakhand. Further they are supported by AICRIP scientists (who are called as RKMPnodal officer) and other stakeholders as their team members. Idea is that, once theproject period is over, existing AICRIP set up will be able to regularly update the portalcontent, as per their mandate.

These Content Collaborators had identified resource persons for developing and validatingstate level knowledge resources like location specific production technologies & postproduction technologies, diagnostic tools for diseases, pests, nutrients and abiotic stresses,FAQs. The information on development programmes were also collected from the statedepartments during the workshops and will be made available through portal.

The static (archive) information on FLD results along with the varietal performance werehosted on the portal. The information available with DRR was made available, to beginwith. This regular updates from different agencies working on FLDs will later on be placedin this domain.

Farming Information System: CDAC along with regional consortia partners were involved in

developing FIS in local languages. The content was translated into Hindi, Telugu, Kannada,Tamil, Oriya, Marathi, Bengali and Punjabi.

Fig5: Conceptual model for development of Farmers Information System

Service (Market/ Export/Input Supply) Information System:

CRRI has coordinated the development of SIS by outsourcing the task to various agenciesinvolved in provision of this information. Some of the information provided by theminclude: Private sector information, Input supply information, marketing information,export/import information and export /import information particularly for basmati.

General Information System: CRRI along with DRR and ICRISAT has develop GnIS onhistory, evolution, crop profile, recipes, rice in day to day life, rice regions, value added

products, fact sheets, directories, linkages to VORTALS, rice statistics along withinteractive GIS map interfaces, digital photo library, rice news feeders, digitized rice

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Portal

K-BaseFIS

Content

Collaborator

Outsourced

Content

Products

Content Packages

and RLOs for EIS

and FIS

C-DAC

(Font Technologies

and Translations)

Local language

Content Packages and

RLOs

Content Advisor

Consultant

(Validations and

Contextualizing)

Content Aggregator

ICRISAT

Topic Maps

ICRISAT-EAR

OFT and FLD

Information

DRR-RKMP Content Upload LabAICRIP Centre

Stakeholder

Workshop


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almanac and rice wikipedia. DRD was associated as convergent partner, where everrequired.

Fig6: Conceptual model for development of Service Information System/ GeneralInformation System

E-learning/ Virtual Platform for Distance Learning: DRR and ICRISAT developed e-learningcourses on the basis of the content developed for RIS, EIS and FIS. Synchronous on linetraining support and Asynchronous knowledge support were developed using commercial

and open source content management system/ software. Capacity building and trainingworkshops were to be organized to enable stakeholders for use, customize and edit thecontent based on location specificity. Once developed in English, relevant courses weretranslated into local languages by CDAC.

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Portal

K-Base

SIS/ GnIS

DRR

Analysis of Workflows

For MIS

Outsourced

Service

Linkages

Development Design

for MIS

Digitizing the existing

(relevant) Service

oriented data

Validation

Software Integration

Content Aggregator

Abstracting

Services

To Portal

Design

Features

CRRI/DRR

FAQs and

Approach Papers

News Aggregator

(RSS Feeds

etc.,) /Crawlers

DRR RKMP Content Upload Lab


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Fig7: Conceptual model for development of E-learning platforms

5. PORTAL DEVELOPMENT

Portal backend development comprised of development of Information Architecture,

defining the platforms in terms of Content Management Systems, Database types, webservers, script, handlers, Concept maps and user interfaces etc., Main portal is built onopen source Content Management System with lot of plug ins to support to the contentflow customization. The basic information unit for the portal is an RLO (Reusable LearningObject). In the Information architecture defined for the portal, there are about 4500content heads with data attributes (both in terms of technical format and agriculturedomain expertise). For ontologies related to rice, a compendium of Rice Vocabulary(RiceVocs) with about 2500 terms was prepared. These terms are again clubbed withother generic terms (such as seasons, geographic location, user types etc.,), to make itmore semantic enabled. For example, in most of the Ontologies, Package of Practices isnot defined as a term for tagging. In such cases, the searches for a package of practice fora specific location will not yield desirable results.

Photo: A group working on Card sorting exercise for design features

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Portal

K-Base

FIS

Content Aggregator

To Portal Design Features

DRR RKMP Content Upload Lab

RIS

EIS

SIS/ GnIS

E-learning

Courses


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Fig8: Conceptual model of portal backend development and user interfaces

Building first semantic portal in Agriculture was another challenge. Such portal shouldenable multidimensional search by means of rich domain ontology. For that, different types

of information were categories into semi-structured and extensible sub-heads allowing forbottom-up evolution and decentralized updates. Effectively tagging of these termshierarchically made users add new classification and organizational schemas and extendthe information structure. With concept maps at application layer, portal content is storedand managed in a decentralized way with effective manual tagging and auto-taggingprocesses.

5.1. CONTENT VALIDATION PROCESS

One of the striking activities of RKMP is a thorough and hierarchical validation processundertaken by the experts. The model format is given below;

Content Validation Form

Topic/RLO/

FunctionalRequirement

Content Suitability

Sourcesareacknowledged/

Copy rightissues areinvolved?

Relevance

Coverage

Clarity

Content/Language

Continuity(flow)

Adequacyof

Tables/Visuals

NeedsImprovement

(Specify inthe draft )

Ye N Ye No Yes No Ye No Ye No

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s o s s s

Certified that the content provided by the RKMP Lab has been validated to the best of myknowledge

The content may go online (as such/ little modification/ complete revision).Signature and Designation of the Validator

Photo: Content Validation Process in Progress

5.2.MONITORING & EVALUATION PLAN

A Consortium Monitoring Unit (CMU) was established as per the NAIP guidelines (for otherComponents) located at DRR. In addition to some regular scientists, contractual staff areappointed to man the unit. The CMU is responsible for preparing the M&E work plan andbudget, preparing half yearly and annual progress reports, coordination with the consortiapartners and liaison with the National Coordinator and the external review teams from timeto time.

For all the consortium partner institutes, the benchmark indicators are fixed and the CMUwas particularly tracking the progress for these indicators and monitoring on half yearlybasis. Besides assessing component productivity, the total system productivity was alsoquantified. Also the submission of regular progress reports by the Co-PIs was tracked. Thekey activities undertaken by the CMU include consortium formation, research planpreparation and implementation, knowledge management, capacity building, and impactevaluation.

5.3. WORKSHOPS PLANNED & CONDUCTED

S.No.

Type of Workshop

(Figures in parenthesis indicates thetotal number of workshops)

Deliverable /

Monitoring Indicator

1 Launch Workshops of the Project

(16)

Role definitions of Consortium partners,refinement of the work plan to the month

level activities.

2 Workshop for finalizing the design Finalized design features and functional

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features and functional requirement ofthe portal.

requirements.

3 Content Development Strategiesworkshop for Content Collaborators andtheir team members

Finalization of content development strategyand Dimensions of location specificknowledge/ information to be collected andfed into RKMP

4 Review Workshop Review of the status of RKMP work and action

points finalized

5 Content Development Phase-I

Content Development for 1st BatchStates

Content Development Workshops (6)

Complete digitized content for EIS and FIS

DRR & ZARS (South)

CRRI (Eastern)

ICAR-NEH (North-east)

IARI (North)

RARS-K (West)

BAU-R (North Central)

6 Capacity building workshop for rice

researchers(3)

45 AICRIP scientists from all the regions got

hands on experience

7 Capacity building workshop for NGOs,KVKs and State Department (extension)Officials

(3)

60 personnel from all five regions to get handon experience

DRR

CRRI

IARI

8 Capacity building and Upscalingworkshop for Private sector

Upscaling Opportunities for the RKMP

(1)

Representatives from 20 private companies/agencies.

Upscaling strategy Phase-1

Refinement of RKMP select features in tunewith their requirements

9 Content Development Phase-II

Content Development for 2nd BatchStates

Content Development Workshops (9)

Complete digitized content for EIS and FIS forthese states

Were organized by AICRIP Nodal officers.Facilitated by:

DRR & ZARS (South)

CRRI (Eastern)

ICAR-NEH (North-east)

IARI (North)

RARS-K (West)BAU-R (North Central)

10 IRRIs Orientation Workshop Orientation and action points from IRRIsperspective

IRRI-India/IRRI

11 Content Translation and Capacitybuilding Workshop

Sharing the content translation strategies

CDAC

12 Review Workshop Review of the status of RKMP work and actionpoints finalized

CRRI

13 Expert Answers on Rice Workshop (1) 24X7 Online web based question-answerplatform. Experts identified for all the states

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ICRISAT

14 Rice Topic Map and Agopedia Workshop(1)

Topic maps with User friendly interfaces

ICRISAT

15 Capacity building workshop in riceregions

(if sponsored by Common Service

Centers (CSC), ICT4D projects, NGOs,State Governments etc.,

(at least 3 anticipated not committed )

not be reflected in the NAIP sub-projectbudget

At least 60 to get hands on experience

DRR

CRRI

IARI

16 Capacity building and Upscalingworkshop for Private sector

Upscaling Opportunities for the RKMP.Sponsored by Private sector

(anticipated number 3 not committed)

Representatives from 40 private companies/agencies.

Upscaling strategy Phase-II

Refinement of RKMP select features in tunewith their requirements

DRRCRRI

IARI

17 Sustainability Planning Workshop Review of the status of RKMP workSustainability Plan finalized

DRR

5.4. CAPACITY BUILDING

Knowledge Management in agriculture is relatively a new concept. The mammoth task ofdriving the knowledge sharing process in rice requires lot of capacity building exercises.

The capacity building requirement for this is classified into three categories.

1. Training on Knowledge Management strategies, exposure training to knowledgemanagement initiatives in agriculture worldwide, Acquiring the first hand

information and managerial skills for sustaining the RKMP etc., (received by theConsortium Principal Investigator). The CoPI from CRRI also got training in this

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direction. This helps strengthening and sustaining the RKMP in all future endeavors.Further this may also help planning future KM Portals of ICAR.

2. Trainings on orientation towards the RKMP, content development strategies andbasic skills of KM strategies are of utmost importance to the Consortium Partners.Hence it was proposed to get CoPIs of the sub-project to get trained in these areas.

This helped strengthening the organizational capacity to harness KM strategies inthe overall agricultural development. IRRI organized country specific trainingworkshop at Bengaluru.

3. Third category of training is imparted to the Communities of Practice.Representatives from all the rice stakeholders of the country got exposed todifferent areas of RKMP. Training includes, orientation to RKMP, content sharingprocedures, capacity building in harness the power of RKMP, workshops formotivating the stakeholders to trickle down the utility of RKMP. Senior Rice Workersgot orientation to KM strategies in rice sector.

4. Online support for effective browsing / adding/ editing / use of content is providedfor all the registered users.

Other than these, to provide the effective hands on experiences to the stakeholdersvarious capacity building workshops have been organized across the country byvarious partners.

Photo: Hands on Experience to stakeholders at DRR, Hyderabad

5.5. TECHNOLOGIES USED / APPLIED

The portal is built on Drupal (open source) with effective tagging of 1000 content heads,this is the most comprehensively defined agricultural semantic portal of the country. Plugins and ad-on platforms (such as .Net and java based) gives additional strength to the

portal.

This portal is hosted on www.rkmp.co.in connected to 100 mbps line of National KnowledgeNetwork. Scalable 1 GBPS in two years time from now.

5.6. SERVICES & INVESTMENTS

The portal and the platforms have been developed at very nominal investments. In mostof the cases, open source CMSs/ LCMSs are used, where in-house expertise (indirect costssuch as contractual staff, CPI time contribution) with some level of customization (directcosts) is done.

Some platforms such as AICRIP-Intranet were developed using commercial software wherein there is direct cost. EAR and i3R platforms are developed by consortium partners

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(ICRISAT). High quality video films are developed by outsourcing. The direct cost fordeveloping all these platforms is about Rs. 37.50 lakh.

These are all developed as one time investment. Effective knowledge management willhave far reaching consequences in bridging the knowledge gap in rice sector. Since thereis an in-built sustainability of these platforms (to be owned by AICRIP from 12 th Five YearPlan onwards), there will be continuous use of these platforms. This makes all theseplatforms economically viable. Indirect benefits of these platforms include; integration ofcontext specific information and knowledge needs of stakeholders, relative easiness, speedand accuracy of knowledge access etc.

6. OVERVIEW OF RKMP FEATURES

For providing the most comprehensive agricultural knowledge directly from the scientificcommunity, Rice Knowledge Management Portal was launched in the presence ofHonourable Prime Minister of India during 83rd ICAR Foundation Day on 16th July 2011.With about 20 platforms, more than 12,000 pages of content, 3000 minutes of audio, 50video clips, this is the first comprehensive agricultural portal of the country. Unlike otherinitiatives, this is the first time public sector R&D organization is providing the credibleinformation to the farmers and other stakeholders of rice. Striking feature is that contextspecific information is provided catering to information needs of different stakeholders.RKMP Landing Page

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Language selector

RKMP supports different vernacular language content along with English. Important

languages include Hindi, Telugu, Kannada, Tamil, Oriya, Marathi, Bengali and Punjabi. It

also supports authoring in local languages.

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Automated Tagging

Flexible auto tagging of the content types via a pluggable interface is provided in theportal. It doesn't rely on pre-defined vocabularies. Instead, this module sends node

content through any number of third party services to determine what the content is

about.If an user does not know the heirarchy of vocabulary, then auto-taggers come in

handy.

Video Gallery & Digital Photo Gallery

Search Functionality

Hierarchical search at every point of browsing the beuty of RKM Portal. Semantic searches

is the key feature of the portal.

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Archive

Tag Clouds

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7. DESCRIPTION OF THE PORTAL SERVICES

Rice Knowledge Management Portal (www.rkmp.co.in) comprising of 1300 RLOs of genericcontent, 1580 RLOs of State specific content, 822 RLOs of State specific content in locallanguages, 52 video clips and 4000 minutes of audio clips on different topics of Rice, 37

Theme papers, 2800 RiceVocs terms, 48 Rice researchers in directory, 75 Governmentschemes, 48 RLOs of Extension Methods, 459 FAQs, 37 Innovative farmers profiles, 8 RLOsof History & Evolution, 40 RLOs of Rice in Indian culture, 56 Rice facts, 62 recipes in Rice inHuman nutrition, 12 Rice End products, 62 News & Events and 37 Virtual rice resources, 12Recap Sheets, 91 local language Government schemes, 27 local language Innovativefarmers profiles, 254 RLOs of local language Weed management, 522 Photos in DigitalPhoto Library (as on 26 December 2011). The features of web 2.0 standards supports forcontinuous content addition and the existing volume of content is bound to grow regularly.For delivering the information services to different stakeholders, the portal operatesthrough several domains;Domain Target Users Content provided/ Services

Researchdomain

Researchers Data RepositoryAICRIP IntranetStatus of rice production state wiseRiceVocs (2500 rice relate vocabulary)Bio-informatics ToolResearch ThemesResearch Fora (Community of Practices)Directory of Rice ResearchersIndia Rice Research Repository (i3R)Guidelines

Tools and TechniquesHistory of Rice Breeding

Rice Research in IndiaExtension Extension Production Know How of rice (2500 heads)

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domain Professionals Package of Practices (state specific)Expert Answers on Rice (EAR)Government SchemesExtension MethodsDiagnostic ToolFAQsFrontline DemonstrationsProduction Concerns of the MonthFarmers InnovationFerti-meterSpot nearest Research/ExtensionOffice/DealerRecap SheetsAudio GalleryVideo GalleryWeed ManagementWeed Information System (Wisy)Indigenous Technical Knowledge (ITK)

Farmers

domain (inLOCAL

LANGUAGE

S)

Farmers Production Know How

Package of PracticesExpert Answers on Rice (EAR)Government SchemesFarmers InnovationAudio GalleryVideo GalleryDigital Photo LibraryWeed Management

Service

domain

Traders Trade Information System (Trade Know How)Mandi (Market) PricesSpot nearest Research/ExtensionOffice/DealerWeather Information

General

domain

Home MakersStudentcommunity

History and Evolution OF RICERice in Indian CultureRice FactsRice in Human NutritionRice End-ProductsNews and EventsVirtual Rice ResourcesRikipediaVirtual Tour

Rice Stats Policy Makers Rice Almanac

GIS MapsE-learning Researchers

ExtensionProfessionals

LearnRice - MoodleLearnRice

There are several offshoot platforms that provide in depth focus on highly specializedinformation needs of the stakeholders. Some of them are;

AICRIP Intranet - http://www.aicrip-intranet.in

All India Coordinated Rice Improvement Programme (AICRIP) is a major activity in DRRinvolving several locations all over the country to test of various technologies developed in

rice production. Such all India testing of promising breeding material (varieties, hybrids,composites, agronomical practices and other input use) helps in identifying the most

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stable, high-yielding or superior genotypes suited for different agro-climatic conditions andpossessing the required level of resistance to the targeted insect pests and diseases.AICRIP Intranet is targeted to automate the whole process of AICRIP data starting fromcenters, cooperators, trials, technical programme, seed dispatch and confirmation, cropcondition to final summary tables for the reaction of aboitic /biotic stress on genotypes.

Data Repository- http://rkmp.co.in/datarepository

RKMP believes in the data-information and knowledge transformation continuum andprovides access to a large database of about 27000 datasets related to AICRIP multi-location trials conducted for last 45 years across the country. With effective tagging basedon disciplines, year, season in searchable pdf format, the RKMP is catering to datarequirements of rice researchers of the country. It is the data about these lines and theirperformance that can make a difference, if used and reused effectively.

Bioinformatics Tool- http://www.rkmp.co.in/bioinformatics

The RKMP Bioinformatics Tool Suite is development and implementation of the programsfor the saving, retrieving and analysis of Biological data and extracting the information

from them. These Biological data can be DNA or Protein sequence. It is focus on developingand applying computationally intensive techniques. Major research efforts in the fieldinclude sequence alignment, gene finding, pattern recognition, prediction of geneexpression.

Analysis in molecular biology and bioinformatics is an automated, computer-basedexamination of characteristic fragments, e.g. of a DNA strand. This set of tools allows youto carry out further, more detailed analysis on your query sequence including querysequence statistics, identity and Similarity, sequence format conversion, DNA Translation,ORF Finding, compositional biases, Restriction Digestion, Restriction Maps and predictionof PCR (Polymerase Chain Reaction) products. The identification of these and otherbiological properties are all clues that aid the search to elucidate the specific function of

your sequence.

Directory of Rice Researchers- http://www.rkmp.co.in/research-domain/directory-of-rice-researchers

Indian rice research and rice development programmes have been recognized assuccessful model endeavors all over the world. In fact, with about 700 rice scientistsworking on rice, the All India Coordinated Rice Improvement Project (AICRIP) is the largestnetwork of scientists on a single crop. The diversity of rice scientists is as good as that ofthe rice growing regions of the country. At a single place, Directory of Rice Researchers provides the access to find all those champions, who have been working on variousresearchable issues related to the most important crop of the country.

E-Books/E-Manuals - http://www.rkmp.co.in/research-domain/e-books

Sometimes whole is bigger than sum of individuals. Certain types of information can onlybe comprehended when in total. Realizing this, a series of e-books and manuals of interestare being provided as e-books. These are the most valuable resources on different areasof rice research and extension that deal with in depth analysis of know how and do how.

India Rice Research Repository - http://i3r.in

i3R is an acronym for India Rice Research Repository.. i3R consists of Conference papers,Journal articles, Book chapters, Books/Bulletins, Slide bank, Conference proceedings andother type of articles.

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Communities of Practice - http://www.cops.rkmp.co.in

The implicit knowledge of individuals has lot of utility when it comes to enhancingproduction and productivity of rice at farm level. To capture such knowledge fromindividual experts in rice research and development institutes, a platformRKMP CoPs(Communities of Practice) is being maintained .

Research Themes - http://www.rkmp.co.in/research-domain/research-themes

Sharing the tacit/implicit knowledge in the minds of individuals from diverse backgroundsand experiences is very important. In a move to capture the implicit knowledge that existsamong various experts in different fields of rice research, they were requested to write forRKMP. This has resulted as an excellent repository of high value review papers (approachpapers) describing rice research conducted so far and the future thrust areas in a specificfield that will be very useful for the rice researchers.

Rice Research in India - http://www.rkmp.co.in/research-domain/rice-research-in-india

covering various aspects. A comprehensive paper "Rice Research in India" coveringdifferent facets of rice research carried out in India since Independence written exclusivelyfor the portal by One of the eminent scholars of our time, Padma Shri Prof. Siddiq. Thetransformation that the country has seen in last five decades can be experienced thereaders.

Rice State Wise - http://www.rkmp.co.in/research-domain/rice-state-wise

Many a times we wish to understand rice production scenario in different states of thecountry. Even though area, production and productivity statistics are available, there is aneed to understand the contexts in which rice is cultivated and various issues related tothe rice production scenario.Keeping in view, this information requirement, the eminent

personalities from different states have provided the general rice production scenario asper their experiences and records in the form of comprehensive Status papers for eachstate.

RKMP content can now be "listened to" as well! - http://www.rkmp.co.in/audio-gallery

For those who wish to "listen rather than read", the portal have options such as 'click andhear'. This enables the users to work on other documents andcan still listen to somevaluable stuff.

Diagnostic Tools - http://rkmp.co.in/diagnostic

RKMP consists an exciting and completely image driven rice pest and disease diagnostictool. This has been designed to help extension workers, farmers and other stakeholders inidentifying the field problems they face in Indian rice fields. The diagnostics is basicallybased on the stage of the crop, but has options to select or search at any point based onsymptoms, type of problems. The tool helps to identify the possible causal agent and themanagement options in brief. If diagosed by a farmer it is advised to contact the nearestextension office or Research station for confirmation.

Expert Answers on Rice (EAR) - http://ear-rkmp.in

The acronym of EAR is Expert Answers on Rice. The Experts on Rice will provide Answers to

the questions posed by different users/clients/stakeholders by using the three tierstructure. The components of three tier structure are:

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http://www.cops.rkmp.co.in/http://www.rkmp.co.in/research-domain/research-themeshttp://www.rkmp.co.in/research-domain/rice-research-in-indiahttp://www.rkmp.co.in/research-domain/rice-research-in-indiahttp://www.rkmp.co.in/research-domain/rice-research-in-indiahttp://www.rkmp.co.in/research-domain/rice-state-wisehttp://www.rkmp.co.in/audio-galleryhttp://www.rkmp.co.in/audio-galleryhttp://rkmp.co.in/diagnostichttp://ear-rkmp.in/http://www.cops.rkmp.co.in/http://www.rkmp.co.in/research-domain/research-themeshttp://www.rkmp.co.in/research-domain/rice-research-in-indiahttp://www.rkmp.co.in/research-domain/rice-research-in-indiahttp://www.rkmp.co.in/research-domain/rice-state-wisehttp://www.rkmp.co.in/audio-galleryhttp://www.rkmp.co.in/audio-galleryhttp://rkmp.co.in/diagnostichttp://ear-rkmp.in/


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Web-based Question and Answer Forum

SMS based alerts

Web based Questions answered through SMS

The expert has to login and answer the question which will be delivered directly to the useron the mobile through SMS.

Extension Methods - http://www.rkmp.co.in/extension-domain/national/extension-methods

Extension methods have been seen as viable factor of agricultural production in India andelsewhere. Whether a public or private sector extension system, it should work on viableextension strategies based on various parameters existing at grass root level.Thestrategies will trickle down to what are known as extension methods /tools/ techniqueswhich remain same for any kind of extension system. Even though, there are efforts todocument the extension methods and tools elsewhere, making these available throughonline or offline CD format has never been thought over. It is in this context, it is felt that acomprehensive database is created and made available in the most readable format.

Farmers Innovations - http://www.rkmp.co.in/farmers-domain/national/farmers-innovation

Some of the Indian farmers have always been innovative in showing the world about bestrice cultivation practices with their innovations, adapt or reinvent recommendedtechnologies or look for opportunities to compete in the global economy. To help spur thisinnovative spirit, RKMP brings to you various innovations related to rice crop.

Soil Information System - http://www.rkmp.co.in/fertimeter

Soil Information System is the platform of RKMP in which complete information about soilsand fertilizer management and personalized recommendations are found. It consists of thefollowing information like Soil Resources and Extent of Fertility Related Stress, District wisesoil fertility status, Soil Degradation and Related Production Constraints, FertilizersConsumption Scenario and Nutrient Demands, Rice Soils and Related Constraints in RiceProduction and Nutrient Management for Sustainable Productivity and Growth.The user cancalculate the requirement of the following by using the calculators - Manure Dose,Individual Fertilizer Need, Biodegradability Index of the Compost,Dung and their NutrientGenerator, Nitrogen Generator from Organic Matter and Vermi Manure Generator.Onlinesoil health card can be generated by supplying the information related soil samples. Itcovers soil information across the districts of India.

Indigenous Technical Knowledge (ITKs) - http://www.rkmp.co.in/extension-domain/national/indigenous-technical-knowledge-itks

Careful amalgamation of ITK and modern scientific knowledge would be most promising,while leaving the choice, the rate and the degree of adoption and adaptation to thefarmers. To foster rapid transfer of technology related to rice cultivation, an understandingof indigenous technical knowledge is needed. ITK in rice farming is important for reducingthe cost of cultivation, reducing the pollution and also safeguarding the natural resourcebase. The information on ITKs remains largely inaccessible to development workers andresearchers.

The portal bring a series of ITKs categorised based on various parameters for the benefit of

all the stakeholders.

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Package of Practices - http://www.rkmp.co.in/farmers-domain/uttar-pradesh/package-of-practices

A compendium of state specific and location specific recommended package of practicesare provided under this head. IP based customisation facilitates that only homestate (thestate from users access RKMP) specific information is available. For almost all the states ofthe country are covered under this head.

Production Know How - http://www.rkmp.co.in/extension-domain/national/production-know-how

RKMP serves the extension information related to rice cultivation in more than 2500Reusable Learning Objects (RLOs). In other words this information is not context specificand may be useful to extension workers cutting across the states (For example - principlesof land levelling).

The contents are effectively tagged in order to provide content with little effort on part ofthe users.

The access to RLOs can be availed using any of the following methods:

1. Search for a specific information object by typing a key word/ phrase. The user willget to see several related links. By clicking on the links the user will be directed to thecontent page.

2. While going through the links, the user may feel appropriate to cross navigate toother information related to your search. Then simply, the user click on the tags (terms)that appear below that results in the listing of the information in a sequence of upload.

3. The user can look for the other related information heads on right side box whichthe user can Click on any of them to get the access the information.

Spot your nearest Extension Office - http://www.rkmp.co.in/service-domain/spot-your-dealer

The users can explore the maps to locate nearest Extension Office/ Research Station/KVK/Dealer and can find the complete contact details.

Recap Sheets - http://www.rkmp.co.in/extension-domain/national/recap-sheets

Indian Extension officers have the reputation dealing with a variety of extensioninformation cutting across the disciplines. While they deal with a variety of extensionadvisory services (broad-basing.. popularly known as), they need to have cutting edge

knowledge on various technologies that are in vogue.

For those extension officers, who wish to recapitulate already existing knowledge on ricecrop, the portal brings a cafeteria one page sheets comprising of most comprehensiveinformation on select topics. The Recap sheets, as we call them, may be used as readyfield reckoners that can be printed and used readily as a flyer!

Video Gallery - http://www.rkmp.co.in/video-gallery

For "how to" content, the only answer we have is to give access to a cafeteria of video clipson rice. The NGO/KVK/SDA staff can write to us for delivery of offline CD of video clips.

You can go ahead screening these videos where-ever and when-ever you wish. In order to

contribute, the users can create own account and upload.

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Video films produced and made available online

Rice Journey DNA & Fingerprinting

Germplasm and Gene Bank C4 plant

Land Preparation Iron Toxicity

Seedling of rice Rice grain quality

Transplanting of rice Brown Rice & Bran oil

Bio intensive pest

management

Parboiler & Husk stove

Pest Traps Threshers

False Smut Traditional post harvest practices

Brown Spot Mat-type Transplanter

Sheath Blight Combine Harvester

Yellow Stem Borers Rice Winnowers

Gundhi Bug Climatic change and riceproductivity

Bacterial Leaf Blight Green House gas emission andmitigation

Brown Plant Hopper

Hybridization Rice Gall Midge System of Rice Intensification

Rice Tungro Disease Seed Production

Weed Management Bio Fertilizers

Integrated NutrientManagement

Hill ecosystem

Pokkali Rice Coastal saline ecosystem

Medicinal Rice of Kerala Navara

Irrigated ecosystem

Aromatic Basmati Rice Upland ecosystem

Organic rice Lowland rainfed ecosystem

Hybrid Rice Deep Water ecosystem Transgenic Rice Rice Delicacies

Marker assisted breeding Rice festivals in India

Double haploid breeding Role of women in rice cultivation

Weed Information System (Wisy) - http://www.wisy.rkmp.co.in/

In India, the losses caused by weeds exceed the losses from any other category ofagricultural pests like insects, nematodes, diseases, rodents, etc. In this backdrop,effective weed management gains significance. Identifying different types of weeds in the

field conditions is essential component of weed management. In an attempt to equip ricestakeholders with the details in respect of weeds that affect rice, WISY (Weed InformationSystem) has been developed.

Rice in Human Nutrition - http://www.rkmp.co.in/general-domain/rice-in-human-nutrition/

Rice is one of the most consumed grains on the planet. In fact, half of our planet'spopulation actually depends on it for survival. With approximately 200 calories per cupserving, it is free of fat, cholesterol, and sodium. Rice is easily digestible, making it suitablefor all ages and individuals with sensitive digestive systems, and its naturally mild flavouris a suitable complement to many dishes. The portal provides information on 80 rice

recipes

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Rice in Indian Culture - http://www.rkmp.co.in/general-domain/rice-in-indian-culture

India has the largest paddy output in the world and is also the second largest exporter ofrice in the world. Paddy fields are a common sight throughout India, be they be northerngangetic plains or southern peninsular plateaus. The paddy cultivation plays a major role insocio-cultural life of rural India. Many festivals such as Onam in Kerala, Bihu in Assam,Sankranthi in Andhra Pradesh, Thai Pongal in Tamil Nadu, Makara Sankranthi in Karnataka,Nabanna in West Bengal celebrates harvest of Paddy. Andhra Pradesh is historically knownas the "Rice Bowl of India", while Thanjavur is historically known as the "Granary of SouthIndia" and the Rice bowl of Tamil Nadu. Nanchinadu was known as the rice bowl of theformer Kingdom of Travancore. In Kerala there is a place (which spreads into threedistricts) called Kuttanadu, which is famous for paddy cultivation. Kuttanadu is called therice bowl of Kerala. The access to this kind of information is made possible at the portal.

RikiPedia - http://www.rkmp.co.in/rikipedia

RikiPedia is Rice Knowledge Initiative under NAIP's Flagship Project RKMP. RikiPedia aims atcapturing the implicit knowledge about rice that exists across the stakeholders.

News and Events - http://www.rkmp.co.in/general-domain/news-and-events

Portal provides regular news and events related to rice sector of the country.

Learn Rice Moodle - http://moodle.learnrice.in/

With a view to bringing about knowledge based sustainable rice development, an e-learning platform namely LEARNRICE. This will help in linking the effective learning withthe immediate working conditions of the farmers and other rice workers. Supportingimmediate application of the learning in local situation will be an important outcome of theproject. It is expected that such an innovative extension approach using Open and

Distance Learning methods will enhance the access to improved rice knowledge andinformation across the country, contributing to the agricultural development. Thisendeavour will also help opening up new vistas in the distance learning and capacitybuilding in the agriculture sector, a sector on which 65% Indian population depends for itslivelihood.

Learn Rice - http://learnrice.in/

LearnRice is a multi-dimensional e-learning platform of Rice Knowledge ManagementPortal, an initiative under National Agricultural Innovation project (NAIP) of ICAR. In thecurrent scenario of fast changing Technology world, learning is considered to be a lifelongexercise. We appreciate the fact that larger number of rice stakeholders across the country

has limitations in terms of access, quality and cost-effective learning opportunities. Not allthe stakeholders are privileged to get their rice knowledge updated on 24x7 basis. It is inthis context, it is felt that there should be an online platform for enabling & supporting thecapacity building exercises in the rice sector of the country.

Rice Almanac - http://www.rkmp.co.in/ricealmanac/

Rice Almanac is the most comprehensive databook on rice. At national level it provides thecontents like Agro-Ecological Regions in India, Rice in India, Rice Ecosystems,Mechanization in Rice Production,Rice Genetic Resources,AICRIP Network,Quality SeedProduction Districts,Rice MillsRetention of Rice for Various Purposes,MSP of Rice,State-WiseProcurement of Rice,Nutritional Status of Rice Grains,Rice Exports and By-ProductUtilization.The General Information, information on Rice Area Production, Varietal

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Information Popular Varieties, Major Rice Production Constraints, Rice Research CentersAnd Growth Rates are provided at the state level.

Mandi (Market) Prices - http://www.rkmp.co.in/service-domain/mandi-prices

Market prices of Rice that are prevailing in the regulated market yards across the countryare made available for better decision making. This is only indexing service fromAgmarknet.nic.in."The arrival and prices of different agricultural commodities as received from theAgricultural Produce Market Committee (APMCs) of different States are uploaded atAGMARKNET portal for information only and shall not be considered as guidance, invitationor persuasion. Users/visitors have to make their own decisions based on their ownindependent enquiries, appraisals, judgments, wisdom and risks. The Govt. of India shallnot be liable or responsible for any loss or cost or any action whatsoever arising out of useor relying on the arrivals and prices and other related information disseminated at theportal."

Trade Know How -http://www.rkmp.co.in/tradeinfo/

In order to leverage the production advantage of rice in India, there is a need to providecontinuous updating of data on market information, market access, procedures etc, whichcan be utilized in the identification of the right product market mix essential to reflectthese production advantages in the form of enhanced presence in the Internationalmarket.

This trade portal will act as a readymade solution towards solving domestic marketing aswell as international trade issues. It would be helpful to all the stakeholders i.e farmers,processors, exporters in India as well as importers in the foreign markets.

Weather Information - http://www.rkmp.co.in/weather-information

Indian Agriculture is highly dependent on vagaries of weather. Any abnormalities in theweather during the rice growing season will affect the plant growth and hence theproductivity.

The prime objective of this short term weather forecast is to render timely information tothe extension agents for real time decision making.

Other Products available with RKMP are RKMP in 3 minutes (Flash object), E-Books/E-Manuals, Protection Concerns of the month (Flash object), CD on In Vogue Extension Toolsand Techniques, CD on Indigenous Technical Knowledge in Rice cultivation.

Box 3: The Beginning of RKMP

This project was developed through a series of consultations involving the consortiumpartners and other ICT4D experts. The CPI (Dr. Shaik N. Meera) has been involved indifferent studies related to ICTs in agricultural (rice, particularly) development for quitesome time. During the initial meeting called for by the Project Director, DRR duringOctober 2006, the ICT and KM concepts were thoroughly discussed and a concept notehas been prepared which is eventually submitted to the NAIP for funding.

During the year 2008, based on the interest shown towards this project, CRRI has beenrequested to develop a similar concept note with an idea to get their perspective. During

the meeting called for by NAIP on 1st September 2008 at New Delhi, these concept noteswere thoroughly discussed and a baseline methodology was evolved. This was followed

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by development of original base paper and a series of discussion meeting with the CoPIson the development of RKMP.

The full length project proposal has been submitted by DRR in the month of October 2008which was sent to the Reviewers. The PIU-NAIP facilitated a meeting on 27th November2008, in view of the interest shown by IRRI and CIMMYT, under the Chairmanship of DDG(CS). Due to preoccupation, the DDG (CS) could not attend and the meeting was heldunder the Chairmanship of ND, NAIP. During the meeting, Dr. Shaik N. Meera, CPI made abrief presentation of the proposal. The proposal was appreciated by all for itscompleteness. The Participants from IRRI and CIMMYT observed the commonalities ininterest and vision in serving the stakeholder through efficient utilization of ICT tools. Ona specific point of the involvement of IRRI, the consortium expressed their interest inkeeping them engaged throughout in consultations, feedback, exchange of ideas etc. IRRIsuggested that their e-learning material could be adopted in the project with suitablemodifications/customization. As per the discussions held by the Directors of DRR andCRRI with IRRI representatives, it was decided that, IRRI may act as the Consulting andConvergent Partners of the Consortium.

The CPI and CL have received the Reviewers comments from PIU, NAIP during December2008. Keeping in view the reviewers comments and other inputs from experts, a finalproposal has been prepared. This proposal has been shared with the consortium partnersbefore Stakeholders Workshop. DRR has organized a one day Workshop of theConsortium Partners on 9th January 2009 at Directorate of Rice Research, RajendranagarHyderabad. The workshop was aimed at fine-tuning the proposal and to come up withproper budget projections for each of the consortium partners. In view of the commentsof the O&MAG Committee meeting which was held on 14 th January 2009, the proposal isrevised once again. The O&MPC meeting and Cost Committee meeting held on21st January 2009 gave few suggestions for fine-tuning the proposal and thebudget. Financial sanction was received from NAIP in April 2009 and the project wasofficially launched on 16th June 2009.

Box 4: The Process of Making RKMP We share

Knowledge Management in agriculture is relatively a new concept. The mammoth task ofdriving the knowledge sharing process in agriculture requires lot of efforts at varioushierarchical levels among agricultural organizations.

In the developing world, there is an urgent and strong need to adapt the KM strategies in

agriculture. In line with RKMP, there is a need to upscale KM initiatives in agriculture.

But before that, relevant human resources, tools, processes, strategies should be in placeto transform agricultural organizations into learning organizations. We are of theopinion that frameworks and success stories of KM worldwide need to be analyzed toprepare a road map for KM in Agriculture.

As a part of this vision, we wish to share the process that is involved in Making of RKMP.

8. USERS CONTRIBUTION/ FEEDBACK / OPINIONS OF BENEFICIARIES

8.1. How can users contribute to RKMP?

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As registered user, one can upload the content into RKMP, irrespective of his/ herinstitutional affiliation. RKMP Nodal officers (AICRIP Centre Scientists from StateAgricultural University) will validate and approve the content before it is displayed online.At RKMP, source of each content is acknowledged. It is suggested that before uploadingbetter to go through RKMP Content Upload Policy available online.

8.2. Interactivity and ease of use

RKMP is reaching to its stakeholders in various forms. Some of the ways interactivity ispromoted are;

a) IP based customization helps individuals to browse through location specific content.

b) Video and audio galleries will help providing do how skills an knowledge on riceproduction technology.

c) Expert Answers on Rice - A platform in which interactivity is involved between theuser and the expert.

d) RKMP provides content/information in the local languages like Hindi, Telugu,

Kannada, Tamil, and Marathi along with English for the ease of Farming community.It is also available in local languages like Hindi, Telugu, Kannada, Tamil, andMarathi.

e) Cafeteria of platforms helps accessing the information at various hierarchical levelsof stakeholder organizations.

f) Offline CDs and non-digital delivery mechanisms help users without connectivity aswell.

8.3. Best usage scenarios

The Rice Knowledge Management Portal provides content/information in the locallanguages like Hindi, Telugu, Kannada, Tamil, and Marathi along with English. It isalso available in local languages like Hindi, Telugu, Kannada, Tamil, and Marathi.

This caters the needs of Farming community who will understand their locallanguages in a better way rather than English.

RKMP can be accessed through any of the search engines (it supports Googlechrome, Mozilla Firefox, I.net explorer 7.0 etc.,)

All the stakeholders who have connectivity can access huge amount of information.We expect that in agricultural organizations, connectivity is going to bestrengthened for effective use of this portal. Mobile interfaces will help reaching out

to farmers as well.

Knowledge Management in agriculture is relatively a new concept. The mammothtask of driving the knowledge sharing process in agriculture requires lot of efforts atvarious hierarchical levels among agricultural organizations. In India, there is anurgent and strong need to adapt the KM strategies in agriculture. In line with RKMP,there is a need to upscale KM initiatives in agriculture. But before that, relevanthuman resources, tools, processes, strategies should be in place to transformagricultural organizations into learning organizations. We are of the opinion thatframeworks and success stories of KM worldwide need to be analyzed to prepare aroad map for KM in Agriculture.

8.4. User experience on how RKMP has impacted user life?

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Photo: Director General (IRRI) visited RKMP at DRRand appreciated the efforts There has been a feltneed for a single gateway of knowledge usingdifferential platforms. It is expected that, theseplatforms will have high degree of consumeracceptance. RKMP has redefined the wayorganizations access rice related information in thecountry.

Many officials and delegates from ICAR and otherorganizations appreciated RKMP in various contextsabout its several global firsts in terms ofcomprehensiveness and utility (See Box 5).

Box 5: Users feedback

RKMP is one model we wish to promote for across agriculture & allied sectorsat country level. We are happy to have funded this innovative project Dr.Bengali Babu, National Director, NAIP

When the Principal Investigator has this kind of clarity, the projects ought tobe successful. Congratulations Prof. SL Mehta, Chairman, RPC NAIP

Amazing work Martin Parr, KM Programme Manager, CABI, UK

RKMP that it is the only portal with full and complete information on rice -Ms. Shilpa Deshpande from Symbiometrics Innovations Private Limited,Ahmedabad

I visited your RKMP and it is definitely a good resource ofinformation on rice. Congrats for the exhaustive work your team hasdone - Sarah M. Fernandes, Information and KnowledgeManagement, Africa Rice Center (AfricaRice), BENIN.

RKMP will eventually be admired as an outstanding mobilization ofICT and agri sciences. I can tell a good tech innovation when I seeone- believe me. RKMP is for me not only a product, but a model, aframework too. You can discontinue developing the product but youcan continue to refine the framework- that is how your leadershipwill come to be recognized

- Dr. Venkataraman BalajiDirector, Technology & Knowledge ManagementCommonwealth of Learning, Vancouver, BC, CANADA

9. ISSUES / CONSTRAINTS IN IMPLEMENTATION

Managing the information is the easiest job in the portal development. Difficult part of theportal development is bringing together the critical mass of scientists together fordeveloping the content. Lack of proper incentives and apathy in sharing the information isanother constraint faced by the team. This was overcome by providing the source nameand user details along with the content. Providing the name of the scientist/ stakeholderhas also added to the credibility of the content.

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The read and write web (Web 2.0 standards) are relatively new to the targeted users of theportal and it is believed that the sharing/contribution from the users is expected toincrease gradually.

IMPACT So far

It is too early for us toassess the impact. But

we have been trackingthe users satisfactionand global rank. As on28 December 2011 (sixmonths after launch ofthe Portal), the globalrank of the www.Rkmp.co.in is 3,86,572standing apart. TheIndian rank is about31,740 which is

remarkable. As on thisday, globally googlesearches on rice aredirecting to this portal.

10. CONCLUSION

RKMP is the first step in terms of the application of ICTs and KM strategies in agriculture tobuild a product like this semantic portal with enormous content. The portal which serves asan information highway for rice sector for farmers, researchers, extension professionals,policy makers, home makers, students etc. The vision is to realise higher productivity andproduction of rice through improved knowledge and skill sets. The efforts will pave the way

to reduce the gaps of the growing digital information divide specifically in the importantcereal crop of the country namely Rice. The success of these strategies can be up scaled toreach the rice stakeholders with more features and can be emulated in other importantcrops. The efforts are coinciding with the increasing technological advances, technologicalreach and ICT readiness at the grassroots level which is a positive signal for the moreinvestments.

The technology mediated knowledge management in agriculture is relatively new concept.While efforts are going on to address the digital divide in terms of connectivity whatappears to be limiting factor is the availability of relevant contextualized, validated contentin usable format. In the developing world, R and D organizations need to take up contentdevelopment on large scale so that the knowledge flows amongst agricultural stakeholders

are strengthened. Developing knowledge repositories require certain standards in terms ofmethodologies and frameworks. It is in this context, the case study of Rice KnowledgeManagement Portal is discussed in length for the benefit of those organizations that areplanning to develop and harness agriculture knowledge repositories as viable factors ofproduction.

Consortium Lead

Dr. Shaik N.Meera

Consortium Principal Investigator & SeniorScientist

Rice Knowledge Management Portal , DRR,

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Hyderabad, India

rtium Partners Name of the CoPIsuttack Dr. G.A.K. Kumar

T Hyderabad Dr. N T Yadurajuew Delhi Dr. P.S.Pandey Hyderabad Dr.C. Kathiresan

gricultural University, Ranchi Dr. B.N. SinghEH, Umiam (Barapani) Dr. A.K. MohantyMandyasity of Agricultural Sciences, Bangalore)

Dr. M.P. Rajanna

Karjatlasaheb Sawant Konkan Krishi Vidyapeeth,

Dr. Kunkerkar

atna Dr. M.C. Diwakarhilippines Dr. Noel Magoryderabad Dr. B Sailajayderabad Dr. Brajendrayderabad Dr. Chitra Shankeryderabad Dr. Mangal Sainyderabad Dr. P Muthuramanyderabad Dr. P Senguttuvelyderabad Dr. S Arun Kumar

* Consulting and Convergent PartnersThe RKMP Sub-project was funded by National Agricultural Innovation Project of IndianCouncil of Agricultural Research (ICAR), New Delhi.The Financial support received isgratefully acknowledged.

List of Abbreviations

ICAR Indian Council of Agricultural ResearchNAIP National Agricultural Innovation ProjectDRR Directorate of Rice ResearchRKMP Rice Knowledge Management PortalICTs Information and Communications TechnologiesAICRIP All India Coordinated Rice Improvement ProjectKM - Knowledge ManagementMT Million TonsMHa Million HectaresSWOT Strengths, Weaknesses/Limitations, Opportunities, and ThreatsRLOs Reusable Learning Objects

i3R India Rice Research RepositoryCMS Content Management SystemICRISAT International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid TropicsCDAC -Centre for Development of Advanced Computing

SAUs State Agricultural universitiesCRRI - Central Rice Research InstituteRIS Research Information SystemFAQs Frequently Asked QuestionsEAR Expert Answers on RiceRSS - Really Simple SyndicationMIS Management Information SystemEIS - Extension Information SystemOFT On farm TrialsFLD Frontline Demonstrations

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http://www.icar.org.in/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Crops_Research_Institute_for_the_Semi-Arid_Tropicshttp://www.cdac.in/http://www.cdac.in/http://crri.nic.in/http://www.icar.org.in/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Crops_Research_Institute_for_the_Semi-Arid_Tropicshttp://www.cdac.in/http://crri.nic.in/


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FIS - Farmers Information SystemIARI - Indian Agricultural Research InstituteGnIS - General Information SystemGIS - Geographic information systemDRD Directorate of Rice DevelopmentSIS - Service Information SystemGUI - Graphical user interfaceCMU - Consortium Monitoring UnitZARS Zonal Agricultural Research StationICAR-NEH - Indian Council of Agricultural Research Research Complex North East HillRegionRARS-K Regional Agricultural Research Station, KarjatBAU-R Birsa Agricultural University, RanchiCoPI Coordinating Principal InvestigatorLCMS - Learning Content Management SystemCPI - Consortium Principal InvestigatorGBPS Giga Bytes Per SecondR&D Research & DevelopmentWisy - Weed Information System

ITK - Indigenous Technical KnowledgeDNA Deoxyribo Nucleic AcidPCR - Polymerase Chain ReactionCoPs - Communities of PracticeSMS - Short Message ServiceCD Compact DiscKVK Krishi Vigyan KendraNGO Non Government organisationSDA State Department of AgricultureMSP Minimum Support PriceAPMC - Agricultural Produce Market CommitteeGovt. Government

ICT4D Information and Communication Technology for DevelopmentDDG Deputy Director GeneralCS Crop ScienceIRRI - International Rice Research InstituteCIMMYT - International maize and wheat improvement centerPIU Project Implementation UnitND National DirectorCL Consortium LeaderO&MAG Organization & Management Advisory CommitteeO&MPC - Organization & Monitoring Programme CommitteeRPC Research Programme Committee

CABI Center for Agricultural Bio-science InternationalCMA - Centre for Management in AgricultureIIMA - Indian Institute of Management, AhmedabadUSI - Unit of Simulation and Informatics

JNTU - Jawaharlal Nehru Technical UniversityUAS-B University of Agricultural Sciences, Bengaluru

References :

Tugrul Temel, 2004. "Mapping organisational linkages in the agricultural innovation systemof Azerbaijan," International Journal of Agricultural Resources, Governance and Ecology,Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 3(1), pages 134-153

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http://wikimapia.org/10018555/Indian-Agricultural-Reasearch-Institute-IARI-Pusa-Delhihttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geographic_information_systemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_user_interfacehttp://www.icar.org.in/http://www.outstart.com/outstart_lcms.htmhttp://www.icar.org.in/krishi-vigyan-kendra.htmhttp://www.icar.org.in/krishi-vigyan-kendra.htmhttp://irri.org/http://www.cimmyt.org/http://wikimapia.org/10018555/Indian-Agricultural-Reasearch-Institute-IARI-Pusa-Delhihttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geographic_information_systemhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_user_interfacehttp://www.icar.org.in/http://www.outstart.com/outstart_lcms.htmhttp://www.icar.org.in/krishi-vigyan-kendra.htmhttp://irri.org/http://www.cimmyt.org/


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Shaik N Meera, Mangal Sain, Muthuraman.P, Arun Kumar S, Sailaja B. , Jyothi SSP andViraktamath BC, (2010). Critical Analysis of E-learning opportunities and E-readiness in thePublic Extension System: Empirical evidence from Tamil Nadu. Journal of GlobalCommunication, Global Communication Research Association, Sydney. 3(2): 11-18.

Documents

Making of RKMP Shaik Meera