Name of Proponent: Prof Anil K Gupta 

Address: Professor and Co-ordinator Honey Bee Network 
Telephone: 91-79-6307241 / 6307341
Fax: 91-79-6306896

Indian Institute of management 
Email: anilg@iimahd.ernet.in 
Vastrapur, Ahmedabad - 380015, INDIA

5. Participating Organizations: 

i) Indian Institute of Management
Vastrapur: Ahmedabad -380015, INDIA

ii) SRISTI 
( Society for Research and Initiatives for Sustainable Technologies and Institutions)
Post Box: 15051, Vastrapur, 
Ahmedabad - 380015, INDIA

iii) GIAN
Gujarat Grassroots innovations Augmentation Network
B-2, SRI Krishna Apartment
Near Lad Society, Vastrapur, 
Ahmedabad - 380054, INDIA

6. INFODEV Program Objective: 
II: Reducing poverty and exclusion of low income countries and social groups.

7. Category of Activity: 

IV: Demonstration project

8. Total Activity Cost: US$ 385,000

9. Funding Requested from INFODEV: US$ 250,000 

10. Abstract:

The developmental paradigm needs to undergo a fundamental shift from a) problem solving to solution augmenting; b) building upon what people do not have or know to what people have, know and excel in; and c) material resource-intensive approach to informational and intellectual resource-intensive approach. A network of knowledge-rich, economically-poor people around their knowledge base in real time can create opportunities for entrepreneurship and economic development. The proposal seeks to operationalize an electronic Knowledge Network (KN) of grassroots innovators scouted through various channels such as Honey Bee and SRISTI Network, a grassroots innovations augmentation network (GIAN), and a global registry of innovations. Apart from the opportunities for linking innovation with investment and enterprise, the Knowledge Network will also help in building bridges between formal and informal science, education, and learning communities.

11. Detailed Description: 

THE DEVELOPMENT PROBLEM

Background:

It was realized some eight years ago that, both on efficiency and ethical grounds, the prevalent modes of knowledge extraction from the people, and dissemination among them, were non-sustainable. Peoples' knowledge has been utilized in some cases for developing value-added products, for instance, in the herbal or plant-derived drug industry, or in improving crop productivity by using local land races. In either case, the beneficiaries of the value-added products were not the same as the providers of knowledge and the related resources - in this case biodiversity. In addition, there were large numbers of indigenous innovations, many of which were green such as herbal pesticides, veterinary medicine, farm implements, etc., which had never become the basis for modern technological development. While there were numerous public/private channels for diffusing innovations produced in the formal sector, similar channels for diffusion and value addition of informal innovations were not available. So much so that knowledge-rich economically-poor people could not benefit, particularly in marginal environments, from the formal technologies, nor could they learn from the informal innovations, due to lack of extensive knowledge networks. The local knowledge networks did exist within a community and were responsible for survival of disadvantaged people in regions where market and public systems were weak.

It was to overcome this gap that the Honey Bee Network was born eight years ago. It was started essentially to scout, experiment, improve if possible, and disseminate local innovations across language and cultural barriers. 

The Honey Bee Network has been documenting grassroots innovations for sustainable natural resource management for the last eight years and has built a database of thousands of such innovations. These innovations include a wide range of herbal, artisanal and other innovations for non-chemical pest control, veterinary medicine, animal health and productivity, soil and water conservation, growth promoters, farm implements, low-energy-requiring three-wheel tractors, a tilting bullock/camel cart, etc.

However, the Honey Bee is essentially a text-based network. This severely limits access by illiterate farmers. And, as time has passed, we have realized that real time connectivity must be organized among the grassroots innovators if green technologies are to be given a real thrust. 

One of the major impediments to the growth of grassroots innovations developed by farmers, artisans etc., has been found to be the lack of an appreciative but critical peer group. This happens through several socio-cultural processes, valid not just in developing countries: (a) Familiarity breeds contempt. People in the same village in which an innovator has developed a unique solution do not recognize and encourage the person till outsiders recognize the person. Sometimes the indifference may convert into much more aggressive contempt. (b) The innovations remain sub-optimal because feedback is not available in time or in sufficient detail. (c) Since there are only a few, or sometimes only one or two, innovators in a particular locality or village, the critical mass does not evolve, i.e. a peer group does not emerge locally. (d) Some of the extraordinary initiatives do not appear to be so to the person concerned till he/she is exposed to some other similarly unique ideas, etc. There may be many other factors that are responsible for lack of networking among grassroots innovators but it is obvious that lack of communication and awareness about each other is a major one. 

Cross-cultural fertilization of ideas and initiatives is one of the fundamental tenets of the Honey Bee Network. While it is true that considerable cultural diversity exists within India, it is also true that homogenization of expectations and perception through popular media masks some of these differences. Previous research by us has shown that there are sometimes extremely innovative and comparable solutions generated in other continents for solving similar problem such as the same pest in the same crop. Rhinoceros beetle on Coconut is a problem in Columbia, Sri Lanka, Karnataka and Gujarat. In each case some common and many dissimilar innovations have been developed. 

Major Limitations of the Honey Bee Network:

a) It relies primarily on textual communication in different languages, though, to some extent, face to face interactions do take place in the experimenters' club/workshops. Similarly, there are other diffusion strategies involving organization of stalls in cultural and agricultural fairs; biodiversity competitions among school children, college students and departmental officials; participation in a few exhibitions; on-farm research, etc. These are, by their nature, extremely time- and resource-intensive, and thus limited in their reach. 

b) The network, created at the Honey Bee central node and its regional language centers, receives queries from the farmers regarding some problems that they are facing, or comments on the solutions published in the newsletter. However, due to quarterly periodicity of the newsletter, the turnaround time of information and knowledge on different problems is very long. 

c) The incentives for sharing information, in anticipation of a quick response and feedback, are few because of point b) above. Similarly, the pressure on scientists to respond to farmers' queries is also low. One consequence of communication lags in the Honey Bee Network is that the competitive ability of non-chemical technologies, over the chemical and environmentally-unfriendly technologies, goes down. Unless the response time is quick and the quality of response is rich, the ability of green innovations to compete and survive in the marketplace is much reduced. 

d) In the absence of an electronic database which has the possibility of establishing contact between innovators, investors, and entrepreneurs (the golden triangle for rewarding creativity), the market potential of a large number of innovations is not fully realized. While the Web site does exist, the limited spread of the Internet in developing countries, and the even more limited knowledge networks in local languages, the triangle of creativity is not being formed. 

e) In the absence of any registration system which provides incentives to grassroots innovators for disclosing their innovations, the intellectual property rights get exhausted, to some extent due to publication of the innovation. The textual registration system may not be conducive to the existing electronic systems at WIPO, or other patent offices which may agree to register various innovations. 

THE PROPOSED SOLUTION

A long term solution to the problems described above is a three phase programme outlined in Annex 1 at the end of the Detailed Description. The activities in this programme for which infoDev support are requested make up Phase 1, and are set out below in more detail. 

The key activities to be pursued in order to tackle this Development Problem are:

A. Establish a Wide Area Network

(a) Establish an experimental wide area network known as the Knowledge Network (KN) among four or five rural Gandhian Institutions in Gujarat, already participating in the Honey Bee Network. This would enable farmer innovators from neighboring regions to have access to a much more rapid means of communication among themselves and with scientists, investors, entrepreneurs and green consumers. The information may be transmitted in textual, sound, or pix files, through the usual electronic channels. 

The connectivity with Internet will be explored only when WAN has been established and some nodes in other countries are identified. This is because of frequent unavailability of Internet connection (due to limited number of telephone lines and large number of subscribers), and marginal difference in cost.

(b) Simultaneously, at least two other nodes will be set up in cooperation with the NGOs in other states. 

(c) It will be possible for each node of the KN to communicate text files with each other node without requiring mediation of the central node.

(d) A Wall Magazine will be printed at each node, to post on paper on the wall of the Village Council Office or other central place, the exchanges on electronic bulletin boards, so that those who have not overcome hesitancy for using new technology will still get to know about new solutions and problems. This will also help in generating demand for databases available at each node. Even illiterate people will start discussing the ideas, and maybe the demand for adult literacy will go up.

(e) Farmer-to-Farmer exchange of tools, seeds and other materials may be encouraged. In addition, a virtual market for green products and other surplus products can be created to promote wider demand for local production. This opportunity will be particularly useful for organic food producers since the demand is scattered.

(f) Linkages will be facilitated with formal centres of excellence, such as science centres and colleges, so that feedback to and from them can be exchanged by farmers. The linkage among entrepreneurs, innovators and investors is another distinct possibility which will be tested during this project so that the process of converting innovations into commercializable technologies becomes faster.

(g) Existing telephone lines will be used except in the cases where direct transmissions through portable communications systems are planned. A colleague, Prof. Ashok Jhujunwalla from Indian Institute of Technology, Madras has developed a very efficient cordless communication system (Cordet) using the frequencies hitherto used by defense forces only. After liberalization of the policy, it opens new possibilities. Prof. Ashok has agreed to be on the Advisory Committee of the project and will help us from time to time. 

(h) A company has already planned setting up 5000 Internet kiosks in the next three years in India. Wherever their nodes overlap with ours, their backbone structure will also be available for the KN in due course.

(i) Remote sites, rich in knowledge but otherwise isolated from infrastructures, will be provided solar- and/or battery-powered satellite-linked direct access systems for mobile as well as stationary nodes. Thus the limits of telephone connectivity should not impinge on the Knowledge Network.

(j) The mobile nodes will take advantage of the traditional institutions such as weekly markets, where people gather to meet their basic needs in any case. There are also festivals and melas (congregations) at which temporary KN nodes will be set up so as to stimulate demand for real time exchange on grassroots innovations. This may also help in scouting new innovations from among the viewers. Economical wide screen projection systems which can work in moderate light also will be needed.

(k) Once multilanguage connectivity is established (see (m) below), notice boards and discussion boards on sustainable solution to problems of local natural resource management are active, and solution-based demand for articulating problems is created, an effort will be made to connect these farmers through the central node with farmers in other countries. Two nodes each in Africa and Latin America will be established in the second year. Contacts have already been established and preliminary discussions are going on under the aegis of the Honey Bee network.

B. Improve access for illiterates

(l) Facilitate access to the KN by illiterate farmers by attempting to transfer sound files, or instead, use a human interface to do the task of inputting text till farmers can manage it on their own. 

C. Reduce language barriers

(m) For communication across language barriers, a human interface at the central node will help in translating and broadcasting the problem or the solution on the KN. We are not trying automatic translation in this project. 

D. Provide access to database

(n) Since the solutions need not always arise afresh and from outside, access to the Honey Bee database, with or without an automated data retrieval system, will be necessary. This will require making the existing Honey Bee database compatible with the KN and accessible in different languages, through a human interface to begin with, and later in automated mode. 

(o) A multimedia database on innovations, in different languages, to be made available at specific nodes/sites. The problem of band width will not arise initially because the Multimedia Database (MMDB ) will not be put on the KN itself. Periodically, it will be updated at each site, for instance through CD-ROMs. The facility for producing CD ROMs is available in the city. This facility will be used on a payment basis till we acquire and build the capacity in-house.

(p) A server at the central node will be available for posting notices, archiving discussions, and searching the database at the central node. The database at the central node will always be more updated than the one available at regional nodes. Each local node will also have a textual database on innovations apart from the MMDB. A text-based database is accessible to literate people and will have much more information than the Multimedia Database to begin with. The MMDB, on the other hand, will be accessible to even illiterate people.

E. Prepare for expert systems

(q) Data for the development of an expert system will be gathered in Phase One, but the system itself will be developed and exploited in subsequent phases. An analysis of exchange and use of local and external information at each local node may help us understand the heuristics that different social groups/actors use for accessing or using information on innovations. The data on who uses, how, for what purpose, how often, with what effect, and with whom does he or she share it, will be some of the questions researched in a participative manner through research assistants posted at each node in Phase One. Research on heuristics will reveal whether the innovation generation and augmentation process becomes more interactive after this intervention. Expert systems will incorporate lessons of this process research so that any new learners anywhere in the world following the Knowledge Network approach may not find a road map, but develop the ability to identify useful and important milestones of learning along the way.

F. Link with other Initiatives

(r) International Network for Sustainable Technological Applications and Registrations (INSTAR): the problem of intellectual property rights of grassroots innovators is being tackled with the help of a grant from the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), project 96-0623. This is a subject which I am going to pursue with WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization) in Geneva. The idea has been mentioned only to show linkages with other initiatives. 

(s) It is also likely that the goals of GIAN (Gujarat Grassroots Innovation Augmentation Network) - an organization already set up in close collaboration with Gujarat Government, as a follow up of ICCIG (International Conference on Creativity and Innovation at Grassroots Jan 11-14, 1997), in collaboration with IIMA and SRISTI and the Honey Bee Network - will be pursued through this Knowledge Network. The GIAN mainly aims at linking grassroots Innovators, Investors and Entrepreneurs so that innovations can be converted into commercial or otherwise products and services. In turn, this process will provide incentives for innovation and also conservation. 

G. Carry out training/awareness building/capacity building

A: Technical

Familiarity and demystification of technology of computers, use of image capture technology to transmit pix files of handwritten ideas (textual and pictures) instead of word-processed text. Operating MMDB as well as textual database. Email connectivity, use of modems etc., so that fear of something going wrong can be overcome.

Recording of sound files for transmission by those who cannot write or want their ideas to go as such. Technical training will also be needed at the nodes in science centres ( such as an agricultural university) so that scientists can operate the systems and respond to queries when necessary.

B: Institutional

The ownership of the experiment will determine whether it lasts or not. More importantly, whether private or cooperative investment ever flows in the setting-up of nodes will determine the real valuation of information and that, too, of the green type. 

The learning process, rather than training, will be the key approach for creating and managing common property resource. It is important to underline that, in a stratified society having all kinds of social and cultural cleavages, it will require developing special norms, or collectively evolved rules, so as to provide access to weaker sections of the society. 

Sharing of information and protection of IPRs of the innovators are mutually conflicting goals and only the development of a registration system (akin to a petty patent systems or INSTAR) will help resolve that issue. Voluntarism for providing assistance to illiterate farmers to participate in the discussions on various innovations will be very vital for the institution-building process.

C: Socio-cultural

The access of women to public amenities such as the Knowledge Network nodes will not be easy and automatic. This will require development of special mechanisms, incentives and also sanctions so that the women have exclusive access at a time when it is convenient to them. Similarly lower caste people will have to be empowered to use this facility lest the new technology widens the gaps instead of lessening it. Since innovations emerge at all scales and among all groups, and in various sectors, this may help raise the respect for innovators, no matter from which social class. Such has been the experience of the Honey Bee Network so far, in any case. 

Democratization of knowledge may thus unleash new dynamics in rural society. Focus on alternative technologies developed at grassroots level will also aid this dynamic.

H. Foresee sustainability

The Gujarat government is closely involved with the Gujarat Grassroots Innovation Augmentation Network (GIAN), but SRISTI is independent. A proposal for PDF B has been in discussion with UNDP and is likely to be finally submitted to GEF next week or soon after. The PDF B is a grant to prepare a large proposal supported by GEF in collaboration with Government of Gujarat, Union Ministry of Environment and Forests, which has supported our GEF application, and other stake holders including IIM-A and other NGOs. 

I met the Swiss Development Cooperation on November 24, 1997 in Bern and, from their response so far, it appears that they may also get involved. However, no commitment has yet been made. Neither has IDRC made a commitment beyond the present project in areas directly touching this proposal.

We hope that some other measures such as royalty income from commercialization, income from lending the Knowledge Network for market research by other agencies, and probable payment by the users if they find services satisfactory and contribute towards their reduction of cost, improvement in productivity and income and also sustainability of their ecosystems health. There is a possibility that some companies may set up Internet kiosks in many villages having populations above ten thousand in the next few years. One such company has approached us to be a partner in a project of this kind where farmers could use the database provided by us. But by responding to some other market research queries they may also earn resources to access the database without additional cost. We are still developing this idea but we are certainly concerned with long term viability of the network and the infrastructure. We hope that market researchers might be willing to defray the cost if they find this network more effective in generating feedback to various products and services compared to other alternatives. That would mean that the Honey Bee network will have to compete with other networks based on the same infrastructure in the long run. This might do well in terms of client orientation and responsiveness in real time. Even green technologies can do with some competition so that the system doesn't develop slack.

OUTPUTS

These networks will generate peer groups which will not only help in speeding up the process of invention, innovation and experimentation but also help in assessment of innovations that need to be taken up for further value addition. Real time connectivity, through an electronic multilanguage multimedia interface, will help overcome barriers of literacy and language for mutual learning. This project will only help in demonstrating the potential of the idea. Large scale replication will of course require much more resources.

BENEFITS

Speeding up the process of learning among grassroots innovators, many of whom have to be very efficient because of working under highly constrained environments, and yet are environmentally friendly due to closer touch with nature and superior eco-ethical values. 

Incentives for biodiversity and natural resource conservation through market mediation rather than reliance of state largess. 

An alternative paradigm of development, relying on what people excel in and are rich in ( i.e knowledge).

Demonstration of what multimedia technology can do to overcome barriers to societal learning and advancement of educational goals, compatible with excellence, ethics, efficiency, equity and environment.

RISKS 

The cross cultural barriers to sharing and building upon each other's ideas and feedback may take time to evolve due to historical deprivation, exploitation by outsiders and lack of any intellectual property rights system accessible to small innovators, unable to hire costly attorneys

The goals are ambitious and somewhat diffused and thus it is possible that equal progress will not be made on all the goals.

ANNEX 1: 

PROPOSED LONG TERM SOLUTION 

(Only Phase 1 is included in this infoDev- funded Activity)

The idea of the infodev proposal emerged when Prof. Anil Gupta presented a paper on Protection of IPRs of Third World Innovators and Scientists at AIPPI Forum at Interlaken, September 1996. Mr. Carlos Braga introduced the concept of Infodev and showed interest in the idea of Honey Bee Network. Accordingly, this proposal evolved with the cooperation of SRISTI, IIMA, and GIAN. 
The key elements of the proposed solution are the following:

Phase 1:

a) Demonstration of the advantage of real time multi language and multimedia based wide area network. The connectivity with Internet will be explored only when WAN has been established and some nodes in other countries are identified. The search for global nodes has been on during last eight years but the current phase will focus on WAN among farmers in Gujarat to begin with. 

b) Simultaneously at least two other nodes will be set up in cooperation with the NGOs in other states. 

c) Once multi-language connectivity is established, notice boards and discussion boards on sustainable solution to problems of local natural resource management are active and solution based demand for articulating problems is created, effort will be made to connect these farmers through the central node with farmers in other countries. 

d) Since the solutions need not always arise afresh and from outside, access to Honey Bee database with or without automated data retrieval system will be necessary. This will require making existing Honey Bee database compatible with WAN and accessible in different languages through human interface to begin with and later in automated mode. 

Phase 2:

e) Development of multimedia database accessible through Web as well as otherwise to potential investors and financial institutions. The idea is to keep the database or a terminal at places frequented by the entrepreneurs (such as financial institutions, marketing hubs, technology parks, etc.) and encourage entrepreneurs to explore the possibility of converting some of the innovations into commercial products.

f) The multimedia database having multi-language interface will also be useful for innovators apart from attracting entrepreneurs and investors from different regions. The database will be hosted at SRISTI site and it will help explore the possibility of finding voluntary or other supporters and stake holders in grassroots innovations. The queries received from the potential entrepreneurs and investors will be forwarded to the innovators connected to the WAN described above or even if unconnected. It is here that the existing social and inter-organizational network of Honey Bee will come to the rescue and help in connecting electronic and textual databases. It is possible that there will be some nodes where cassette players will be provided so that communications through recorded messages, questions, answers could take place to overcome the barriers of literacy. 

Phase 3:

The knowledge network will be activated in different countries both in north and south among scientists, organic farmers, green consumers and marketeers, venture capitalists, etc., so that following three goals are achieved:

i) Real time connectivity among problem and solution generators across the globe particularly among those interested in green innovations

ii) Exploration of forming golden triangle across the world so that a small scale entrepreneur in say, Canada may source an innovation in India, seek funds from US or Canada and set up an enterprise in South Africa or a Latin American country. The forces of globalization will be harnessed for grassroots innovations so as to counteract the increasing monopolization of market place by few players. Such a monopolization is neither in the interest of democracy, polycentric economic development nor will help move the factors of production to their most favoured and efficient locations and entrepreneurial targets. 

iii) The incentives for conservation have to emerge essentially through value addition as already being tried at small scale by SRISTI through IDRC support and earlier through the support from PEW Conservation Scholar Award. However, without these incentives, the conservation of biodiversity and other natural resources cannot be achieved by keeping people poor. The economic opportunities available in the markets of developed countries through increasing green consumerism are enormous. This potential demand can provide a market mediated model of poverty alleviation, biodiversity conservation, and innovation augmentation if the proposed knowledge networks around the world are created and operationalised. 

The greatest hope for such a thing to happen lies in our faith in the increasing voluntary spirit and emerging civic society consciousness in north and south which believes in providing fair opportunity to efficient and environmental-friendly solutions to be scaled up. If such a model does not exist today despite millions being spent on information technology or on poverty alleviation, it only shows poverty of imagination and timidity of thinking among the elite institutions and global institutional leaders. In any case no major reform has often come from the top. The simmering from the grassroots captured by Honey Bee network of creativity and innovation will eventually stir the conscience of civil society and other institutions of establishment.

12. Evaluation Indicators: 

a) Whether some communities, first within Gujarat and then in India, can communicate among themselves in real time around specific problems and solutions of sustainable agriculture and natural resource management. 

b) Whether KN can help forge new partnerships across sectors and regions among grassroots innovations with investors and entrepreneurs using electronic information technology.

c) A comparison will be made of the advantages of real time connectivity with a control group in which network is active without such connectivity. It will be better to do that within Gujarat where other inputs will be constant. 

d) The growth of ideas as a consequence of feedback from the peer group of farmers and also from scientists connected to the network can be compared with and without an electronic network. 

e) Other indicators of evaluation could be the growth of the database, the number of cross-regional contacts, and the number of new enterprises mediated by the network. 

f) A sample survey of existing resource management practices will be undertaken to benchmark the status of local/indigenous knowledge, practices and innovations. This will help in gauging the impact of the electronic WAN and the text-based Honey Bee Network. 

13. Geographic Scope: 

Gujarat in India to begin with but later it may have country and globe wide implications

14. Does the activity create or acquire physical or intellectual assets? Yes

Software, data bases, and these will be protected in such a way that communities are not prevented from accessing these tools but others are prevented from pirating it. Similarly, INSTAR is expected to provide some kind of petty patent protection. 

15. Key Contacts 

Prof Anil K Gupta
Indian Institute of Management
Ahmedabad - 380015
anilg@iimahd.ernet.in  
FAX: 91 79 6427896, 6307341 
PHONE: +91 79 6307241 , 6307341 , 6564979 (R)
and 
Coordinator
SRISTI
sristi@ad1.vsnl.net.in 

sristi@sristi.org 
http://csf.colorado.edu/sristi 

16. Staffing 

Computer professionals, editors, community researchers, IPR attorney etc

17 Time Table:

Month 1: Model implementation of KN within IIMA campus using the existing infrastructure. A demonstration node of KN will be permanently created at IIMA so that visiting innovators, scientists and policy makers can interact with grassroots innovators. 

Month 3: establishing understanding with participating communities, innovators and institutions

Month 4: Workshop of Stake holders

Month 6: determination of benchmarks of knowledge/innovations and practices 

Month 9: establishment of five nodes in Gujarat. Contact with other potential partners will be started right away.
Months 12-15: nodes outside Gujarat within India

Month 18: nodes outside India; Workshop of Stake holders

Month 21: Workshop of Stake holders to review the effectiveness and efficiency of KN

Month 24: evaluation of indicators and report writing begins

Month 30: Phase Two proposal draft discussion

18. Activity Budget: US $ 385,000 (Phase I)

19. Source of Funds

Infodev US$ 250,000

GEF and UNDP (to be determined)

The commitments are awaited from SDC and Global Environmental Facility. The proposals are under discussion with both agencies. A private philanthropic foundation, Sadbhav Trust has shown 
interest in supporting SRISTI to set up a lab to add value to biological diversity and related knowledge systems. The expected budget support is likely to be Rs.25,00,000 (USD 60,000)

In-kind contribution (volunteer time, office space, etc.) US$ 135,000


20. World Bank Staffing Support:

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