This compendium attempts to recount various regional and sector perspectives of rural development actors on ComDev as an asset for family farming. These perspectives were drawn out from three regional virtual consultations that took place from 25 August to 12 September 2014 through FAO-AMARC regional platforms: Onda Rural in Latin America, Yenkasa Africa, and ComDev Asia.
Furthermore, a global consultation meant to discuss and complement the outcomes of the regional consultations was held from 22 September to 6 October 2014 on the E-agriculture platform.
Key highlights of the compendium are as follows:
- ComDev, community media and ICTs support family farming as they allow for access to information, education & training, policy advocacy and reforms, multisectoral partnership, knowledge sharing, and participation.
- Community radio and mobile phones are tools widely used in rural communication services for family farming. However, despite the potentials of ICTs in terms of social media (Facebook, Twitter), the lack of electricity and other infrastructure limit its use.
- Gender inequity (in terms of content), lack of enabling policies for community media and ICT and lack of systematic integration of communication approaches needed priority actions.
A systematic ComDev planning process for family farming can serve as guide in doing smaller ComDev plans for specific issues.