Social Norms
Social norms action with informed and engaged societies
Social Norms
After nearly 28 years, The Communication Initiative (The CI) Global is entering a new chapter. Following a period of transition, the global website has been transferred to the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) in South Africa, where it will be administered by the Social and Behaviour Change Communication Division. Wits' commitment to social change and justice makes it a trusted steward for The CI's legacy and future.
 
Co-founder Victoria Martin is pleased to see this work continue under Wits' leadership. Victoria knows that co-founder Warren Feek (1953–2024) would have felt deep pride in The CI Global's Africa-led direction.
 
We honour the team and partners who sustained The CI for decades. Meanwhile, La Iniciativa de Comunicación (CILA) continues independently at lainiciativadecomunicacion.com and is linked with The CI Global site.
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Agritools Project

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Since 2014, the Agritools multi-media project is providing an online platform to document and better understand the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in the field of agriculture, fisheries, and livestock. The platform was created in order to provide a forum to exchange information, ideas, and resources related to the use of ICT for sustainable agriculture and rural development. This journalistic research project began with information collected during field work in Senegal, Kenya, Uganda, and Ghana, and crowdsourced information is being used to update the platform tools. Agritools is co-funded by the Innovation Grant Programme in Development Reporting (IDR), with the support of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation through the European Journalism Centre (EJC).
Communication Strategies

The Agritools interactive online platform shares information and documents related to ICT for Agriculture projects and start-ups in Africa working in this field. It was created to "try to explain how African tech innovations and technology-based startups are revolutionizing the agribusiness sector and promoting the development of cultural values and rural policies." At the beginning of the project, the researchers consulted with CTA in Netherlands and the Food and Agriculture Organisation in Italy, before going into the field to meet famrers, experts, startups, and other development actors in Senegal, Kenya, Uganda, and Ghana to explore successful stories and the factors that lead them to succeed.

The project makes use of two key research tools/ platforms:

  • An interactive map of Africa with short video documentaries of stories from the African research trip, as well as a research trip to Netherlands and Italy. The map plots the location of projects, and shares details about the initiative. For example, there is a video story of a 23-year-old man who built an application to help farmers. Additional information is being added from the crowdsourced stories.
  • A crowdsourced storytelling space was developed in collaboration with e-Agriculture, a community of practice focusing on ICT for sustainable agriculture and rural development. The project uses this forum to collect stories from the field about ICT for agriculture initiatives. Start-ups, groups of young people, farmers, and organisations involved in an ICT project in the agriculture, fisheries, or livestock sectors are invited to send through their experiences.

In order to share the information with a wider audience, the Agritools reports are also being published in national and international media. As a next step, the plan is to create local hubs of young people interested in the topic, who will be able to explore the sector and sensitise and encourage other youngsters to work in agriculture. People can also interact with Agritools through the AgriTools facebook page and follow Agritools on Tumblr.

Development Issues

Agricture, New technologies

Partners

Innovation Grant Programme in Development Reporting (IDR), Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, European Journalism Centre (EJC)

Sources

AgriTools website, e-Agriculture website, AgriTools on Tumblr, and Journalism Grants website on July 3 2015.