Three fundamental problems characterize the current situation of the rural sector in El Salvador: i) relative and extreme poverty concentrated in rural areas; ii) low rate of growth of the agricultural sector, which is the principal economic activity in rural areas; and iii) high rate of deterioration of natural resources and the environment.

"The three fundamental problems mentioned above are closely interrelated, so that one could say that each is the cause of the others. Poverty, linked to low education and scarce access to modern production techniques, prevents improvements in agricultural productivity, which in turn holds yields and incomes down, which in turn exacerbates poverty. Poverty, together with low agricultural yields and income, leads to the use of marginal lands and unfettered exploitation of natural resources, without replenishment, which further impoverishes the countryside and the environment, making it even more difficult for the rural population to lead a humane, productive existence –or in many cases, even survive."[1]

These assertions have been addressed in a large number of studies: however, few of them address the possible impact of dysfunctions in information and knowledge management on rural development. Nor has information use been more than marginally considered as a tool for development.

The study on rural development conducted by the World Bank and the Salvadoran Foundation for Economic and Social Development (FUSADES)[2] links the role of information with rural market failures. Thus, the study states that declining agricultural prices between 1991 and 1995 are largely due to national market failures, in which information plays a leading role, along with other factors.

Furthermore, the study establishes a correlation between reducing rural poverty and diversifying residents’ sources of income. In other words, the less poor households are those which receive income not only from their own farming, but also from non-agricultural salaries and incomes. This diversification of sources of income assumes that other types of economic activity exist in rural areas, but it also means that rural labor markets are functioning better in those cases, particularly in regard to information.

With the objective of examining more systematically the potential role of knowledge and information in rural development, the learning circle selected six priority areas: low agricultural growth, poverty, the environment, rural education, connectivity infrastructure, and modernization of the State. The following sections address each of these issues.

The agricultural sector continues to be strategic for the Salvadoran economy. Its importance in the labor market is considerable: in 13 of the nation’s 14 departments, agriculture is still the chief source of jobs, despite its declining relative importance in the national economy and its weak rate of growth. An analysis of intersectorial commercial exchanges[3] shows that agriculture is the principal client and supplier of Salvadoran businesses. Reactivating agriculture and achieving sustainable development in this sector are thus necessary conditions for national development.

The role of information in the economic reativation of the agricultural sector displays several important aspects, including: generation and transfer of agricultural technology, market information, and financial technology, which are analyzed in the following sections.

Generation and transfer of agriculture and market technology

Technology generation and transfer in the Salvadoran agricultural sector has been developed by both the public and private sectors. In the public sector, there are a variety of institutions involved in development of new technologies: the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock (MAG), the National Agricultural School (ENA), the Agricultural Development Bank (BFA) and, principally, the National Center for Agricultural and Forestry Technology (CENTA), created as an instrument of the "green revolution" and traditionally in charge of agricultural research and extension services. CENTA’s principal areas of focus have been the small plots owned by producers of basic grains, and to a lesser extent livestock production, fruits, vegetables, agro-industrial products, and reforestation.

The private sector, for its part, has specialized organizations involved in research and extension services, for example in the areas of coffee (PROCAFE), dairy products (PROLECHE), and sugar (CENCICA). Finally, there is a significant number of non-governmental organizations that also provide agricultural extension services, but there is no precise information available as to their number or extension practices.

In general, the training provided to agricultural producers is hardly innovative: agricultural extension services focus on production techniques, with some effort in the area of post-harvest losses and food processing. But there are no programs for on-site farm training.

The design of technology generation and transfer systems is likewise very traditional, and is characterized by poor communications between technology generation and its transfer, and an insignificant role for producers in defining the contents of extension services. In the case of the public sector, the traditional separation of research and extension activities leads to problems in defining research priorities, in which researchers’ interests predominate, or those of institutions such as CENTA or MAG, at the expense of farmers’ needs. In the case of the private sector, one might assume that this problem is relatively less dire, since the fee paid by the farmer ought to serve as at least a partial guarantee that technology offerings correspond to client demand.

CENTA has 425 extensionists and 65 agencies;[4] however, coverage of agricultural research and extension services is low, which implies a challenge to define more efficient ways to utilize information.

By the same token, assimilation of technology is inadequate: for example, the benefits of introducing new seed types have not been sustained for lack of follow-up and ongoing support by extensionists, and thus in many cases, farmers have gone back to their old practices. But the most determining factor in low levels of assimilation has been the lack of farmer participation in defining extension processes.

There are also obstacles to accessing and reading the products of the research that has been conducted: neither in the public nor the private sectors is there a systematic practice of recording the research that has been carried out; the lack of communication among institutions exacerbates this lack of documentation. Finally, there are no high-quality documentation centers on agricultural technology.

Lack of market information

Rural markets in El Salvador are characterized by their extreme inefficiency, and are largely responsible for the declining competitiveness of the agricultural sector. The costs of transportation and storage are high, there are no modern norms governing product standardization, nor is there sufficient competition throughout the different stages of bringing a product to market, either domestic or foreign, which means that producers are paid low prices and consumers pay high prices.

Information plays a preponderant role in the proper functioning of markets. In the case of El Salvador, there are serious deficiencies in the production of information (updating, reliability of data) as well as in the stages of recording and access (there is no simple information for farmers on market trends, only figures for that day).

Appropriate credit technology

It is estimated that in rural areas, scarcely 5% of all productive activities are financed with credit. Commercial activities, which are more dynamic and immobilize financial resources for shorter periods of time, are preferred targets of credit. Inversely, high-risk agricultural activities have limited access to financing. Besides involving higher risk, agricultural production requires a more complex and specialized range of financial services.

One of the reasons behind the low availability of financial services for agricultural activities is the lack of information created about these services: there are not enough initiatives aimed at capitalizing and systematizing experiences in the area of agricultural credit. Thus, no information is available on the following aspects: clients and their environment, the cyclical behavior of financing needs, most effective ways for producers to associate to obtain financing in a given locality, principal financing problems for different activities, risks and factors which favor financing a certain economic actitivity, etc. Some international organizations have tried out different financing schemes with diverse types of technology: consortia of producers with both material and associative collateral, shareholders’ schemes with venture capital which can be converted into loans in the medium term, etc. But there is no systematized experience recorded on these different types of efforts.

From the producers’ standpoint, there is also a considerable lack of information: the rules of the game are not clear, changing requirements to access credit lead to reduced demand, the indirect costs of obtaining credit (travel, photocopies, different types of commissions) are high and there is no clearly-stated information about their nature. Above all, producers have no real opportunities to dialogue with the formal or informal financial system to help define the financial services which could meet their needs.

El Salvador’s environment is deteriorating at a troubling rate. This has ominous consequences on key aspects of the lives of all Salvadorans, such as drinking water quality, the prevalence of respiratory ailments, and harmful foods.

The past several years have seen increasing awareness of this problem, which has led to stronger public and private institutions involved in environmental issues, although much remains to be done for these institutions to pursue their goals efficiently.[5] Other positive signs are the gradual incorporation of environmental awareness modules in educational programs, as well as the availability of local and external resources to support initiatives aimed at improving the environment.

Even so, efforts to improve the environment are limited by, among other things, serious information gaps. There is no basic, consolidated information on the state of the country’s natural resources, but rather a collection of outdated statistics, project reports which are difficult to access, etc.

By the same token, a wide variety of recommendations have been made to preserve the fertility of slope soil, which makes up the majority of soil areas cultivated in El Salvador. However, it is hard for farmers to obtain a clear, overall view of which techniques are most appropriate for their farms, given the lack of concise, high-quality information.

Finally, over recent years, there has been growing appreciation of the role of agriculture in the sustainable management of natural resources, to the extent that payment can be justified for this service to the community. Although systems exist to finance environmental services supplied by farmers, there is no clear information about these systems. Thus, in El Salvador there is no experience in the sale of carbon sink, while in neighboring countries like Costa Rica, there is already substantial experience in the operation of these markets.

Poverty in El Salvador is principally concentrated in rural areas. In 1996, 64.1% of the rural population lived in poverty, with 31.4% in extreme poverty. It has been demonstrated upon various occasions that overall economic growth has a weak impact on reducing rural poverty:[6] despite an average annual GDP growth of 5.1% during the 1990s, rural poverty levels have remained stable.

Some progress in understanding this issue has been seen over recent years, so that today there is a relatively broad level of understanding of the problem. Analysts consider poverty to be the nation’s principal development challenge, and foreign aid programs are willing to mobilize funds to fight poverty. However, despite these advances, the general trend is to continue excluding the poor from the design and implementation of programs, resulting in a deficit in citizen participation.

Improving labor information and employment profiles in rural areas

One condition for developing non-agricultural activities in rural areas is the consolidation of integrated rural labor markets, as well as the availability of good-quality information on employment profiles and demand for training.

Thre is currently little information available on rural labor markets, which poses a serious problem for both employers and laborers, which can be translated into a loss of time and money as well as distortions in forward-looking decisions (investment or training) for entrepreneurs, and reduced foreign investment and erroneous public investment decisions.

Labor information and occupational profiles are created by the following institutions:

• Entrepreneurs who seek to hire personnel by placing ads in newspapers. This method is basically used by urban businesses. The systematization of this information, if it even exists, is not made public, so it is difficult to spot trends.

• Tacit knowledge: in any particular area, in a particular farm or cooperative, it is generally known that the sugar or coffee harvest will start on a particular date. The harvest bosses, foremen, and others spread the word among the population, but this information remains local.

• General demographic data contained in population census reports and household surveys, but this information is not frequently updated, and is not broken down into much detail.

• The Salvadoran Professional Training Institute (INSAFORP) has information on trainings it has financed locally. This is also the case for the Business Foundation for Educational Development (FEPADE), the Don Bosco complexes (Soyapango and Chalatenango), and other training institutions. However, there is no national consolidation of information on supply and demand for professional or vocational training.

The almost nonexistent opportunities for training, both for agricultural professions and other economic activities, is another of the large educational problems for rural areas. Overall, there is no clear definition of the demand for certain employment profiles. Training is guided by the short-term demand defined by the productive sector, with no instruments available to produce a medium-term vision, and also by demand on the part of those who seek training (who choose professions where work has always tended to be available: hairdressing, sales, mechanics, etc.). This is due to the lack of information on prospects for different economic sectors. For example, has anyone projected the future impact on the labor market of plans to modernize coffee production? Or the impact of offshore production [maquila] plans?

In any case –and the list is by no means exhaustive– we are facing fragmented information, produced without regard for the true demand for information, but rather in response to the internal needs of the institutions which produce the information.

A large part of the information available circulates only by word of mouth, and is not recorded. Another part is found in internal reports or statistical compendia. In both cases, there are no mechanisms available to disseminate this information.

One of the chief problems in rural areas is residents’ low level of education: high rates of illiteracy, limited training, inadequate coverage of public education, high dropout rates, and others. This deficient educational system leads to a terrible waste of human resources among youth.

One of the problems inherent in rural education is that it has been copied directly from urban education, which means its contents are biased toward urban realities; furthermore, it takes place during school hours which compete with the agricultural calendar, which increases the dropout rate.

In addition, education in rural areas has been incapable of including rural culture and knowledge in the creation of a value system which would allow rural residents to feel comfortable with their identities. There are very few –if any– efforts to recover local cultures. It is unknown whether any place exists which records or collects this type of information, much less whether it is adequately organized and stored, or how accessible it is to the population in general. This is reinforced by the phenomenon of emigration to other countries, and by the return –voluntary or forced– of a significant portion of that population, which implies the importation of different codes of conduct, without any measure of its impact on rural life.

Even so, there are some positive indicators: studies show that the average stay in school is increasing, and that parents increasingly value education. Studies have also observed that one of the principal uses of family remittances sent from abroad is for education.

Rural residents face many difficulties which prevent them from participating in principal information flows. We know that farmers receive information by radio, either commercial or community stations. Television and the print media have less coverage. Books and manuals are marginally available in rural areas, perhaps little more than in small cities, and principally in the form of school texts. Telephone coverage is also inadequate in rural areas. Most information is oral, and circulates throughout diverse and complex social circuits. The real possibilities of communication between one rural area and another are very limited.

There are no statistics available on the use of information in rural areas. There may be sectorial data available on the circulation of the print media, the number of television and radio sets, the circulation of educational texts and the use of public libraries, the impact of mobile libraries, the sale of books, the presence of the national telephone company and other providers, as well as Internet coverage. However, the learning circle was unable to locate a consolidated analysis of this situation.

Overall, it is important to point out as well that information flows, regardless of their nature, are directed from the city to rural areas. There are few formal information flows which originate in rural areas, and there are financial and regulatory obstacles which inhibit the proliferation of information producers and broadcasters: high cost of radio frequencies for community radios, heavy concentration of the principal media, closed markets, and others.

Another important point is that of relevant information contents. The information available in the principal mass media is aimed at urban consumers. There are no real vehicles of information which directly address the reality of the rural world.

Current concerns about the rural crisis have coincided with a period of definition –both conceptual as well as operational– of a more efficient government, which represents an opportunity to create a higher-quality administration, with greater transparency and citizen participation in decision-making, and with more qualified personnel. In regard to communications and information, the State will have to define an information policy, and above all provide incentives for new types of behavior in accordance with these new objectives, in order to allow municipalities, for example, to obtain the information they need to govern effectively.

In the case of the agricultural public sector, the modernization of the State involves a substantial increase in the quantity and quality of information available to the public, as well as a new definition of how information is to circulate internally. The geographical dispersion of public agricultural agencies (Santa Tecla, El Matazano, San Andrés, and others) as well as their institutional dispersion (MAG, CENTA, ENA, CENDEPESCA...) makes it even more crucial to define an information policy, which is often confused with public relations activities.

In order to begin providing answers to the serious problems of information and knowledge in rural areas, the learning circle has selected certain actions, or projects, described in the section below, basing them on the following priorities and principles:

• Priority on producing information for the rural population, and on the circulation of information within rural areas.

• Rapid development of relevant information for agricultural and rural productive activities, including technical aspects and training in business methods.

As we mentioned above, current practices related to the generation and transfer of agricultural technology do not involve farmers in defining their priorities, or the priorities of extension activities. However, several studies[7] tend to demonstrate that extension activities are more effective when farmers are partially or total involved. There is also a traditional lack of interest in the agricultural knowledge which farmers possess, in spite of the immense store of knowledge available in rural areas. Finally, the current process aimed at modernizing the agricultural public sector offers a good opportunity to define new schemes of technology transfer. Thus, this project is an attempt to try out a system of technology generation and transfer based on producers’ best practices. The project contains the following elements:

General objective: Increase income levels among agricultural producers by implementing a system based on the circulation of agricultural technology information among farmers which is both relevant and updated.

Goals:

• Base improvements in agricultural technology on the experiences of producers.
• Strengthen information and knowledge flows among producers.
• Help redesign the national system of technology generation and transfer.
• Share knowledge of producers’ experiences so that they can be utilized by others.

Activities:

The project should be developed in the following phases:  [see implementation proposal]

• Create a leadership structure made up of experts in agricultural extension, representatives of farmers nationwide, and representatives of producers who participate directly in this project.

• Define a precise workplan for the project.

• Define criteria used to select pilot areas in which the project will operate.

• Select one or more geographical areas for the project.

• Call for bids for project implementation, and select implementing group.

• Study the agricultural practices most customary in the area.

• Identify which producers are "champions".

• Collect agricultural information and create technical guide sheets based on the best practices identified.

• Verify and validate the technical guide sheets.

• Define possible improvements and tests to be conducted on farmers’ plots.

• Disseminate successful cases, correct errors.

• Follow up on plots studied.

• Impact evaluation and replication/expansion of the experience.

Another key failure in the prevailing system of technology generation and transfer is that it is focused on the technical aspects of production, without taking productive and administrative patterns into account. Thus, when proposing technological changes, no thought is given to considering a producers’ annual cash flow, or bottlenecks in obtaining labor. Furthermore, improving farmers’ administrative and management skills is not part of agricultural extension programs. This could become a serious obstacle to diversifying agriculture, or making it more environmentally friendly. In fact, administering a plot with greater crop diversity and which responds rapidly to market signals, or combining chemical and biological pest control methods, all pose administrative problems which assume certain skills on the part of farmers. This project therefore proposes the creation of training materials for agricultural administration.

General objective: Raise income levels among small- and medium-scale agricultural producers by improving their administrative skills.

Goals:

• Complement current training offerings with educational materials related to farm administration.

• Make top-quality educational materials available to farmers, non-governmental organizations, extension agencies and farmers’ associations.

• Promote the use of business administration tools by small- and medium-scale farmers, with recognition of the particularities of family production.

Activities:

The project should be led by an advisory committee made up of experts in agricultural administration, representatives of farmers’ associations, non-governmental organizations, the agricultural public sector, and then with representatives of project beneficiaries. The following activities are tentatively identified:  [see implementation proposal]

• Collect existing material, available both nationally and internationally.

• Define contents to be created (advisory committee with possible outside expert support).

• Advisory committee submits content creation to outside bidding.

• Material is produced by bid winner.

• Material is tested by groups of farmers.

• Material is corrected as a result of the testing.

• Material is disseminated.

B. Recommendations to enhance ongoing projects:

Besides the above two project proposals, the learning circle recommends the development of electronic information resources useful to rural areas. The Infocenter Association would be in charge of the proposals which follow, based on the stated guidelines.

It is advisable to set up an appropriate structure for producing these contents successfully, which basically means leadership institutions (board of directors or advisory board), in such a way that the broadest possible range of rural interests and information sources is represented, depending upon the subject. It is also advisable to gradually incorporate representatives of rural information users into the leadership group. The leadership body would also have to define ways to accommodate new membership rapidly.

1. Creation of a virtual information center on cultural practices, cultural heritage, and rural traditions:

This project could be taken up as part of the education learning circle, or else by an ad hoc group dedicated to information production around cultural issues as part of the Infocenter Association.

General objective: Help build social cohesion in rural areas by means of a better understanding of rural cultural heritage, which will allow local cultural practices to be more highly valued, thereby developing a positive rural self-image.

Goals:

• Increase available knowledge about rural areas throughout the country.
• Help raise the self-esteem of rural residents by highlighting the value of their lifesetyles.

The following contents could tentatively be suggested, among others:

• Patron saint festivals, village celebrations, and their relationship to local economic and social life
• Popular art
• Pre-hispanic languages
• Architectural heritage
• Traditional medicine and healing plants
• Traditional cooking
• Cultural change
• Rural housing

The production of these contents would be carried out at first by collecting existing information and placing it on line. However, there will probably be a need to create new materials or develop original applications (courses in the Nahuatl language, for instance).

2. Creation of relevant rural and agricultural information, and organizing its dissemination and access

The project presented below has the purpose of creating a significant Website aimed at satisfying the information needs of the rural population, in terms of productive information as well as health, environment, and other subjects. Its principal support structure would be the Infocenter Association, which would bear a dual responsibility in the project: in terms of infrastructure, its planned network of 100 Infocenters, of which many would be located in rural areas, would be the principal means of access to the information produced. At the level of content production, the Association would create a rural committee among its members to produce information for rural areas.

General objectives:

Support the development of the agricultural sector and rural areas of El Salvador by producing relevant information and designing ways for it to circulate, principally by means of Infocenters.

Goals:

• Generate an expanding process of producing and disseminating relevant information for rural zones based on users’ demands for information.
• Define a combination of means to circulate this information (Internet and radio, for example), to maximize coverage.
• In coordination with the rural population, design low-cost, efficient means of communication for rural areas.
• Supply the Infocenters network with information resources which enhance its success in rural areas.

Contents:

In terms of the contents to be produced, the range of issues relevant to rural areas is quite broad. The projects’ advisory committee, in coordination with information producers and Webpage designers, will have to define priority areas for the creation of digital information. The following areas are tentatively proposed:

1. Market information

• Purchase and sale prices, both national and international, of principal agricultural products
• Information about prices of agricultural inputs
• Analysis of different market trends
• Land markets, cadastral information
• National and international trade norms governing products (grain humidity, harmlessness of products)
• Advice on marketing and storage of products
• Principal addresses and links of importers, exporters, paperwork centers, etc.

2. Information on the environment and sustainable agriculture

• Databank on sustainable agriculture
• Support for exchange of experiences in sustainable agricultural production
• Support for systematization of experiences in sustainable production
• Environmental education
• Information and training on environmental markets (carbon sink markets)
• Forums on environmentally friendly agricultural practices
• Markets for organic products

3. Climate

• Weather patterns
• Agro-climate zoning throughout the country, and risk classification
• Heat and drought trends

4. Information on food security

• Availability, consumption, stability trends
• Information-collecting system to build indicators

5. Disaster prevention and emergency advice

• Weather patterns and trends
• Information on local and national aid and prevention programs
• Practical advice before and after disasters; family reunification

6. Online forums, systematization of experiences and databases on relevant issues

For example:

• Experiences in rural credit
• Agro-industrial and non-agricultural business chains in rural areas.

1. Committee on Rural Development, "Lineamientos para una estrategia de desarrollo rural", discussion paper, San Salvador, November 1998, pp. vi & vii.  [return]

2. The World Bank: "El Salvador Rural development study", Washington, March 1998.  [return]

3. Hugo Ramos, "Revalorización del sector agropecuario", mimeo, proyecto CRECER, San Salvador, 1998.  [return]

4. No figures are available on extension services in the non-governmental sector.  [return]

5. See, for example, the proposals for institutional reforms set forth in Temas Claves para el Plan de Nación, consulta especializada, capitulo "Medio ambiente y desarrollo", Enero de 1999, San Salvador.  [return]

6. Samuel Morley: "La pobreza y la recuperación y la reforma en América Latina", San Salvador, PNUD, 1997.  [return]