Learning and sharing in communication
for rural development

Dear friends of the FCCM working group,

 We hope this finds you well and ready to work together on the Forum resolutions. Over the last couple of months, we have been busy planning and kicking off activities relate to the FCCM follow-up, including our common web platform, and now it’s time to launch the FCCM community and open the floor for suggestions, exchanges, contributions and collaborations. Until now we have been collecting positive feedback and we believe that this initiative can bring an added-value to the work that each institutions is carrying out individually.

 We would also like now to share with you a number of updates on the FCCM follow-up:

 ·       CCComDev & FCCM community

The College of Development Communication of Los Baños - focal point Cleofe Torres - has taken the responsibility to maintain and facilitate the FCCM dedicated page, now fully integrated into the upgraded CCComDev platform at http://fccm.cccomdev.org The page features a Gallery and a Useful Docs section where all FCCM-related materials are posted, including the Note with the final statement and recommendations endorsed during the Forum (in EN-FR-SP).  The FCCM blog is the place to announce and post regular updates on the initiatives promoted by the FCCM Working Group. It is very much open to contributions and especially you as members of the FCCM Working Group are warmly invited to submit news, views and stories related to rural communication, ICTs, family farming, etc

·   FCCM online discussions

The online community has been set up along the lines of the FCCM Action Plan: it hosts 5 discussion groups, one for each priority area of work that we had identified. One or more convenors per group will be steering the discussion. All of us have already been registered in the general discussion group called “FCCM WORKING GROUP” that will be used for coordination and to promote joint activities as part of the FCCM Action Plan. According to your interests, you are also invited to join the groups on KNOWLEDGE SHARING and NETWORKING; RESEARCH; CAPACITY DEVELOPMENT; SUPPORT TO PROGRAMMES and COUNTRIES, either as convenors or participants.  Just take some time to log in the community and see you online! (you’ll be able to retrieve username or password directly from the website, using your email address – otherwise just contact us)

 ·       Research on evidence-based rural communication services (RCS)

An excellent team of academics from the Universities of Queensland, Wageningen, Reading, Guelph and Los Baños is working under the umbrella of IAMCR and in coordination with FAO to undertake a scoping study on ‘evidence-based approaches for rural communication services’. The activity is coordinated by Elske van der Fliert (UoQ). An online consultation will be organized in the CCComDev community to involve also other experts and members of the FCCM group. Meanwhile, you will find more information about this activity in the discussion group named “FCCM Research”.

 ·       Advocacy paper

We are glad to announce that the paper Farming for the Future: Communication Efforts to Advance Family Farming has been released and is available for download from the FCCM docs page. We encourage you to promote and share this resource as well as other FCCM outcomes widely within your networks!

 We think this is a good start for the FCCM Working Group to work out more joint initiatives and involve new members. Meanwhile let’s welcome to the team Rikin Ghandi, from Digital Green India, and Antonio Heberle, from EMBRAPA Brazil.

 Several activities are in pipeline for the FCCM: for example, two regional fora on rural communication services in Africa and Latin America, to be organized by AMARC and EMBRAPA respectively, in collaboration with FAO. Another important effort will be to reinforce regional platforms such as Yenkasa, Barza, ComDev Asia, Onda Rural, and to provide concrete training opportunities for community media, farmer organizations and development practitioners at the regional level.

 The above are just examples of possible synergies that are materializing under the FCCM action plan and  it is now time to join forces capitalizing on activities planned by each institution. We will take care of providing regular updates on the progress of FCCM activities. In case you need further information about the FCCM community you can also contact Marzia.Pafumi@fao.org 

 Let’s start our activities and discussions under the different streams of the FCCM community.

 Looking forward to hearing from you,

 Mario and the FCCM team