Agriculture, libraries and human development: case studies of Europe, Africa and Latin America

Information is crucial to sustainable farming in developing countries, yet public library services that address farmers’ information needs are hard to find. There are vast stores of useful information on the Internet, about new farming methods, pest control, crop disease, insurance, care of livestock, market prices, the weather. Yet it is even more difficult to find public libraries in developing countries serving farmers through information and communication technology (ICT). But the examples of innovative public libraries, successfully serving farmers, demonstrate the potential which can be realized at the local level. Being local and close to the communities that in developing countries has big representation allows them to reach out to a significant part of small farmers and traditional crafts makers. Farmers in developing countries need information, but often they lack access to infrastructure, ICT skills and sometimes are even illiterate. Public libraries, equipped with ICT and knowledgeable librarian, can meet needs of local communities, providing a) physical access; b) skills training c) guiding in information resources and selection d) if trained, even transfer of knowledge to illiterate farmers. This case study presents a number of public libraries in various countries, who have developed training strategies to prepare staff of rural libraries in order to provide necessary skills to their communities to address challenges of their environment: educational, health, agricultural and others. Training of trainers, transferring skills to the community and generation of human and social capital have been strategies that have been successfully implemented by some public libraries across Europe, Africa and Latin America.