One of the contentious issues in ICM for Agricultural Development in the Asia-Pacific Region is in the inadequacy of useful and relevant agricultural information, its further generation and access. Generating and opening access to relevant and useful information for smallholder farmers and producers and small rural entrepreneurs engaged in agriculture related businesses and livelihoods needs high attention by all actors in agricultural development in the region.

 

An expert consultation was jointly organized by APAARI, GFAR, FAO, SAARC Agriculture Center and the Council for Renewable Natural Resources Research of Bhutan (CoRRB) with the Information and Communication Services (ICS) of the Ministry of Agriculture, the Royal Government of Bhutan to discuss and act on this issue.

 

The consultation stressed that access to agricultural information and its effective use by smallholder farmers in the Asia-Pacific region urgently require collective actions to implement policies and practices with targeted investment and capacity building in ICM, improve governance of agricultural information systems and strengthen partnerships and networks in support of opening access for greater sharing of agricultural data, information objects and knowledge by organizations, countries and communities in the region. A list of commitments by participating national systems in collective actions to improve accessibility and effective use of agricultural information was developed at the consultation and action to support the commitments is being followed up by the organizers.