We are currently working on the following initiatives and ideas. If you are working on a similar topic or find an idea interesting, please contact us. We are very conscious of the sometimes wasteful redundancy in the development field and will always act in the interest of best efficiency, redirecting or joining efforts as the situation might require.
Price information, marketing, literacy and numeracy: MarketInfonet
MarketInfonet is yet an idea. An idea for an internet-based and mobile phone driven information, communication and learning system for small scale farmers and fishermen covering three areas: agricultural education, market information and basic skills training.
MarketInfonet aims to support small scale farmers
- to achieve better prices – by providing them with access to market information
- to improve their production, the quality of their produce – by offering information on agricultural techniques
- and to support their ability to make use of available information – by offering learning material for literacy and numeracy in reference to their everyday life.
A preliminary concept for project design, milestone plan and budget have been completed in cooperation with partners bringing together their special expertise and thus reflecting the three columns of MarketInfonet: agricultural expertise and knowledge of local circumstances come from the Ugandan Busoga Farmer Network (Bufanet). Competence in basic skills training as well as experience in international project work in general and project work in Africa in special come from the National Institute for Adult Continuing Education (NIACE). Avallain contributes its e-learning expertise to pitch this bold project idea. ( Image above courtesy of ITU )
Find out more about the idea of MarketInfonet in this article for the NRDC, our presentation at the International Conference of NRDC (PDF, 39 slides) and our blog post.
Market information: education for agricultural entrepreneurship
Agricultural knowledge and access to information on prizes is important – but not everything. Successful farming demands skills in trading and marketing: presentation, transportation, storage or book keeping are important aspects of the agricultural cycle. Farmers need to know what markets demand and respond these demands accordingly. They need to develop and enhance their production patterns, improve effectiveness, develop plans and strategies that stretch over the bare activities of planting and harvesting and include as well as the exploration of new markets, development of new products and possibilities of value addition to realise higher prizes to become able to invest in the ongoing advancement of their business and much more.
Vocational training / work skills: embedded learning in authentic scenarios
Today’s work life confront employees with increasing complex demands. In response employees have to constantly develop and expand multi-complex competences (rather than singular executive skills). For example “communicating effectively and appropriately with customers” is a competency that draws on an individual’s expertise in a particular area, knowledge of language, practical IT-, inter cultural and social skills and many more (e.g. on operation and procedures in the particular workplace, knowledge on communication and social interaction, inter cultural aspects, common courtesy, task and time management skills etc.). e-learning for development aims to offer appropriate measures enabling learners to develop and train these competencies in an authentic context. Mapping the learning in an environment, designed according to the real work life situation, supports transferability. In cooperation with the Swiss Association for International Cooperation Helvetas we explore the possibility of conducting part of training for hotel staff (receptionists, room service, etc.) within a tourism project in Kyrgyzstan by means of e-learning.
Basic Skills: literacy, numeracy, workskills, health, child nutrition
Basic Skills (including Literacy, Numeracy and Workskills such as cooperating with others, time and task management, etc.) represent the prerequisite enabling people to make use of information and available tools and acquire further skills. According to UNESCO more than 781 million adults is not literate (two-thirds of them women) while 75 million children are out-of-school. The condition for the possibility of development is the access to basic education. To make use of agricultural education, prize information systems or to use available learning material farmers must be able to read and write. To negotiate fair prizes they need to be able to do basic math. E-Learning for development can address these issues and basic skills by offering learning material that is using topics of everyday life such as comparing prizes, placing an order or aspects of hygiene, child nutrition, HIV prevention, and many more. We are working to find ways to offer our Basic Skills System to larger audiences at no or very low cost and to adapt it as far as necessary for specific infrastructure such as the XO.
