Essential Electronic Agricultural Library Research Articles

The Impact of TEEAL on the usage of AGORA in Academic and Research Institutions in Ugand

The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL) and the Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture (AGORA) are key information support programs in learning, teaching, and research. They provide access to relevant scientific evidence, in agriculture and related sciences. While AGORA was introduced in Uganda in 2005, TEEAL was introduced earlier as a “Library in a Box” and later as LAN-TEEAL. With the recent increase in acquisition of TEEAL sets at a number of academic and research institutions in Uganda and with the TEEAL and AGORA campaigns through the training organized under the Information Training and Outreach Center for Africa (ITOCA), it is not clear how TEEAL has impacted on Agricultural research and on the usage of AGORA as an online program in Uganda. The aim of his paper was to explore how TEEAL is used compared to its counterpart, AGORA. The key question to this study relates to respondents’ preference among the two programs and the underlying reasons. An online questionnaire was used to gather responses regarding preference and use of the two programs by students, academics, librarians, IT specialists, and researchers at the various institutions in Uganda. The study was informed by a review of literature from related studies. Findings from 59 respondents indicate that all (100%) the respondents had an idea of TEEAL while for AGORA it was 58 (98.3%) respondents. Of the respondents, 52.5% preferred TEEAL to AGORA because it required no internet access, although the majority believed that AGORA was more important than TEEAL, due to the coverage of more relevant online scientific literature. The most prominent challenges to TEEAL and AGORA were network failures and slow internet, respectively. TEEAL and AGORA were both acknowledged to be very vital resources for academic and research institutions in Uganda. TEEAL mainly had one advantage over AGORA and that is being an offline resource that can be used in institutions with unreliable and inadequate internet. AGORA was also found to have an advantage over TEEAL in that it had a wider content coverage. The most common strategy for improving the use of both programs, as stated by the respondents, was increasing awareness through training and marketing. It was thus recommended that the program hosts utilize the results of this study to improve the utilization of these vital agricultural databases through further training and awareness. It was also recommended that institutions be advised to strengthen their IT infrastructure to support the programs and ensure effective use, for increasing their academic and research output.

An Investigative Analysis on the Utilization of the Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL) by Researchers: A Case Study of National Centre for Agricultural Mechanization (NCAM) Library.

An Investigative Analysis on the Utilization of the Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL) by Researchers: A Case Study of National Centre for Agricultural Mechanization (NCAM) Library.

Awareness and use of the Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL) Database among faculty members in Federal University, Kashere and Federal College of Education (Technical), Gombe, Nigeria

The study investigated the extent of awareness and use of The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL) resources by faculty members of Federal University, Kashere and Federal College of Education (Technical) Gombe. A survey design was adopted for the study. The questionnaire was used as data collection instrument. The population of the study consists of all the 85 teaching staff in the Faculty of Agriculture and School of Vocational Education of both institutions. A total of 85 questionnaires distributed but 82 were returned duly filled. The data collected was analyzed through simply percentage and descriptive studies. The study reveals that the faculty members under study are using TEEAL resources satisfactorily. Awareness level was greater than usage because of lack of search skills, difficulty in finding relevant information in the database, recurrent power outage and lack of support from library staff. The study recommends that the library should focus on user orientation and training on effective use of e-databases, awareness and orientation should be a continuous effort, and libraries should think outside the box and find an alternative source of power supply such as a standby generator, inverter or solar energy system.Keywords: TEEAL, database, awareness, access, use of information resources, faculty members, library

TEEAL and AGORA: Off-and Online Access to the Scientific Literature of Agriculture for the Developing World

TEEAL (The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library) and AGORA (Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture) are digital collections of scientific agricultural literature for the developing world. Through both, the agricultural research cycle in the developing world functions more effectively, including in areas where access to the internet is limited, slow, or unreliable, thanks to TEEAL's offline access. This paper discusses the programs' training, outreach, and usage and barriers to it, and the international partnerships that make them possible. Also profiled is the new AgriKnowledge database, which provides access to key unpublished agricultural content, including reports from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's programs and projects.

Faculty Awareness and Utilization of the Essential Electronic Agricultural Library for Teaching and Research: A Study of Academic Staff in the University of Calabar, Nigeria

This study reports on a survey conducted to explore the awareness and extent of utilization of The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL) database resources by academic staff at the faculty of Agriculture, University of Calabar, Nigeria. Structured Questionnaire was designed and used for data collection. Eighty copies of the questionnaire were randomly distributed to respondents in their offices; 60 copies of these were retrieved and used for data analysis (with 75.0% response rate). The findings of the study indicate that although vast majority (88.3%) of academic staff in the faculty of Agriculture are aware of TEEAL database resources, their utilization is rather low (46.7%) in teaching and research, the frequency of usage is equally low, as most (46.7%) respondents use these databases “occasionally”. From the findings of the study, most respondents used TEEAL abstracts for research and publication (80.0%), for better research output (53.3%) for insights to various topics for lectures (50.0%) and keep abreast with current trends in the field of study (50.0%). Major factors that impede awareness and utilization of TEEAL databases by academic staff of the faculty of Agriculture, University of Calabar, Nigeria include lack of awareness of the available databases by the university library, lack of access to TEEAL databases in the University library, lack of time to spend in searching TEEAL databases in the Library and inadequate information skills to use TEEAL, and improper orientation on the use.

Building a “Library in a Box” with an out of the box solution: creating a prototype engineering library using XTF

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to describe the process of selecting and customizing XTF open source digital library software for a unique application. The paper describes how Rutgers University Libraries, in collaboration with the University of Liberia, and with grants from the Engineering Information Foundation (EIF), the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), and with contributions from the International Society of Electrical Engineers (IEEE), have created The EAKO System – Engineering Access to Knowledge Offline, a prototype “Library in a Box” for engineering information at the University of Liberia. The product runs on the open source platform XTF, created by California Digital Library, and is based on TEEAL, The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library, developed by Cornell University. Because internet access is extremely limited in Liberia, The EAKO System, like TEEAL, will work entirely offline.Design/methodology/approachOver 20 open source software programs were considered during the development of the prototype. XTF was selected based on its ease of use and adaptability.FindingsXTF is an easily customizable and powerful open source digital library solution, which met the needs of The EAKO System.Research limitations/implicationsThe amount of time required to enter data into the product was an issue. Solutions to streamline the process are being investigated.Practical implicationsFuture development includes more automation of data entry, as well as creating mobile access.Social implicationsThe EAKO System could be easily adapted to other areas of information need, in developing countries and elsewhere.Originality/valueUsing the open source software XTF for an offline information resource is a novel application, which may be of value in other developing countries where internet access is limited.

Digital innovation for food security: a case study of the TEEAL programme and its contribution to agricultural research output in African institutions

This article looks at The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL), an innovative offline database, and its impact on research output in agricultural institutions in Africa. The article also examines some lessons gathered from 10 years of training and outreach on the system in Sub-Saharan Africa. TEEAL, a project of Cornell University's R. Mann Library, in cooperation with over 50 major scientific publishers, societies, and index providers, is a digital collection of research journals for agriculture and related sciences. Researchers, students, academic staff and librarians can discover and access thousands of full-text PDF articles without the use of the Internet. Through TEEAL, scientists in developing countries now have access to current research; but has this access translated into effective research and teaching? Several studies have been carried out to evaluate whether TEEAL was meeting its objective of contributing to the enhancement of the quality and effectiveness of agricultural research and teaching through improving students' and researchers' access to relevant literature. The studies took various approaches in collecting data including a questionnaire, interviews and a bibliometric analysis of publications from institutions that have acquired and are using TEEAL. Results generally show that TEEAL is successfully meeting its objective. Recommendations are made for extending the use of TEEAL sets, particularly the inclusion of more journals from developing countries as a way of further enhancing its appeal to a wider audience.

Digital Library Adoption and the Technology Acceptance Model: A Cross‐Country Analysis

AbstractIn this article, we examine, through the framework of the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), some of the features that inform user acceptance of a digital library system implementation at agricultural universities in two developing countries: Kenya and Peru. This is a study not only examining factors contributing to adoption of this offline digital library, but also a cross‐site comparison, meant to examine the functionality in the developing world of a theoretical model developed in and based on conditions in the developed world. As we unravel predictors of technological acceptance of a digital library implementation in the developing world, we simultaneously investigate a broader question: not just questions regarding improved research in the developing world, but on it as well.We analyze data from both sites on overall measures of perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness (two constructs of the TAM), and on individual measures making up the overall measures. We found the TAM to work well in describing factors that affect usage of digital libraries in developing countries, with perceived usefulness as the main predictor of intent to use this system (The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library, or TEEAL), and with relevance as the major constituent driver of perceived usefulness. Overall, we also found particular predictors of perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use that are consistent across cultures (relevance, trust, and ease of access), while other constructs (social norm, domain knowledge, visibility, and self‐efficacy) demonstrated predictive power in only one setting. While post‐hoc analyses gave several clues as to drivers of these differences, this study cannot definitively address what causes differences in predictive power between sites. What is clear, however, is that application of the TAM to IT implementation in developing countries must be guided more by the specificities of local circumstances than by the performance of the TAM in highly‐developed countries.

Use of print and electronic resources by agricultural science students in Nigerian universities

A two-part questionnaire was designed to elicit information on use of print and electronic resources by agricultural science students in Nigerian universities. 912 respondents from faculties of agriculture in three Nigerian universities completed the questionnaires. The results revealed that agricultural science students most prefer to use textbooks (42.1%) among print materials, while The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL) is the most preferred among electronic resources available in their libraries (52.2%). Major problems faced by the agricultural science students include inadequate access to full Internet connectivity and lack of skills on their part to use available electronic databases properly. The study recommends restructuring library collections by increasing the number of agricultural textbooks and databases to meet the information use and retrieval needs of agricultural science students. Other recommendations include establishing Internet-ready computer centers to complement teaching, learning, and research in the library.

Printed And Electronic Resources Utilization By Agricultural Science Students In Nigerian Universities

This paper examines the use of printed and electronic resources by agricultural science students in three Nigerian universities. A two-part questionnaire was designed to elicit necessary information from the respondents selected for the study. One thousand three hundred (1300) respondents from faculties of Agriculture in three Nigerian universities were selected for the study. A total of 912 respondents duly completed the questionnaires. Frequency and simple percentages were used to analyze the results. The results revealed that students rely mostly on textbooks among the printed resources available in their libraries. The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL) was the most widely consulted electronic database resources while electronic mail was mostly used among the internet facilities listed. Respondents adjudged the library collection of one of the universities to be poor. Major problems faced by the students include inadequate provision of full internet connectivity and lack of skill to use the electronic databases available. The study recommends restructuring of the yearly orientation programme to meet the information use and retrieval needs of library users. Other recommendations include the establishment of internet ready computer centres to compliment teaching, learning and research in the library and organisation of training for users on databases search.

The State of ICT in University Libraries in South Eastern Nigeria

The work surveyed eight university libraries in southeastern Nigeria to determine their state of ICT application including the availability of the hardware, software, e-resources and their challenges. A tenitem questionnaire was designed and distributed to the surveyed libraries. Most of the libraries have above average ICT literate professional staff but very low ICT literate non professional. The first computers acquired were used for document processing and till date most of the libraries have not advanced into other uses. Many of the Libraries especially the state funded have no Internet, or LAN workstation but each of the library can boast of standalone computers. Library software, network operating systems and LAN are conspicuously absent in most of the libraries. Though a few of the libraries subscribe to online electronic resources such as EBSCOhost, Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture (AGORA) , Health Internetwork Access to Research Initiative (HINARI), Online Access to Research in the Environment and The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL), most of their electronic resources are predominately on CD-ROM. They face series of challenges including poor funding ; unskilled manpower ; ignorance of the location / availability of ICT and its application; ICT avert of library and university management and infrastructural problems. Recommendations were made based on the findings.Samaru Journal of Information Studies Vol. 8 (1) 2008: pp. 35-43

Recent Advances In Agricultural Information Dissemination: Applicability Of Agora And Teeal Initiatives To Developing Countries

The world is gradually actualizing the Global Village concept, which was an abstract and imagination some years back. The concern with even development has made many developed countries and international agencies to design programmes of assistance to less developed countries in all human endeavours. Knowing the importance of food production, supply and sufficiency at every stage of economic development, the Food and Agricultural Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) initiated various programmes of assistance to low income countries in order to transform their peasant agricultural practices to mechanized ventures. In line with the information and communication technology (ICT) age the initiatives of Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture (AGORA) and The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL) were developed by the FAO in collaboration with Cornel University of the United Kingdom to enable agricultural scientists and practitioners have unlimited access to over 500 journals on agriculture and related disciplines. Against this background, the article examines the concept of AGORA/TEEAL, the merits of electronic referencing, the limitations imposed on users in low income countries and recommended measures for improvement to enabled the achievement of the goals and objectives of the initiatives. Keywords: Advances, Information, Developing, AGORA, TEEAL JORIND Vol. 6 (1) 2008: pp. 26-26

Options For Access To Journals, Print, CD-ROM, On-Line In A Nigerian Agricultural University Library

The paper investigates the use and the most preferred among printed journals, CD-ROM database and On-line database available to researcher at the Library of the University of Agriculture Abeokuta. To elicit the necessary information, a questionnaire was designed and distributed to 200 final year students and postgraduate students of the Institution out of which there were 142 responses. Analysis of the questionnaire shows that the users preferred the CD-ROM database particularly ‘The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library' (TEEAL), this was followed by the print journals. The paper recommends adequate publicity of the electronic journals available in the library and a demonstration of their use once or twice a session for the users. Samaru Journal of Information Studies Vol. 7 (2) 2007: pp. 24-27

Utilisation and impact of The Essential Electronic Agricultural Database (TEEAL) on library services in a Nigerian university of agriculture

PurposeThis study examined the utilisation of the Essential Electronic Agricultural Library database (TEEAL) at the University of Agriculture Library, Abeokuta, Nigeria.Design/methodology/approachData collection was by questionnaire following a purposive sampling technique. A total of 104 out 150 (69.3 per cent) responses were received and analysed.FindingsPostgraduate and final year undergraduates are the major users of the TEEAL database. The study also revealed that though most of the users are computer literate, they still seek the assistance of library staff for database searching. The major constraints to the use of the TEEAL database include the high cost of printing of selected papers and the limited number of workstations.Practical implicationsThe study recommends that the number of workstations be increased, the cost of printouts should be subsidised by the university and more library staff should be trained in ICT.Originality/valueOffers recommendations to improve the accessibility of quality information for research in Nigerian universities.

TEEAL and AGORA: Improving Access to Agricultural Journals in Low-Income Countries

The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL) and Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture (AGORA) are programs that will provide low-income countries with access to agricultural journal literature that advances their agricultural research and education objectives. Developed by Cornell University's Mann Library and launched in 1999, TEEAL is a self-contained agricultural research library with full-text articles and graphics of 140 major journals related to agriculture from 1993 through 2003, stored and indexed on over 400 CD-ROMs. In mid-2005, most of the collection also became available for use over local area networks. Launched in October 2003, AGORA is an Internet-based journal delivery system led by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), with Mann Library as a principal partner. AGORA offers almost 800 journals from twenty-seven international publishers to 113 low-income countries and territories for free or a nominal fee.

TEEAL and AGORA: Improving Access to Agricultural Journals in Low-Income Countries

The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL) and Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture (AGORA) are programs that will provide low-income countries with access to agricultural journal literature that advances their agricultural research and education objectives. Developed by Cornell University’s Mann Library and launched in 1999, TEEAL is a self-contained agricultural research library with full-text articles and graphics of 140 major journals related to agriculture from 1993 through 2003, stored and indexed on over 400 CD-ROMs. In mid-2005, most of the collection also became available for use over local area networks. Launched in October 2003, AGORA is an Internet-based journal delivery system led by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), with Mann Library as a principal partner. AGORA offers almost 800 journals from twenty-seven international publishers to 113 low-income countries and territories for free or a nominal fee.

AGORA: Access to Global Online Research in Agriculture [Abstract only

This paper will introduce the audience to an international initiative underway to improve access to online journals in agriculture in the developing countries. AGORA (Access to Global Online Research In Agriculture) is a collaborative project of FAO, CGIAR, the World Health Organization and Cornell University's TEEAL project, along with major scientific publishers. AGORA is based on TEEAL (The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library) and modeled after the World Health Organization's HINARI (Health InterNetwork Access to Research Initiative). The ultimate goal of AGORA is to increase the quality and effectiveness of agricultural and environmental science research in low-income countries and, in turn, to improve food security. By providing access to the scholarly literature of agriculture and environmental sciences, researchers and decision makers in developing countries will have access to the work of the global scientific community and be better able to incorporate proven scientific knowledge into their research. AGORA will provide access to online content through a portal to be built especially for the project. The AGORA portal ultimately will fulfill the multiple information transfer functions so necessary to information delivery in the developing countries. In this first phase, AGORA will build a core platform providing access to online scientific journals in agriculture and related environmental and social sciences. The AGORA program team is working closely with publishers and agricultural database producers to build an excellent online collection of agricultural material, which will be made available either for free or at very low cost. In order to provide reference and technical support, libraries and librarians around the globe will be enlisted. We envision a 24x7 multi-language virtual reference/technical support service with agricultural libraries around the world contributing to the service. We also envision a "train the trainer" program, where librarians throughout the developing world will receive training in the use of the system and thus be prepared to pass that knowledge along to other trainers and end-users. This aspect of the program may offer an opportunity for U.S. land grant libraries to provide assistance with AGORA. While the possibility of obtaining access to online journals is greeted enthusiastically, some barriers to delivering online information in developing countries still exist. TEEAL undertook an Internet readiness survey in February 2002. This presentation will discuss some of the results of that study and the implications for delivery of information in the developing countries. We hope that, like TEEAL several years ago, AGORA will be the next program to revolutionize access to agricultural information in the developing countries. This presentation will introduce the USAIN audience to the many facets of this initiative.

Bringing scientific literature to the developing world: The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL)

The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL) is an indexed library of key agricultural, environmental and related science periodicals created to help institutions in developing countries significantly expand their journal collections despite the prohibitive cost of journal subscriptions. TEEAL currently contains nine years of subscriptions (1993‐2001) to over 140 scientific journals with 1.7 million pages of articles on 381 CD‐ROMs. TEEAL is distributed at a low cost to 109 low and lower‐middle income countries around the world. Today, 66 institutions in 34 countries use TEEAL, and many others are negotiating its acquisition. This paper discusses the creation and development of TEEAL and its future direction in the context of working towards universal access to scientific information.

The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL): A Tool for Agricultural Education and Research in Developing Countries (A Case Study)

The Essential Electronic Agricultural Library (TEEAL): A Tool for Agricultural Education and Research in Developing Countries (A Case Study)