Livestock Research for Rural Development

Volume 9, Number 4, September 1997

LRRD Newsletter

Welcome to Volume 9 Number 4 of Livestock Research for Rural
Development, the twenty-seventh issue of the journal.

Published by CIPAV (Fundacion Centro para Investigacion en Sistemas Sostenibles de Produccion Agropecuaria)

E-mail: cipav@cali.cetcol.netco

Contents

On Line Formats for Livestock Research for Rural Development

International Network on Role of Palm trees in Sustainable Rural Development in the Tropics

Better Use of Locally Available Feed Resources (GCP/RAS/143/JPN)

E-mail Networks in Vietnam, Cambodia, China, Philippines and Laos

Tropical Feeds

Tropical animal feeding: A manual for research workers

The Ecological Farm On-line

The University of Tropical Agriculture Foundation


On Line Formats for Livestock Research for Rural Development

LRRD, now available in HTML, remains at the technological cutting edge.

HTML ('HyperText Markup Language') is the native language for publishing documents on the World Wide Web and is understood by all Web browsing software. The journal, as the principal means of publication of developing world sustainable agriculture, needs to be easily available to the widest possible audience of interested people. Using HTML as the on online publishing format has three principal advantages. The first is that everybody who finds the journal will be able to read it with their Internet browser (Microsoft Internet Explorer or Netscape are amongst the most common). Secondly, the Internet search engines such as Alta Vista, Infoseek and others will index the pages. Thirdly, articles are being posted on the WWW as soon as they are refereed and edited, thus increasing tremendously the speed of communication of information.

A counter has been installed on the LRRD Homepage to record the numbers of visiters. The trends over the 5 months since records were kept is shown in the figure. The response is linear with a slope of 6.1 indicating that every day 6.1 persons on average are logging on to the journal.



It is intended to put a counter on individual papers which will provide valuable feedback as to which articles are attracting most attention.

All previous issues of the journal will be converted to HTML format, to improve accessibility to what is now a library of nearly 10 years of research in the field of developing world sustainable agriculture. We hope to host as much of this as possible, starting with the most recent issues, through the CompuServe 'Our World' web pages to speed access for readers outside Europe, while continuing to mirror the pages on the server at the Oxford Forestry Institute.

The HTML version of LRRD is available on the WWW at:

http://www.cipav.org.co/lrrd/lrrdhome.html


The MS-DOS, Windows Help and Acrobat formats

The MS-DOS and the Windows Help format are now discontinued. Undoubtedly, there are readers of LRRD who do not yet have access to Windows 3.1 or 95/97 nor to Acrobat readers or the Internet browsers. However, it is apparent that access to these more powerful programmes is rapidly increasing in most developing countries. Preparation of the MS-DOS format is time consuming and it is not possible to incorporate graphs. The Windows Help format permits incorporation of graphs and linkages within and between documents, but it is also time-consuming to prepare.

The publishers of LRRD receive no core funding and the journal is prepared and published entirely on a voluntary basis. We feel it is more important to dedicate these efforts to the HTM and ACROBAT formats as both these versions are relatively easy to prepare. The HTM version is certainly the definitive format for the future and from now on will be considered as the standard. Several readers have requested that we maintain the ACROBAT format which will therefore be continued and can, in fact, be accessed from the HTM version.

Comments from readers and authors regarding these decisions are welcomed.

The earlier LRRD volumes (up to 8.1) will be maintained on the UNELLEZ server and can be downloaded by "FTP" from:

ftp://saman.unellez.edu.ve/pub/revistas/LRRD

The "Acrobat" version for 7.2 onwards as well as previous MS-DOS versions are available on the World Wide Web at:

http://www.cipav.org.co/lrrd/lrrdhome.html

For readers resident in Vietnam these versions of the journal are available on the "VIETNET" List Server located at the University of Agriculture and Forestry in Ho Chi Mi City.

Any comments about the journal should be sent to the Chief Editor (thomas%preston%sarec%ifs.plants@ox.ac.uk)

For readers in Vietnam, members of VietNet, the shorter form of the e-mail address can be used, which is: thomas%preston@sarec


International Network on Role of Palm trees in Sustainable Rural Development in the Tropics

This new network has been established as a result of initiatives taken at a meetings in Colombia, in September 1996 and August 1997, when it wa decided to promote the use of the palm tree family as a contribution to sustainable rural development in tropical regions. Details from:

info@cipav.org.co


Better Use of Locally Available Feed Resources in Sustainable Livestock-based Agriculture in South-east Asia (GCP/RAS/143/JPN)

This network, executed by FAO and financed by the Government of Japan, became operational in February 1994 and will end in 1997.


Electronic Mail Networks in Vietnam, Cambodia, China, Philippines and Laos for Sustainable Rural Development

Electronic mail networks, to link resource persons working in sustainable rural development, have been established by CIPAV in Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Philippines and South China. This has been as a result of initiatives (and financial support) from the International Foundation for Science (IFS), the Swedish Agency for Research Cooperation with Developing Countries (SAREC), the Oxford Forestry Institute (OFI) and the FAO/Japan project (GCP/RAS/143/JPN). These operate as national networks in the individual country and are connected to the INTERNET by:


Tropical feeds

There is now an electronic edition of the book `Tropical Feeds', originally written by Dr Bo Göhl, and published by FAO in 1971. The database (program prepared by Dr A W Speedy and Nick Waltham) is available on diskette from: The Senior Officer (Feed Resources), Animal Production and Health Division, FAO, Via della terme di Caracalla, 00100-Rome, Italy. An updated version (February 1994) has been prepared and is now available in Spanish, French and English versions.


Tropical animal feeding: A manual for research workers

This new edition of the Manual for Tropical Feed Researchers, prepared for FAO by Dr T R Preston, has been restructured to reflect the changing role of livestock in a world committed to sustainable use of renewable natural resources.

Copies can be obtained from: The Senior Officer, Feed Resources Group, AGA, FAO, 00100 Rome Italy
E-mail: manuel.sanchez@fao.org


The Ecological Farm On-line

The Ecological Farm, also known as 'Finca Ecologica', now has a presence on the World Wide Web. The aim of the site is give a digestible overview of the technologies that are in use on the Ecological Farm. We hope to develop the site further, adding facts and figures, research abstracts and links to relevant papers, for those readers who want to follow up the subject more deeply. The URL for the site is:

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/ecofarm/ehome.htm


The University of Tropical Agriculture Foundation (UTA)

The first MSc course, executed by UTA and funded by the Danish embassy in Hanoi, is in progress. It was designed as a 'learning by doing' experience which encompassed the development of practical skills in natural resource management through to the use of modern computer technology replacing the teacher and the classroom with a dynamic global source of information. The use of computers and email allowed each of the students to achieve their full potential through access to the most experienced scientists throughout the world, most of who have access to email. Students participating in the first of these courses are now actively engaged in their research projects.

It is hoped to initiate the second course in Cambodia in 1998 in a collaborative effort with the Royal University of Agriculture at Phnon Penh.

Details are available on:

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/utaf

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