Aaqua.org
aAQUA
aAqua is agriculture based online community forum to solve farmers problem [1]. It is multilingual forum mainly for rural areas. Farmers can register and post question and Agriculture Experts answers farmers question based on farmer’s geographical location, weather, season, crops and their preferences.
This online forum uses multimedia technologies and allow register member to access content & forum discussion using any web browser. It also allows members to create, edit, view and manage content in their mother tongue & local languages (i.e Hindi, Marathi,Telugu,Kannada etc). Additionally, the forum content is shared and, therefore, more localized in terms of farmer’s requirements, issues and solutions. Along with agriculture aAQUA can be configured and customized for Expert advice in e-governance, strategy making, proactive planning, education in agriculture institutes, agricultural business, health-care, improving nutritional effectiveness and other domains of interest to a developing community and Individuals.
aAQUA uses relational database management systems and information retrieval techniques with query optimization, intermittent synchronization, complexity analysis, semantic-based search,design patterns, multilingual support.
Description
The aAQUA eAgriService answers your agri-related queries in 24 to 72 hours depending on your question type.
An example post is http://aaqua.persistent.co.in/aaqua/forum/viewthread?thread=520
You will note that a user wanted to know the markets for silk cocoons. The expert replied to the post with a paragraph about the auctions held in the country. They then attached data they had in their reports with details of each market including dates between which the markets are open. They added another post describing where payments were to be made and that the govt. provides official transport to the auctions sites with the fuel charges to be borne by the buyer.
You can also search on the words "Success" and "thank" to see some Q&A which made a huge impact. Or Search on an area of your interest.
- aAQUA - Almost All Questions Answered is a Q&A forum for farmers in India run by IIT Bombay, KVK Baramati and Vigyan Ashram.
Additional Information
Q: Who answers aAQUA Questions?
A: Anyone can answer aAQUA Questions since the forum is open to all on the Internet. You have to check the source of the answer before you take the answers seriously.
Answers from Public Extension Experts are marked with a Green Color Logo "Salahagar" in Marathi or "Advisor" in English, also shown as Certified Expert.
Answers from Farmers and Private Experts come with the information they provided during registration.
We have spam filters to remove the obvious misuse of the forum.
Q: Do you support only Marathi?
A: All Indian Languages are supported. If you use aAQUA web-keyboard, it is currently available in Hindi/Marathi, Telugu and Kannada. Other states currently need to use English, pls write to us at 
, if you want more languages.
Our Telugu and Kannada experts will also send answers. You will receive English answers from experts in Maharashtra.
The home page will soon be customized by your default language to show same language question-answers first.
Q: Can anyone post a question? A: You will have to register with the forum to ask a question (no charges for our users). Yes, you're welcome to use aAQUA for your daily use. The site is mostly text based and has been tested on DIALUP/SLOW INTERNET CONNECTIONS, as slow as 10 kilo bits per second.
Users can attach photos to helps illustrate their question. Files can also be attached.
One can even use a post to advertise his business by putting his details and photos on the forum for charges of Rs 500 per post. Please write to if you're interested, you will also receive infomation of how many people clicked on your (post) advertisment.
Q: Our organisation helps operate information kiosks and services. Can we use aAQUA for our purposes?
A: Yes, if you can manage the collection of questions and answers from (your) experts you can appoach us with your deployment plan (Contact: ).
Q: What are the plans for increasing aAQUA users on a larger scale? A: aAQUA users have grown so far by word of mouth publicity including articles in regional newspapers written by some of our users. We have achieved content sustainability and the questions keep coming. We are now providing aAQUA Mobile services (weather or agri-tips) as well, currently benefiting 16,000 farming households.
The online forum is powered by various open-source software such as mvnforum and lucene that are available in the public domain. We offer aAQUA replications to organizations seeking their own aAQUA portal with Indian Language support using Red Hat's model of charging for additional services such as hosting, training, installation, maintenance etc.
Q: Apart from (1) the aAQUA Q&A what other Agricultural content is provided?
A: We have also developed a Digital Library built using GreenStone providing
(1) Marathi Crop Doctor
(2)Marathi Crop recommendations
(3)Marathi Crop Diagnosis via Images
(4)Translated Hindi and English aAQUA
We have price information services of agricultural produce collected from APMCs countrywide (source: AGMARKNET) in a user friendly interface - Bhav Puchiye Iconic as well as Bhav Puchiye Lite. If you would like to compare historic prices for a commodity across markets try - Bhav Puchiye Trends.
You can reach all of them from the home page.
Also look for these tools:
aAQUA Keyword Browser - Search by common keywords aAQUA Experts' Assistant - Read Common topics Instanty aAQUA Mobile - www.aaqua.org/m Browsing on the mobile phone? aAQUA Blog - What are we currently working on? Check our blog http://aaqua.blogspot.com
Q: What recognition have you received? A: Foremost, we have the trust and satisfaction of farmers and computer operators spread over rural India - 432 Districts. aAQUA has been covered in various magazines and Marathi newspapers some of which have been documented Read Here: http://aaqua.persistent.co.in/aaqua/forum/listthreads?forum=241
aAQUA was honoured with the Manthan award - Gold prize best eContent in July 2005 under the eInclusion category. Thanks to Digital Empowerment Foundation for the excellent platform to showcase other Indian Best Practices in eContent.
Q: Why only agriculture? If we can help, can you provide other forums?
A: We can help you with a new forum for a topic, if you can arrange for experts in your area.
Examples:
Need: Advice about new businesses Action: Identify an expert who will volunteer to answer these questions and make the operators market the service
Need: Primary health Action: Make a directory of local authorized practitioners. You can tie up with a volunteer doctor who can give first-level diagnoses.
Need: Get school students to use internet resources effectively Action: Identify volunteers who will guide the students and have students post their questions on a forum.
Need: Advice about crop/animal diseases Action: Use exisiting forums to ask queries
Need: Career counselling for unemployed Action: Get a local volunteer to answer questions posed by the locals. (The first meetings can be face to face and once trust is built they can be done online)
As you can see, the possibilities are enormous. aAQUA acts as a 2 way conduit between layman and expert. So if you can identify a genuine need in your region and locate experts who have access to internet and are
willing to contribute (for free or otherwise) you can start a service. Some face to face meetings and a campaign may start the process but eventually people will come to your forum if they find value in your answers. They may be even willing to subscribe and pay for the services. Email for business enquiries.
Q: What is the Developmental Informatics Lab at IIT Bombay?
A: Developmental Informatics Lab:
A cross disciplinary group working on research issues in increasing access to internet and communication technologies to rural and small town India. The lab is involved in various projects funded by Media Lab Asia, Ministry of Communications and IT (GoI), Development Gateway Foundation (GoI, World Bank) and Pan Asia Networking (UNDP, IDRC, APDIP, ISOC, APNIC and Microsoft). The areas under investigation include design and evaluations of devices and interfaces for computer, handheld and mobile users, cross-lingual information retrieval and translation, improving information dissemination protocols over the internet catering for low bandwidth and small devices, ethnographic studies emphasizing the study of social & cultural factors influencing interaction design of applications for e-learning and use of computers in education. The laboratory is formed around several core projects, each involving academic, industrial and village community partners.
Our role is to facilitate the invention, refinement, and dissemination of innovations that benefit the needy masses. We work with industry, NGOs, and governments, to bring these innovations to rural and small town India.
Q: Who are our partners?
A:(a) Vigyan Ashram, Pabal (b) Krishi Vigyan Kendra, Baramati (c) ICRISAT, Patancheru, Hyderabad (d) University of Agri Sciences, Dharwad and its KVKs at Dharwad and Gulbarga (d) University of Pant Nagar and its KVKs at Kashipur and Dhakrani
Dr. S.S. Kalbag set up Vigyan Ashram in the year 1983 with a vision to train village school dropouts in rural technology so as to enable them to earn a living in the village itself. The course was appropriately named Rural Development Education System (RDES). The objectives of the RDES Program are: -
a. The Integration of development with education. b. To stimulate the intellect through physical activities. c. To broaden the horizon of experience of the students. d. To reverse the rural to urban migration and to give a multi-skill base for specialization.
The system of `Learning while Doing, in real life situation' adopted by Vigyan Ashram, involves doing community service work in real life as part of education. The RDES Program is at present getting implemented in 23 schools and 2 non-formal centers. In December 2001, Dr. Kalbag signed an agreement with n-Logue communications to bring wireless connectivity to Pabal region. As per the agreement Vigyan Ashram became the Internet Service Provider for n-Logue projects in Khed (Rajgurunagar) and Pabal. www.vigyanashram.com
The Krishi Vigyan Kendra is a district level Farm Science Center established by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), New Delhi at Agricultural Development Trust Baramati, District Pune for speedy transfer of technology to the farmer's fields. The operational area of this Krishi Vigyan Kendra comes under the western Maharashtra dry Zone. The aim of Krishi Vigyan Kendra is to reduce the time lag between Generation of technology at the research institutions and its transfer to the farmer's field for increasing production, productivity and income from the agriculture and allied sectors on a sustained basis. www.kvkbaramati.com
Complete list of KVK Partners
KVK Baramati, Pune Maharashtra
KVK Gulbarga Karnataka
KVK Dharwad Karnataka
KVK Dhakrani Uttaranchal
KVK Kashipur Uttaranchal
KVK Nasik Maharashtra
KVK Ahamadnagar Maharashtra
KVK Nandurbar Maharashtra
KVK Amravati Maharashtra
KVK Latur Maharashtra
KVK Solapur Maharashtra
KVK Jalana Maharashtra
Q: Who is Agrocom Pvt Ltd?
A: Agrocom is a company started by the Founders of aAQUA incubated at the IIT Bombay's Business Incubator.
Agrocom supports the aAQUA server and service and owns the copyright of the content provided on aAQUA. By posting on aAQUA you acknowledge this transfer of copyright. Agrocom also moderates the aAQUA forum in addition to the experts to maintain editorial quality.
The purpose of this is to ensure that it is possible to make the content available in various forms (such as Book form)
without requiring the consent of each and every person who has posted on aAQUA, since it is impractical.
Agrocom ensures that the content is available
in the public domain by releasing it under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 India License.
Please write tofor more details or visit www.agrocom.co.in
Having made aAQUA sustainable in content, we are now exploring ways of making it also financially sustainable: www.agrocom.co.in
Related Domains
External Links
- Alexa: Aaqua.org
- WHOIS for Aaqua.org
