^{INTERNET AS A NEW FACTOR OF AGRARIAN DEVELOPMENT}

^{Dr. Alexander O. Makeev}

^Director

^{Foundation for Agrarian Development Research (FADR)}

^{Moscow, Russia}

^{Since the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the Russian agrarian sector has been going through a transition in which no concrete strategies for change have emerged. Collective and state farms have dissolved, and some have been replaced by individual farms with little capital. Lack of the State support and the price disparities caused the situation in which the rural people have limited knowledge of how to operate in this new atmosphere. At the same time, the officials responsible for agrarian reform have limited knowledge of what is really happening at the grass-roots and even at the regional level. Unfortunately, the real process of agrarian transformation follows the political imperatives, backed by quasi-information. To elaborate an effective and successful agrarian policy it is necessary to have the following:}

^{× adequate information on situations in different regions of Russia,}

^{× opportunity to use both positive and negative world experience in agrarian reforming. Internationalization of the world information resources should help to develop national policies in the field of agrarian development and land use practices. The latter is important for all countries, but especially for Russia and for the countries of the former Soviet Union, where access to foreign experiences was limited until recently.}

^{× Agrarian reform in Russia should be regarded as a part of building a new society. The Russian population should have access to information and actively participate in the reform process by creating NGO's and actively collaborating with official institutions.}

^{The world is now moving towards information society and new information technologies which may help to solve the above problems. Electronic networking options, rapidly developing everywhere, are of special importance. Thanks to these options, the abstract definition of the "World Information Resources" has gained it's real meaning. Only the Internet has tens of million of users in nearly all countries of the world.}

^{Telecommunications now play an important role in World Agrarian Development. In 1990 upon the initiative of the US and Indian Governments an International Forum for development of the sustainable land use systems (INFORUM) was formed to meet the demand for information exchange among 132 countries. By now there are several hundreds agricultural mailing lists. Among the most important moderated conferences are those, supported by INFORUM (SARD-Forum - Sustainable Agriculture Research and Development), which are now taking place on the UNDP server. Numerous databases on different aspects of agrarian development (economic, legal, ecological resources, etc.) are also accessible on the World Wide Web and their number is continuously increasing.}

^{Having the possibility of exchanging the information is an important step in creating successful reform opportunities. Only the possibility of networking may satisfy the following demands for information needed for a successful agrarian development planning:}

^{× Unlimited access to all information sources required at different geographic levels (local, regional, national and global);}

^{× The possibility of direct information exchange between all interested partners.}

^{In spite of the deficiencies in modern communication facilities, networking possibilities are actively developing in Russia. Only in 1995 the total volume of foreign investments in telecommunications reached US $1 billion. By now practically all regional (oblast) centers have access to electronic mail services, which allow them also to participate in electronic conferences. Such opportunities are now also appearing at the county (raijon) level. Networking options are now actively used by foreign companies entering Russia's agricultural market.}

^{The Russian Ministry of Agriculture recently initiated a big Aris Project on developing a telecommunication system with the World Bank financial support (US $250 million loan). The Project implementation plan envisages that all 89 regional centers of Russia and about 500 local (raijon) centers will be linked to share information on legal and economic issues, and will monitor prices of main agricultural products, etc. The Aris system users will have access to several databases. According to the Russian Minister of Agriculture, the Aris Project will help to restore and strengthen regional links, which is of primary importance when considering the vast size Russia.}

^{The new information technologies which are already part of the Russian reality and have found its place in the agrarian sphere must also be used effectively for the benefit of the rural populations.}

^{Unfortunately, one of the main constraints is not the lack of access to these new information technologies, but the fact that for many organizations in Russia, information exchange seems something very distant from their daily needs. Lack of interest in information exchange is a reality not only for rural audience. According to the estimates, powerful backbone channels are used only at 20% of their capacities.}

^{Main goals of use of telecommunications in agrarian development}

^{Legal support to the Russian Government bodies (Parliament, Federal and regional Governments) is very important now when a great number of legal Acts is being rapidly developed. It is evident that legal decisions should be based on specific domestic, but also on a wide spectrum of legal practices of other countries. At the request of the Russian Parliament, the Foundation for Agrarian Development Research (FADR) studied world information sources of the Internet, regarding Soil Protection Acts. The FADR was faced with the fact that legal decisions in different countries are made by different official institutions according to their historical traditions. In the United States, for example, the legal Acts on land use are in the US code, Supreme Court Regulations and USDA Documents (Natural Resources Conservation Service). There is no uniformity in dividing the competence between Federal and regional administrations. In some other countries, the most important regulations for land use were made by the regional and even local administrations. So direct citation of foreign Acts, which unfortunately is a frequent practice in political debates, is inadequate. It is therefore necessary to provide complex analyses of the whole juridical system, including the mechanism of implementation of legal Acts. The study of legal practices of different countries confirms that such a mechanism is one of the most important parts of the juridical system.}

^{Among the mechanisms of implementation of legal Acts is a lobbying technique, still lacking in Russia. Discussions on the 1995 Farm Bill have recently finished in the US. This event seemed so important, that a delegation of Russian deputies visited the US to become familiar with this procedure. The FADR used the Internet to obtain the necessary information. A special Web site was established to follow the Farm Bill discussions. It contains megabytes of information, including all the debates, numerous comments, summaries, etc. Mailing lists also played an important role through which the FADR often received papers entitled: "Farmers vote through Internet". This example shows that telecommunication is a very democratic instrument which may allow a farmer from a distant region to participate easily in both national and international events as an equal partner. This makes networking facilities especially attractive for the former socialist countries, where until recently everything was centralized.}

^{It is necessary to develop an information-consulting agency which would serve the needs of the Russian Parliament, and which would use modern information technologies to provide legal practice analyses, based on world information sources available on the Internet. Similar agencies now exist for Parliaments of many other countries.}

^{Ecological crisis and other phenomena related to natural resource deficiencies, bring about the awareness of the need for a new approach to land use as a global priority (systems of landscape-adaptive, sustainable, alternative, and biological agriculture). In 1994 INFORUM conducted the first International electronic conference on Indicators of Sustainability with more then 200 experts from all continents. Among the most important results of this Conference was the participation of scientists from many "new" countries. By now numerous moderated electronic conferences and mailing lists established partnership for thousands of experts from tens of different countries. There are English-speaking, French-speaking, Spanish-speaking groups. Unfortunately, participation of Russian scientists is still not very active, and valuable Russian experience in regenerative agriculture is still fairly unknown to the world community. Such participation is of great importance especially because of the shortage of funds for international travel.}

^{Internet also allows to have an access to the new technologies in land evaluation systems, resource base planning, agro-ecological monitoring, which is of great importance for Russia in the period of land ownership reforms.}

^{The need for development of a nationwide electronic system for information exchange on rural issues is obvious. We know very little about what really happens in different regions. On the other hand, the regions have no tools to influence federal policy since the feedback system has not been developed yet. Electronic mailing lists and moderated conferences will enable numerous participants from different regions of Russia to contribute to decision making on a regional, national and even international level.}

^{The system of electronic communications is also necessary for sharing experiences of agrarian reform between different regions of Russia (privatization, models of agrarian reform, monitoring of migration processes and demographic situation, etc.).}

^{For many countries undergoing the process of agrarian reform the Russian experience, even when negative, may be of interest. For Russia as well, the experience of both of developing and developed countries is very important. For example the USA, Sweden, Israel and Japan all have different agrarian reform approaches. The Green revolution of India and Chinese experience help to formulate new alternatives. Sharing experiences with the countries of the former socialist block, however, is of major importance. There are now mailing lists especially devoted to this problem, e.g., CEEPN (Central and East European Privatization network); CEEMAN (Central and East European Management Development Association). CEEMAN recently conducted an International Conference in Saint-Petersburg, entitled: "From reforming to stable improvement: lessons from the best companies". These great number of electronic conferences demonstrates, once more, that the modern approach to information exchange is becoming more and more important.}

^{Mailing list RUSAG (Russian Agriculture) issues regular information on political events in Russia related to the Russian agrarian reform from the standpoint of foreign observers.}

^{Lack of an effective system of information exchange restricts the new forms of management and marketing. Positive experience in this field remains unknown. There are difficulties in establishing direct links with the partners in different regions of Russia and abroad. The Western standards, based on thorough information surveys, remain unknown to the Russian businessmen. At the same time, however, commercial cooperation via Internet is developing very actively also in agribusiness. There are servers, oriented towards the Russian agricultural market, e.g. BIZNIS (business for New Independent States) and many others.}

^{The above makes obvious the necessity to develop electronic networking options to help Agrarian reform and the rural population. To this end, the FADR, a Russian nonprofit organization, has developed information networking capabilities in Russia and backed the collaboration between the FADR, other Russian NGOs and official structures dealing with important rural development issues. FADR was formed in 1993 in response to the growing concern over the uncertain fate of the agricultural sector.}

^{FADR comprised over 100 individual members, numerous scientific institutions and NGOs, with new alliances and partnerships growing continually. Members include the Association of Peasant Farmers and Rural Cooperatives, the Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow and People's Friendship University, the Center for Humanitarian Studies, and many others. FADR also cooperates with numerous international organizations, including INFORUM, Rodale Institute, the Academy for Farming Systems Research and Extension, the Central and Eastern European Privatization Network, Center for Citizens Initiatives, etc.}

^{FADR: Mission is to create an independent Russian Rural Information Network.}

^{The main goal of the FADR are the following:}

^{× to establish networks for information exchange both between groups and individuals in Russia and to link these groups with regional and global networks;}

^{× to promote efficient and sustainable land use systems in Russia;}

^{× to implement environmental education programs;}

^{× to assist people in adapting to new forms of land use.}

^{To meet these goals FADR is developing the following activities:}

^{Communication}

^{Presently FADR has full and unlimited access to information sources on the Internet and has created its own home page on the World Wide Web in English and Russian (Windows code) versions. This home page includes a brief description of the organization and its objectives, supplies information about its current activities and gives a partial list of its partners. The FADR's World Wide Web address is:}

^{http://www.fadr.msu.ru.}

^{FADR also places information supplied by its regional centers and its partners. FADR suggests that any NGO may input its information.}

^{The FADR's Electronic Library includes documents, software and Universal Resources Locator (URL) collections related to different aspects of agricultural development and electronic communication possibilities. In addition, FADR provides space for their partners to present their information on the Web.}

^{The FADR FTP Server has the latest software necessary for electronic communication development (TCP/IP clients) and also the documents and software relevant to various aspects of the environmental sciences.}

^{The following information is available on FADR's Server:}

^{× The book "A Guide to Electronic Communications in Russia"}

^{× Information about FADR training courses}

^{Homepages of our partners on the FADR server include:}

^{× "http://fadr.msu.ru/~rus-farm/" Working Group for Land Privatization and Farm Reorganization in Russia}

^{× "http://fadr.msu.ru/rodale/" Rodale Institute}

^{× "http://fadr.msu.ru/~yakushev/novsad.html" "Noviy Sadovod i Fermer" Magazine}

^{× "http://igc.apc.org/cci" Center for Citizens Initiatives}

^{URL Collection}

^{This section of the page contains links to interesting pages related to agricultural and computing topics. The agricultural section has links to FoodNet, the Web's virtual agricultural library and pages on topics such as Agricultural Education,}

^{Agricultural Science, Crop Protection and Economic Information. The Computing section contains links to pages with free software, Graphics, Internet information, Fax services, FAQs and Search Engines. Furthermore, the organization has a series of Uniform Resource Locators (URLs) and links to other WWW resources on agriculture and computing.}

^{To reach the Russian audience FADR has initially selected four regions to establish information centers and to initiate its work: Novosibirsk in Western Siberia 3,500 km from Moscow, Tver, a forest region in central Russia 200 km from Moscow, Volgograd and Astrakhan, a semi-arid region 1200 km south of Moscow and Orel, a steppe region 400 km away Moscow. Selection of these regions was based on their diversity in agrarian policy, level of economic resources, infrastructure, soils and climate. FADR currently has 138 regional partners. These partners include governmental agencies, scientific and educational institutions, NGOs, farmers' associations, businesses, and individuals. Most of the partners participate in FADR's information exchange system. Partners are particularly interested in receiving information on market prices and how to market their food products successfully.}

^{To link partners FADR maintains its own electronic listserver, FADRnews, to which dozens of groups and individuals from throughout Russia subscribe. Interested parties can subscribe by sending the message:}

^{× subscribe.srcc.fadrnews}

^{to the following address:}

^{× Newserver@srcc.msu.su}

^{The listserver currently presents the following list of topics:}

^{× Global News: News from over 40 electronic bulletin boards dealing with agricultural, environmental, and rural development issues;}

^{× National and Regional News: These inputs are provided by regional coordinators;}

^{× Announcements about different events and conferences; and}

^{× Information on cooperative programs, requests for participation, information on sources of financial support, job opportunities and other current information.}

^{FADR also produces a quarterly electronic journal, Agrarian Development, which was initiated in February, 1995. The journal contains updates on agrarian reform policies from regions throughout Russia and on agricultural developments in the US and other countries.}

^{At present FADR is conducting an International electronic conference on privatization and agrarian reform in Russia (social, economic and ecological aspects). This conference started in March. The conference is held in two versions: English and Russian, with English participants subscribing via the United Nations Development Program server in New York and Russian participants - via the FADR server. Over 100 people from Russia, Germany, India, Chile, Canada and the US have registered to take part in the conference via their computers.}

^{The following people have been selected to fulfil specific functions in the conference:}

^{Conference Chair: Dmitri Durmanov, FADR President;}

^{durmanov@dmitri.msk.ru}

^{Conference Moderator: Alex Makeev, FADR Director;}

^{makeev@fadr.msu.ru}

^{Conference Information Manager: Evengeniy Yakushev;}

^{yakushev@fadr.msu.ru}

^{Conference Manager: Bob Hart; bhart@undp.org}

^{The following conference subscription instructions are taken from the Conference Announcement which FADR has distributed to multiple electronic listservers and news servers:}

^{To participate in this electronic conference you must subscribe to the SARD-ROOM4 list on the UNDP computer. Send an electronic mail message with one-line of text (the Subject line is optional) that reads:}

^{subscribe sard-room4 name@domain}

^{Where "name@domain" is your Internet Email Address. Send this one-line message to:}

^{majordomo@undp.org}

^{You will receive an Email message back from the Majordomo Listserver acknowledging your subscription. You may receive a message back that your subscription has been sent to the List Moderator for approval (this occurs when the address which is in the header of your Email message is different from the address you write in your subscription message).}

^{When your subscription is confirmed you will receive a welcome message from SARD-ROOM4 asking you to introduce yourself. You will be asked to send an Email message with your name, address, institution, technical interests, etc. to the Email address of the Conference Room, which is:}

^{sard-room4@undp.org}

^{After following these steps, your subscription is complete.}

^{Although there is an acute need for information, the information market has not been established in Russia yet and not many clients are ready to pay for information. This applies both, to government institutions (no funds to pay even salaries) and agribusiness, leaving aside the NGO's. However, such a market undoubtedly will start to form in the nearest future. The limiting factor for many potential clients is lack of access to telecommunications, therefore it is necessary to find cheap ways to enlarge the access to the FADR network.}

^{At presents, since many possible partners do not have direct access to telecommunications, it is necessary to develop a system of further distribution of information, delivered electronically. For this reason the FADR regional centers are responsible for making their contribution to local newsletters, published for rural people.}

^{FADR also combines electronic and traditional Conferences and Workshops to encourage people to present case studies on different aspects of agrarian development. In 1995-1996 FADR conducted 5 International Conferences. Among them: Land and ownership (together with Orel regional administration, Orel, April,1995); Perspectives of sustainable agriculture in Russia, Moscow, April, 1995); Agrarian reform in Russia (together with Russian Parliament, Moscow, November, 1995); New rich and new poor (Moscow, April, 1996). Regional and interregional workshops aim to design multi-institutional rural development projects for the benefit of rural populations.}

^{Modelling relations between rural NGO's and official institutions.}

^{FADR is moving towards its long-term objective to develop an independent national rural information network. In this line FADR is trying not to oppose Government agencies, but to establish cooperation as an independent consultant agency. FADR staff are the members of Environmental and Agricultural Committees of the Russian Parliament and were helping to draft the Soil Protection Act. The key role of FADR in this exercise was to provide a broad international spectrum of possible legal decisions, based on the information available on the World Wide Web. FADR was also requested to present recommendations for laws on the stabilization of agriculture in Russia by the year 2000 and on the agricultural microbiology. In April upon the initiative of the Russian Senate speaker Professor E. Stroev, FADR was invited to join the Working Group on the elaboration of the Concept of Agrarian Reform in Russia.}

^{FADR has established relations with other information agencies, operating in Russia. An agreement was signed with Aris Network of the Ministry of Agriculture and opened links according to which all the participants of the Aris network may receive information from FADRnews, and vice-versa, FADR participants may be provided with the information available on the Aris network (market and prices monitoring, commercial information, legal issues, etc.). At present, Aris program has no Internet access, therefore it was agreed that the FADR should be responsible for providing Global information resources. FADR also established cooperation with the information network of the Ministry of Environmental Protection.}

^{In addition to the above, the FADR developed cooperation with a nationwide network of agricultural colleges. There are more than 250 such colleges in Russia, training skilled workers of different profiles - from agronomists and veterinarians to rural construction workers and accountants. These people are future farmers, extension agents, agribusinessmen, local authorities, etc. All these colleges are linked with network under the leadership of a special Technical Education Department of the Ministry of Agriculture. FADR has therefore established cooperation with the Department and is thus responsible for supplying the information to colleges, providing consultations on training methodologies, and giving practical examples of training performed in other countries. Furthermore, under this scheme, the FADR organizes training courses on sustainable agriculture and training on extension. The main goal of this FADR initiative is to gain access to nationwide audience and to get a free tool for information distribution.}

^{Furthermore, the FADR established a strong cooperation with the Agricultural Universities which all have a great need for information. Agricultural Department of Peoples Friendship University was adopted as a base for such cooperation.}

^{FADR keeps contacts with regional governments. In Orel FADR has a common information center, organized with the help of the Governor of Orel oblast Prof. E. Stroev.}

^{FADR has also established contacts with Agricultural Scientific Institutions. For example under the agreement made with the Russian Soil Science Society all regional departments of the institution are invited to participate in a FADR information exchange system. Thanks to the advertising organized by the Russian Soil Science Society, over 100 institutions became FADR collective members and partners in information exchange.}

^{Implementing new forms of agricultural practice.}

^{One of FADR's goals is to create the infrastructure which will encourage and foster sustainable land use in Russia. FADR is studying World information sources on ecological and regenerative agriculture issues and is trying to make these resources available to a broad circle of possible users. FADR participates in numerous electronic mailing lists and moderated conferences on sustainable agriculture and indicators of sustainability, ecological enhancement through agriculture, food safety, etc. The most interesting papers are transmitted to FADRnews mailing list. FADR is also developing Projects in different regions designed to conduct applied research on some aspect of land use practices and their improvement in the area. The projects are designed to inform, through training and education, the agricultural community on the implementation of techniques acquired through the research that enhance the region's ability to produce healthy food on healthy soil.}

^{Making agrarian reform a part of building civil society}

^{FADR is trying to consolidate activities of different Russian and foreign NGOs in order to create nationwide movement which may help to bring a wide participation of people in agrarian reform. An International Conference "Agrarian reform in Russia as a part of building civil society", scheduled for October 1996 has the following Agenda:}

^{× The role of community development and public awareness in agrarian reforming - rural NGOs;}

^{× Extension service for farmers and agricultural cooperatives and it role in income generation of rural population;}

^{× Promotion of new approaches to land use (sustainable agriculture and food security): technological and educational aspects;}

^{× Russian agriculture in the future: Western outlook. Crucial points for technical assistance.}

^{FADR is proposing its nationwide networking system to the audience inside and outside of Russia as a communication tool for public movement.}