Dear Colleagues,

Collaborate, Create, Communicate...

I am pleased to provide you with the April issue of ICT-KM Program monthly update.

ICT-KM 2004
INVESTMENT PLAN DEVELOPMENTAL UPDATES

I am extremely pleased to announce that the ICT-KM 2004 Investment Plan was approved by the World Bank on 4 March 2004 and the initial tranche is in the process of disbursement to those projects set to begin.

This news is featured in the latest edition of the CGIAR Newsletter: http://www.cgiar.org/enews/march2004/.

The project coordinators for Category 1 projects i.e. Second Level Connectivity, E-Publishing System, Knowledge Management and Sharing, Consortium for Spatial Information and Virtual Resources Center have submitted their detailed project plan and spending schedule and started their activities. The funding for Category 1 projects will be released from the World Bank directly to the Lead Centers. The E-Publishing System project led by its project coordinator, Michael Devlin successfully held its Core Team Planning Meeting at IPGRI, Rome from 10 to 12 March.

Project coordinators for projects under Category 2 (i.e. VASAT, Data Resilience, On-line Learning Resources) have also submitted their revised project document together with a detailed project plan and spending schedule. These are being reviewed now.

For projects under Category 3 (i.e. Data Standards, DIVA-GIS, Advanced Research Network, Virtual Library, Desktop Video Conferencing and Intelligent Information System), the deadline for submission of revised project documents together with a detailed project plan and spending schedule is 15 April.Due to a change in the coordinator, Tech-based Info Product Evaluation revised project will also be submitted on 15 April.

In addition to the three main thrusts, the Investment Plan presents the need for close coordination of the projects. We are privileged that David Balson the current consultant to the ICT-KM Program has agreed to extend his consultancy to cover the coordination of the implementation of the ICT-KM 2004 Investment Plan. David will continue to provide the valuable support to the overall ICT-KM Program that he has been providing, but will significantly expand his work in support of coordination across the projects. As you are aware, David has worked closely with us over the last 15 months. His credibility, neutrality and experience have proven valuable assets to the ICT-KM program to date. We will build on past achievements and successful collaboration (and his commitment to our Strategy) and look forward to working closely with him as part of our team.

The Investment Plan also presents the need and strategy for a comprehensive Program level monitoring and evaluation activity. As such, an overall Program Evaluation will be implemented. We were very fortunate to have been able to develop this activity in collaboration with IDRC’s Evaluation Unit. They have been pioneers in the development of innovative evaluation approaches (including Outcome Mapping) that work well in the development context. They will continue to work on this ICT-KM Program activity for the next year. The former Director of this Unit, Terry Smutylo, will be working with us.

Both the Program Evaluation Meeting and Thrust 2 Coordination Meeting are scheduled to be held back to back at IPGRI, Rome this May.

More information on the upcoming meetings can be found on the ICT-KM Collaboration Site http://collaborate.ictkm.cgiar.org/project/. Login is “browser1”, with password “browser”.

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PROJECT UPDATES

Collaboration Software

A critical component of our ICT-KM 2004 Investment Plan and the new CGIAR way of doing business is the adoption of collaboration software. We will shortly commission a study to review available collaboration tools and make recommendation for adoption. We asked for colleagues to volunteer to participate in the users’ requirement analysis and we are happy to report that the response to our call for volunteer was excellent. We will keep you update on the progress of this important initiative.

Global Public Goods 2

Following on the activities on Global Public Goods database upgrades which started last year, there is potential new funding in the region of USD 3 Million for a system aiming at integrating the CGIAR Global Public Goods information systems - referred to as GPG2. As we will be working much more on a system-wide basis, in order to achieve a shared vision on the GPG2 project, and draft a proposal we held a 3-day meeting from 29 to 31 March 2004 at the Evergreen Laurel Hotel Penang. A total of 10 participants from CGIAR centers attended the meeting.

The first two days were devoted to consultation on the concept notes and developing a proposal. The third day was devoted to the drafting of the proposal for consideration by Center Directors’ Committee for funding. By the end of the 3-day meeting we had a well-advanced document supported by all the centers attending. The document is currently being finalized for submission to the Center Directors’ Committee by 15 April.

Strategic Analysis and Knowledge Support System (SAKSS) Meeting

I attended the Strategic Analysis and Knowledge Support System (SAKSS) Meeting in Tivoli, Rome from 8 to 9 March and in FAO, Rome on 10 March. The meeting which was co-sponsored by FAO and IFPRI focused on the design of a Strategic Analysis and Knowledge Support System (SAKSS) to build knowledge base and capacity to achieve more effective rural strategy processes in Africa. This initiative is supported by the US Presidential Initiative to End Hunger in Africa (IEHA). We had a fruitful discussions and I had the pleasure to meet a number of representatives from FAO, IFPRI, ILRI and USAID, East Africa regional office.

More Good news:

The Knowledge management Project of the ICT-KM program has attracted the interest of new investors. New additional funding is in the process of being secured for this project. This is excellent news.

We hope that the ICT-KM program will facilitate other projects to attract further funding.

Project Manager Version 2.5

CIAT's Information Systems Unit launched its Project Manager version 2.5 on 1 March.

I take this opportunity to congratulate CIAT for the development of this software which allows the tracking of Investigation Projects, from the creation of concept notes to the financial reporting allowing the upload of several types of documents associated to a Concept Note, Proposal and Projects.

In this new version, CIAT has made the software more user friendly by updating the documentation and made some video tutorials in order for the centers to learn how to administer the Project Manager, to input information for Project Management and to install the software successfully.

Centers are recommended to visit CIAT to see how the application works and get a better idea on the implementation. CIAT can also visit the centers and provide suggestions on how they should work with the application.

For more information, please visit CIAT’s Project Manager web site at http://webpc.ciat.cgiar.org/ProjectManager_DC/index.htm or contact Tania Jordan for support on Project Manager at t.jordan@cgiar.org.

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TECHNICAL CORNER...

Good Practice Notes

In the last monthly update, we have announced that in the coming year the ICT-KM Program plans to develop good practice notes on system security, system development, IT support to Challenge Program and IT infrastructure and support in common premises in collaboration with the CGIAR System office Internal Audit Unit. At the same time, we also called for comments and inputs.

I am pleased to inform that we have received quite a few valuable comments and suggestions to develop good practice note on managing laptops and desktops, global IT projects portfolio, system development, standards, methodologies and procedures, software contract management and criterions of technology adoption. Thank you for your comments and suggestions, we will take them into serious consideration.

For those of you who would like to share your comments, suggestions or inputs, please send us an email.

Active Directory Project

With only 4 centers still to join, this project is almost completed.

CIAT has agreed (thanks!) to prepare a note outlining the benefits of this project. We hope you will find it useful for communications within your center.

Reminder: weekly updates on the Active Directory project are posted on the IT collaboration site at http://forum2.ipgri.cgiar.org/cg-it/. IT Managers can log on to the website for details.

Exchange 2003

To support the CGIAR upgrade to Exchange 2003, CGNET is currently developing Exchange 2003 migrations recommendations and system-wide policies. CGNET is also collecting information about the Exchange infrastructure in the centers in order to develop migration strategies appropriate to the CGIAR.

We should be able to start implementing Exchange 2003 in June.

CGNET Contract

Negotiations are under way to extend the current contract with CGNET for the provision of messaging and web-hosting services. The negotiation team is made up of Ian Moore, Nancy Walczak, and myself. We have shared the results of our negotiation efforts with the IT community and final discussions are under way. We expect to have the contract signed in a couple of weeks.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all IT managers and web managers for their contribution to the preparation of this contract document, and especially Nancy and Ian for their support in this effort.

Clean Up Our GAL

As you are aware, the IT managers are starting a new Let's clean the GAL campaign very soon to address the issue of complying the email naming convention which allows for easier identification of members of the CGIAR email list.

We are grateful to Nancy Walczak from IFPRI who offered her help in updating the email naming convention prior to the implementation of the campaign.

Web Usages Analysis

A study on CGIAR Web Usage Assessment was commissioned and a report was produced and shared among the IT managers and web administrators.

This report provides an interesting tool to start understanding where the CG web resources are reaching. Your feedback on this initiative, on the various recommendations it proposes and on ideas of how such an activity could be mainstreamed are most welcome.

Spam Messages Removed

Spam messages are a real nuisance….in the month of March the corporate Unsolicited Commercial E-Mail software at the central CGIAR mail server prevented over 700,000 ‘undesired’ messages from reaching our mailboxes!

Video Conferencing Facilities Survey

As we announced in the February monthly update, we have compiled an inventory of Video Conferencing facilities available in CGIAR centers.

Seven centers in the CGIAR are equipped with the video conferencing facilities, i.e. CIAT, CIP, ICRISAT, IFPRI, IPGRI (HQ, APO, INIBAP), IRRI and WorldFish. The other eight centers currently do not have the facilities i.e. CIFOR, CIMMYT, IWMI, ICARDA, ICRAF, IITA, ILRI and WARDA. However, CIFOR, ICRAF and ILRI are able to rent the facilities from outside source and IWMI and CIMMYT are planning to install the facilities in near future.

The detailed survey table can be found on the IT collaboration site at http://forum2.ipgri.cgiar.org/cg-it/ or URL http://forum2.ipgri.cgiar.org/cg-it/Doc Repository/Communications and Infrastructure/Video Conferencing Survey 27 Feb 04.xls. IT Managers can log on to the website for details.

TECHNOLOGY WATCH

This column is specially dedicated to keep a regular watch for emerging ICTs of potential interest to the CGIAR and inviting potential candidates to join our roster of consultants.

If you come across any potential candidates please forward their CV or credential to us. Or if you have heard about any new technology that is applicable to CG and we can learn, please share this news with the whole community.

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Collaborate, Create, Communicate...

this is the motto of the ICT-KM Program. We believe that by expanding the CGIAR's opportunities to work together and communicate we will produce better science to help poor in developing countries, and we will get that knowledge to them.

Your comments are especially welcome. Please visit the Website, http://ictkm.cgiar.org/ or write to ictkm@cgiar.org with comments and/or ideas for the next monthly update.

Working together for a better future,

Enrica