banner
2nd Quarter 2008


ICT-KM supports events and conferences

Enterprise Security in the Americas IT workshop: Providing Training for increased security
March 31-April 11, Peru

Advancing Agriculture in Developing Countries through Knowledge and Innovation
April 7-9, Ethiopia

International Farmers Conference on Participatory Plant Breeding
May 4-8, Syria

Data Management in the CGIAR
June 9-11, Italy

Annual Knowledge Management for Development Meeting
June 18-21, Portugal

Knowledge Sharing launch at IFAD
June 18, Italy

Snippets

Joint ICT supports ILRI – WorldAgroforestry (ICRAF)
A project for sharing ICT capacities between two centers has moved to a new level in Nairobi, which hosts the Headquarters for both ILRI and WorldAgroforestry (ICRAF). The project began in 2001 with the establishment of a joint ICT team and appointment of one IT manager for the two Centers and evolved through development of a common ICT strategy that advocated increased communication and collaboration and sharing of common needs such as Internet and email applications.

In 2007, the project activities expanded by establishing function-based rather than site-based teams. These teams now deal with customer service, infrastructure and applications for both Centers.

The next steps will be consolidating use of equipment and software applications, data storage and telephone equipment between the two Centers. This will require the upgrading of capacity, inter-campus connections and internet connectivity. Continued efforts to learn lessons from this inter-center collaboration will be shared with the IT managers and CGIAR Centers.

Email, virus, and spam volume on the increase
As all of us are well aware, the volume of emails received each day has risen astronomically in recent months. In the month of July 2007, the 8000 staff members of the CGIAR received a total of 5 million messages. Just nine months later, in March 2008, it had risen to 24 million messages. Breaking it down further, this amounts to 32,000 messages per hour or a 500% increase in nine months. And one last tidbit on this issue – more than 80% of this is spam.

However, thanks to a partnership between CGNET and Symantec that filters incoming mail, most of these spam messages do not reach our networks. This level of protection makes sure our valuable bandwidth, particularly in the CGIAR’s remote locations, remains free and CGIAR scientists do not lose time dealing with troubling spam or viruses.
Click here for more information.

Bragging about our blog(s)
ICT-KM is using blogs as one of our tools for sharing knowledge updates, news, thoughts and ideas directly from the programs, activities and projects. All are welcome to participate in the blog communication, which can be accessed through http://ictkm.cgiar.org/.
The Knowledge Sharing Project’s blog, one of the most active within ICT-KM, can be accessed from the KS Web site: www.ks-cgiar.org or directly at http://ictkm.wordpress.
com/category/knowledge-sharing.
The CGXchange blog offers insight into its operations, thoughts and ideas at http://ictkm.wordpress.com/
category/cgxchange. The information is there to be shared, discussed and added to – from learning more about "pics and maps" (photos in Google maps) to discussing what’s up with social technology adoption, to informing about ICT-KM staffer Antonella Pastore’s participation in the Italian Information Architect’s Summit.



ICT-KM Homepage



Collaborate, Create, Communicate...

Dear Colleagues,

In the five years since ICT-KM took its place in the CGIAR, we have promoted, championed and tailored a variety of initiatives to support the use of information and communications technology and knowledge management to improve the effectiveness of the CGIAR system's work.

This quarter, the ICT-KM staff and the project leaders of the 2006 Investment Plan projects gathered to look at the achievements to date, strategize about the Program's future and, in the process, to build team spirit and trust. Our overall goal was to review the projects, discuss outcomes with the project leaders, and begin the process of identifying challenges and issues that need to be considered when planning future ICT-KM contributions to CGIAR's research activities.

A lot to be proud of in the last 5 years and the last quarter: EasyMTP was succesfully launched, installed and used to develop and submit Medium Term Plans in 13 CGIAR centers. This marks the first succesful step towards facilitating the availability and access to the important information contained in the CGIAR Centers' MTPs. Stay tuned for the analysis features the system will offer. Our Knowledge sharing workshop was a great success, the launch of the Knowledge Sharing toolkit a real hit, our work supporting research projects adopt innovative knowledge sharing techniques very welcome, and we are piloting innovative IT systems....and the list goes on.

All while we continue to work hard on our communication efforts.....participating in conferences, and posting more and more frequently on our blogs!

I hope you enjoy this issue of the ICT-KM newsletter, we look forward to hearing your views, either by email or on the ICT-KM website via the ICT-KM blog.


Enrica Porcari
Chief Information Officer
CGIAR


Main News

CGMap is up (loaded) and running
The CGMap system is now up and running for the download of Medium Term Plan documents. The 13 participating CGIAR Centers submitted their MTPs via EasyMTP. All CGIAR MTPs were available by the agreed deadline of June 20 at the CGMap site.
Read More  bullet

Quality Online Agricultural Education for Sustainable Development through CGIAR-UN Cooperation
by Wayne Nelles (Head, Capacity Strengthening Department, CIP)

The ICT-KM Online Learning Resources (OLR) Project conducted a short course as part of the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development (UNCSD) thematic review of its Promoting Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development (SARD) activities. The ICT-KM OLR project, which is hosted by CIP, brought a CGIAR-UN collaborative perspective with a timely substantive contribution to these debates.

Read More  bullet

CGgMail case study launched
by Marco van den Berg (IRRI) and Tania Jordan (ICT-KM)

The CGIAR mail numbers are numbing. In just three months, from January to March 2008, more than 55 million messages were addressed to the CGIAR. About 45 million were spam.

Email, virus, and spam volume continue to increase. While the CGIAR has a network to be proud of, we cannot ignore that licensing costs are rising and alternative technical options are becoming available. Thus, in efforts to increase efficiency and innovation, we decided to explore alternatives, starting with Google Applications.

Read More  bullet

Second Level Connectivity Pilot Project brings together regional IT activities
The ICT-KM Second Level Connectivity Project (SLC) focuses on providing high quality ICT support for all CGIAR staff, including those in regional, country and project offices. Steve Mupiwi who has headed up the SLC’s nine-month pilot project in the East and Southern Africa Region reports that his efforts to coordinate and carry out ICT support in the region have led to improved collaboration among Centers sharing offices and increased joint initiatives in procurement as well as sharing of support services.

Read More  bullet

Promoting knowledge sharing in the CGIAR: The KS toolkit
For knowledge creators, brokers and users alike, it’s perhaps stating the obvious to declare that we live in an increasingly interconnected and complex world. While this modern truism has some annoying consequences – information overload being among the most pervasive – we shouldn’t lose sight of the enormous opportunities this connectivity offers. At least that’s part of the thinking that drives the Institutional Knowledge Sharing (KS) Project of ICT-KM.

ICT-KM, with its CGIAR Center partners, has been experimenting with a range of KS tools and methods over the past five years and has recently assembled these and many others into a toolkit.

Read More  bullet

Staff Changes and Additions at ICT-KM
We have had several changes and additions to our ICT-KM staff during May and June.

Michael Marus joined us as Systems Development Specialist at the beginning of June.
Jenin Assaf returned from maternity leave at the beginning of June and is back in her position as ICT-KM Program Officer.
Fiona Chandler, the Program Officer who filled in for Jenin, left in mid-June to take a new position as Scientific Liaison Officer with the CGIAR Alliance Office, hosted by IFAD, Rome.
We are also sad to see Silvia Ticconi (former CGXchange Technical Assistant) leave the Program to start a new position as Helpdesk Coordinator for Bioversity International.
We wish both Silvia and Fiona all the best in their new positions….


We welcome feedback on the ICT-KM News, so please feel free to contact us at ictkm@cgiar.org