ICTs in knowledge management: the case of the Agropedia platform for Indian agriculture

Authors

  • Kiran Yadav
  • Rasheed Sulaiman V
  • N.T. Yaduraju
  • Venkatraman Balaji
  • T.V. Prabhakar

Keywords:

knowledge management, agriculture, information, ICT

Abstract

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) are increasingly used for knowledge management (KM) currently. However the full potential of ICTs are yet to be realized due to several challenges. This paper explores the challenges in using ICT for KM using the case of Agropedia, an ICT mediated knowledge management platform for Indian agriculture. The paper argues that KM is no longer a technical challenge but is rather constrained by social and organizational barriers. Without initiating institutional and policy changes to address these barriers, ICTs cannot contribute significantly to KM. By March 2014, Agropedia had close to 8500 registered users and 33,062 published nodes solely dedicated to agriculture and 24 crop knowledge models. A total of 35 institutional Agropedias and a mother Agropedia were created for a better content management system. In conclusion, the deployment of ICT in agriculture is found to be a socio-technical process, facing social and organisational challenges. Against this background, knowledge sharing needs to be incentivised.

Published

2016-01-03

Issue

Vol. 11 No. 2 (2015)

Section

Papers
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