E-resources for agricultural research capacity building in African universities
David O. Onyango · 2016
The Regional Universities Forum for Capacity Building in Agriculture (RUFORUM) and CABI are collaborating to strengthen tertiary agricultural education in Africa through provision of privileged, costfree access to two of CABI's valuable scientific information resources, CAB Abstracts database and CABI Compendia, to all the universities that make up the RUFORUM consortium.Between September 2013 and December 2015 usage of the e-resources generally grew and peaked immediately following awareness creation campaigns and training.Low usage in some of the universities was attributed to limited promotion of the e-resources, lack of skills needed to use them and poor information technology infrastructure to support their use.Where used, the CABI e-resources were mostly utilized in writing proposals and articles and for consultancies and professional research.They reduced the time spent searching for content online and led to better quality, scope and volume of research output.To realize the benefits attributed to the CABI e-resources, systematic awareness creation and regular training of both librarians and e-resource users are essential.Awareness creation, which should be continuous and should target top university management, librarians, lecturers and students, should be conducted using seminars, workshops, university websites, social media, flyers, posters and other channels.Training of librarians should be regular and geared towards enhancing their capacity for proficiency in the use of existing and new e-resources.A system is also required to track, analyse and report on e-resource usage to understand the trends, which will help in developing the strategies and interventions to ensure optimal utilization of the e-resources. E-resources for agricultural research capacity building in African universities Key highlights• Awareness creation and training on the CABI e-resources were crucial factors in increasing their usage • CAB Abstracts had the highest overall usage among the CABI databases available in the universities, probably owing to its wide subject coverage• The CABI e-resources were highly regarded for their scholarly value, with more than three-quarters of the users indicating that they would likely recommend them to colleagues• The CABI e-resources were used to best effect in writing proposals and articles and in consultancies and professional research • When used, the CABI e-resources were reported to enhance information access and retrieval, increase and improve research output, improve referencing skills and reduce the time taken to access online content • Usage of CABI e-resources was extremely low compared with the other e-resources such as Google, Google Scholar, AGORA and HINARI• Inadequate awareness of the CABI e-resources, poor user skills, insufficient accessibility to computers, and infrastructural limitations associated with information technology were considered the main factors responsible for the low usage of the e-resources ContextsAfrica relies on agriculture for its economic growth and that sector contributes 65% of the continent's gross domestic product.However, agricultural productivity lags behind that of the other continents, one reason being that Africa is deficient in the skills required for agricultural development.To serve their role as key contributors to the development of agriculture through the research they undertake and the skills they build, African universities need up-to-date information, and particularly e-resources, considering that information is being generated and delivered at unprecedented speeds.Current information is an essential prerequisite for quality research, to find out what has been done, to find new ways of doing things and for networking of professionals, among other things.E-resources today are at the heart of academic knowledge management, and research has shown that their proper utilization positively impacts scholarly work.But access to such information is limited in Africa owing mainly to costs of subscription, but also in some cases poor technical infrastructure.