Brief Project Background

M S Swaminathan Research Foundation (MSSRF) believes that information and communication technologies can play a major role in environmentally sustainable rural development, not only reaching the poor but also helping them to achieve food security and social justice.

MSSRF held an Interdisciplinary Dialogue on Information Technology : Reaching the Unreached in January 1992. The dialogue participants concluded that ICTs would have a major role to play in promoting sustainable agriculture and rural development in the developing world. To be of use to farm families, the generic information found in the networks, including the Internet, should be rendered into locality-specific knowledge that farm families, and rural women and men, can act on. This was the model adopted for implementation in this project. The Foundation''s approach to dissemination of new technologies in rural areas is premised on the statement of its Founder, Professor M.S.Swaminathan: "whenever poor people derive some benefit from technology, the rich also benefit; the opposite does not happen". Advantages for women also have an extensive effect, because “when women derive benefit, the whole family derives benefit”. The MSSRF project includes a special effort to benefit rural women.

In an experiment in electronic knowledge delivery to the poor, we have connected ten villages near Pondicherry in southern India by a hybrid wired and wireless network -- consisting of PCs, telephones, VHF duplex radio devices and email connectivity through dial-up telephone lines -- that facilitates both voice and data transfer, and have enabled the villagers to get information that they need and can use to improve their lot. The entire project draws its sustenance from the holistic philosophy of Swaminathan, which emphasizes an integrated pro-poor, pro-women, pro-nature orientation to development and community ownership of technological tools against personal or family ownership, and encourages collective action for spread of technology. The bottom up exercise involves local volunteers to gather information, feed it into an Intranet and provide access through nodes in different villages. Value addition to the raw information, use of the local language (Tamil) and multimedia (to facilitate illiterate users) and participation by local people right from the beginning are the noteworthy features of the project. Most of the operators and volunteers providing primary information are women, thus giving them status and influence. All centres evolved themselves to meet the information demands made by the community.

The project began in 1998 at the village of Villianur, 20km from Pondicherry, in Union Territory of Pondicherry, South India. The first efforts of villagers and project staff were to develop mutual understanding. In Pondicherry we have certain initial advantages: an accessible government and reasonable telecom infrastructure. The level of poverty is high in rural areas. An earlier program of the Foundation for community asset building based on biological technologies had been fully operational in this region and the ICT project was expected to complement this program.

From the earlier research we noticed two striking features. One is, 11 villages in the area around Villianur had a population of 22,000 but only 12 public telephones and 27 private telephones – an average of not even 1 phone per 500 people. Reach of electronic media, especially television, is reasonably high when one considers the prevalence of poverty in the villages surveyed. Most of the households are below poverty households; the total annual income of the household is less than 350 USD (Rs 16000) per annum.

To understand the communication habits of the population in the rural areas, especially among the poorer households, we conducted detailed survey in 1998 covering 10% of the resident families in the area. The predominant sources of information are the local shop keeper, the market place, and the input supplier. A very considerable amount of information transaction takes place between the rural poor households and this also acts as a primary source of information. The linkages with external institutions were normally weak. Project work during the mobilization phase determined that the information requirements of the villagers could best be met by strengthening the existing linkages. The generic knowledge from external sources would have to be transformed – that is, selectively compiled, edited, and integrated with local knowledge – to become relevant or useful in the local context. Hence, the project gave highest priority to locally relevant information.

This project uses a hub and spokes model with Villianur as the hub center. Our project staff operates this. Other village knowledge centers were set up on the basis of community's willingness and on their demand. The KCs are located in temples, panchayat office, govt. building, noon meal programme center and in one case in a private residence.

Prior to setting up these Village Knowledge Centers, participatory rural appraisal was carried out in the hamlets. In each case, the community has identified and provided an accessible place and two to four volunteers. The community also agrees to provide quality space rent-free and agrees to compensate the volunteers whenever needed. The volunteers are young men and women chosen by the community. They manage the village center on a voluntary basis. The project pays NO money to them. In turn, the project provides all the needed equipment, training and data. An MOU is signed to this effect and is renewed whenever necessary.

Participatory rural appraisal (PRA) was used as a method to identity information needs in any community. PRA was also used to assess how far the community was willing to go in operationalising the local center, by way of making in-kind or cash contributions. This was also used in the identification of a group of individuals who would be chosen by consensus by the community for managing the local center. The project staff suggested that 50% of them must be women and that they should have sufficient education (at least up to high school).

The village center operators were trained in PC operations and in using the data-cum voice network. They were trained in maintaining a register to log use of the center by the local residents. Training was also imparted in basics of management, and in handling queries from illiterates. The staff in the centers frequently met them, and all the center operators and the staff met once every month (the last Saturday) to sort out issues. This also helped the project staff in maintaining a view of the changes in the community needs and perceptions.

Gender concerns are central to the project. We believe it is essential for success. More than half the volunteers are women. It was a deliberate decision. This has positively reflected on the increase in the number of women users as well. In the evening some KCs provide counseling to women. Most of them form Self Help Groups and use the loans for education of children and starting cottage industries. KCs help women get training related to new economic opportunities like incense stick manufacturing, and mushroom production. Handling of PC and answering men’s questions give women new confidence and status in the community. In the fishermen village women users are less. They get most of the news through public address system. Many women tell us that they do not have enough time to visit the center because of their house and labour work. Some women obtain the information from women who have visited the KC.

An evaluation of this project, entirely participatory in character, was conducted last year as part of the PANAsia Telecenter Learning and Evaluation process, which was derived from the IDRC-supported meeting on Telecenter Evaluation (Val Morin, Quebec, Sep-99). Significant outcomes of the project, as found in the evaluation report, are presented below
· The hub-and-spokes model of a value-addition center (at Villianur) linked to village knowledge centers (numbering nine) is a workable model;
· Pro-active intermediaries at the village centers (identified by the community and trained by the project staff) have contributed much to the success of the project;
Introduction of ICTs in the rural setting has led to creation of a community asset; besides it has led to empowerment of the users.

Creation and updating of relevant content to suit local needs is a key factor in the programme. Unless people get what they want – unless they get answers to their queries – they will lose interest in the whole programme. The value addition center in Villianur has generated a number of databases to fulfill many of these requirements. Most of them are frequently updated. A considerable part of information is accessed from the local sources. All the databases are in Tamil except one on below-poverty-line families which is an official document in English. Local volunteers facilitate the users to know if they were listed under BPL. We have created Rural Yellow Pages, and permit people to insert advertisements. For example, one can know who is renting a tractor and at what price. A tailor buying a new sewing machine can announce the sale of his old machine and someone renovating house can announce the sale of old tiles and bricks

Results

Here is how Celia Dugger's news story in New York Times begins: "EMBALAM, India -- In this village the century-old temple has two doors. Through one lies tradition. People from the lowest castes and menstruating women cannot pass its threshold. Inside, the devout perform daily pujas, offering prayers. Through the second door lies the Information Age, and anyone may enter. In a rare social experiment, the village elders have allowed one side of the temple to house two solar-powered computers that give this poor village a wealth of data, from the price of rice to the day's most auspicious hours." Caste-based divisions is still a major problem in southern India, and our project has made a minor dent. We have also shown that ICTs, which normally excerbate the economic and social divides, can be made an ally in the equity movement, if used intelligently and innovatively. More than half the population has used our centres, and we have analysed user needs and satisfaction levels. Besides, we had an international team evaluate our project and on their suggestion, we collect successful stories and anecdotes from the user community.

We have shown that empowering people through access to timely and relevant information can make a difference in the life of the rural poor. We have also demonstrated that new ICTs can play a crucial role in this effort. Information provided in the village knowledge centres is locale specific and relates to prices of agricultural inputs (such as seeds, fertilizers, pesticides) and outputs (rice, vegetables), market (potential for export), entitlement (the multitude of schemes of the central and state governments, banks), health care (availability of doctors and paramedics in nearby hospitals, women’s diseases), cattle diseases, transport (road conditions, cancellation of bus trips), weather (appropriate time for sowing, areas of abundant fish catch, wave heights in the sea), etc. Unique to our project is the fact that most information is collected and fed in by the local community itself. The centres are operated by local volunteers.

Prior to commencing content-building activity, extensive consultations were held with the participating village communities through small groups. It emerged that provision of dynamic information on prices and availability of inputs for cultivation -seeds, fertiliser or pesticides - was important to all farmers, especially the medium and small farmers. Knowledge of grain sale prices in various markets in and around Pondicherry is critical to farmers during the harvest season. This information helps the farmers market his produce profitably. We also provide information on wave heights 24 hours in advance to the fisherman for their safety while at sea.

From our user register, we find that most of the villagers use our entitlement database. There are 180 Government schemes based on income and social security needs. Once villagers became aware of the programs, some of them became proactive in initiating a dialog with the Governmental machinery by applying for soft loans, training programs, etc. and get the benefit. Incidentally, as the programmes become widely known, we find greater transparency in governance.

Citizens' Charter provides information from Government Departments such as activities currently being carried out and the procedure to obtain the various entitlements. We provide addresses of contact persons, details of schemes, application forms, etc.

The various farm practices for crops help the farmers to plan farm management and adopt technology developed by various research institutions. These databases help farmers to save their crops from various pests and improve their productivity.

Education database describes the courses available in nearby schools, colleges and also neighboring states along with cost information. We also provide several suggestions regarding industrial training related courses, collected from various journals, professors and experts under the Education Treasury database. Young people are keen on this. We also provide public school examination results for the children of our communities.

In Pondicherry, many of the primary health centers are operated by male doctors. Users register showed women had only cold and fever. But when we organized health camps with the support of JIPMER we found that women, as expected, were suffering from other ailments as well. From the health camps we found that a large number of cataract patients required medical attention. We conducted an eye camp with the support of Aravind Eye Hospital. After attending the camps, women in rural families become interested in obtaining health-related information, particularly concerning disorders in the reproductive tract, and in child health.

The village centres, according to them, should provide such information in a substantial way. Regularly we get health information from Aravind Eye Hospital. We have developed a multimedia flash card presentation. Many people have watched this small presentation.

Telephone numbers of govt. departments and names of contact persons are very useful to the villagers. For instance, local goons in Embalam village started cutting down trees in a village neighborhood, villagers rushed to the KC and located the Forest Department phone number and used the telephone in KC to inform the Forest Department officials of the illegal tree felling. In this instance the wood was impounded and culprits arrested. Many people use addresses of doctors, especially specialists, and ambulance services, for their family, and addresses of veterinarians for their livestock. Many rural people have taken group insurance based on the insurance database. Employers like Hindustan Lever Limited and Ponds send messages to the KCs to let the villagers know that they will be visiting the village on a given day and time for recruitment. Some young men and women have got jobs in educational, police and fire service departments.

We introduced a daily news item called Farmers diary in which we provide information on technologies relevant to Agriculture and Animal Husbandry. The aim of the Farmers Dairy is to alert farmers by giving them information on Agriculture Farming Practices relevant to main crops like paddy, sugarcane, cotton, pulses, cereals and horticulture crops. We obtain information from Agriculture university magazines, individuals, research stations, and indigenous farming practices shared by the farmers in magazines.

The Dairy for animal husbandry aims to give information on animal health practices suggested by Tamil Nadu Veterinary University, research stations and farmers' indigenous animal health practices. Many farmers informed us that Farmers Dairy is very useful for them.

Lessons

Many distinguished leaders of the world, journalists, representatives of governments and NGOs have visited our villages and appreciated the work. Bruce Alberts, in his presidential address to the Fellows of the US National Academy of Sciences, told "I want to highlight a wonderful example that points the way forward. As mentioned previously, the M.S. Swaminathan Foundation has established an experimental network in India that will soon connect more than 20 isolated rural villages to a wireless Internet service. About half of the population in most of these villages has a total family income of less than $25 per month. The project is designed to provide knowledge on demand to meet local needs using the World Wide Web, and it does so through a bottom-up process. The process starts with volunteer teams that help poll the villagers to find out what knowledge they want. Particularly popular thus far are women's health information, advice on growing local crops and protecting them from diseases, the daily market prices for these crops, local weather forecasts, and clear information about the bewildering array of programs that are provided by the Indian government to aid poor families. Drawing on this concept, I envision a global electronic network that connects scientists to people at all levels -- farmers' organizations and village women, for example. The network will allow them to easily access the scientific and technical knowledge that they need to solve local problems and enhance the quality of their lives, as well as to communicate their own insights and needs back to scientists."

Prof. Swaminathan, the architect of India's Green Revolution, was always concerned that all the benefits of science, technology and development do not reach the poor. He was also greatly concerned about the tremendous differences new technologies, especially ICTs, could bring about between the rich and the poor. He wanted to use the very same ICTs to bring about greater opportunities for the poor and to usher in an era of job-led growth.

Development Impacts

We are using both traditional and modern technologies to spread the information to the villages. Two years ago we introduced public address system in Veerampattinam. The main purpose of the system is to announce the wave height and weather reports. Due to the salty wind, cable wires and some systems were damaged. This year MSSRF and Veerampattinam village shared the costs and replaced all the old wires, and painted the old public address systems to protect them for corrosion. Now the system is also used for announcing various government schemes related to fisherman on a regular basis, such as when the local fair price shops distribute rice, kerosene, and sugar, fish market details, etc.

The installation of a powerful light on top of the Spread Spectrum Antenna (used for communication) has proved to be a boon to the fishermen of Veerampattinam who go for fishing in the night. Even on a misty winter night they could now identify their village and more importantly know the whereabouts of rocks in the sea. This focusing light is useful to save their time, diesel and to avoid damages of nets by the rocks.

We introduced video conferencing by web camera through Spread Spectrum technology in Villianur, Veerampattinam and Emabalam. This is very helpful for Self Help Groups (SHGs) cleared their doubts regarding the loan repayment schemes from Bank Managers. Often, Emabalam and Veerampattinam school children use this facility to get their doubts in their schoolwork cleared.

In Embalam, a washerwoman, who had to collect the clothes from her clients standing outside their homes, is now a volunteer operating computers and dispensing information, and people come and ask her for information! In Thirukanchi the Dalit landless labourers used to get their tea at the local tea stall served in glasses meant for them; the upper caste people would not use those glasses. After some of the Dalits started working in our Thirukanchipet KC, they became emboldened to challenge this practice. They started to write poems of Bharati condemning caste-based discrimination on the KC notice boards. Now there is only one set of glasses in the tea stall. In yet another development landless labourers receiving part of their wages in kind now get the correct wages fixed by the Department of Labour.

The question of content creation is crucial to this project. The village residents are most interested in dynamic and customized information. This is a resource-intensive activity and has implications for sustainability in view of the potential of involving more locals to create and manage local and customized information content. An encouraging development in this regard is that some village knowledge centers create the contents related to Agriculture, Animal Husbandry, Education, Employment, Health, Govt. announcements, Income generating enterprises, general information and environment. Even after MSSRF withdraws from the scene they will create the content on a regular basis and share the information between them. We also use media professionals to help rural areas create their own content.

This year we are conducting a survey of both users and non-users in five villages. This is an ongoing process. This survey gives very interesting results. People derive economic benefit from employment news, crop and fish market details, and computer training. They also rate information on loans/ govt. entitlement news and farmer dairy news high. Real estate agents and small merchants finalise trading deals through wireless phones. Weather and wave height, education details, daily news, recipes, notice board announcements, important phone nos., transportation and power cut details, public address system announcements benefit in intangible ways. Women are very interested in health information, recipes, naming new born babies based on the stars. Computer training for the ladies and children in the local village ensures safety, saves time and money. Most of the non-users told they could not find time due to labour and office work. Some feel shy because they are uneducated, old people are not sure if they would get respect from the young volunteers. Some old men avoid the center because they are run by women! The community wants us to provide training in micro-enterprises and to provide flash news on computer screen using multimedia, to increase the working hours of the hub and KCs. Some women are advised by their husband not to go to the centre, Some need computer training certificates. Fishermen would like to have two way communication between sea and shore, and training in protein extraction from fish.

So far we have not paid any money to the village volunteers. Already five villages take care of telephone bill and Internet browsing charges. All the village knowledge centers take care of the cost of furniture and electricity. Two villages raised money themselves and built a new building for knowledge centers. Five villages allow volunteers to earn money through job typing, designing wedding cards, PCO / STD facility, computer training, and games. The local temple and Panchayat also allot some money to the maintenance of KCs.

We realise that one way to achieve sustainability is through forging partnerships. We now have close relationship with government departments. Department of agriculture wants to link three farm clinics to our hub and launch www.pondyagrimarket.com. Department of Science and technology wants to replicate this experiment to all the villages in the Union Territory of Pondicherry. They already share the costs of setting up five knowledge centers. Department of Statistics uses our network to disseminate agriculture related information to villagers. Also their staff use our centers to transmit statistical data collected in the field to their head office. Police & Fisheries departments already share their contents with hub center. Department of Education shows interest to link their Adult Education Programme with the knowledge centers. District Rural Development Agency (DRDA) wants to link more than 500 women self help groups (SHGs) (micro credit and savings group) to rural knowledge centres for increasing their knowledge and income. We provide content for many All India Radio programmes relevant to rural communities. Major donor organizations and several international institutions want to get their developing country partners trained by us.

Project Information

Contact Information