In India, National Agricultural Research & Education System (NARES) is a huge repository of knowledge and information on crop sciences, horticulture, resource management, animal sciences, agricultural engineering, fisheries, agricultural extension and agricultural education. Digital technologies and online access to information resources have brought increased expectation from library and information services. For researchers, timely and fast access to existing scientific outputs and archived scholarly information on his/her topic of interest is as crucial as current scientific knowledge. The modes of services that librarians and information professionals provide has thus become very important and have undergone fundamental changes over past few decades. Digital resources, digital services and access technologies continue to create new opportunities, new challenges and new expectations. Union catalogue, digital repository and digital libraries are the new paradigms which have been taken up under E-Granth initiative to facilitate researchers, teachers, students, extension professionals for a limited number of universities. These facilities should be extended in more efficient and effective manners. For this, a project proposal is being framed for strengthening the digital platform for NARES repository by linking various Libraries under NARES. In continuation of the previous work under E-Granth, a concept note is being framed for Design and Implementation of Digital Library for National Agricultural Research and Education System (NARES) which may lead to creation of National Knowledge Management Centre for Agricultural Education and Research for effective and efficient dissemination of knowledge to the end users.
To act as a Digital Scholarship Centre to specialize on new technologies and tools such as data acquisition, visualization, and digital asset management, digital preservation, training and consultations as a part of the suite of services and resources.
WORK PLAN :
 | Discovery (searching in several modes and using several methods, indexing in a variety of ways) . |
| Delivery of data, images in jpg format and texts in usable modes including streaming media. |
| Push notifications through mobile app for fast and efficient dissemination of information to end users. |
| Alerts and recommendations based on experimental result, expert opinion. |
| Knowledge extraction through text-mining and its analysis. |
| Union catalog of all NARES libraries. |
| Combining digital objects and data to form new views, analyses, and expressions (e.g. overlay of data in geospatial information systems approaches). |
| Annotation and labeling of digital objects for private and broader distribution. |
| Managing courses and presenting course material. |
| Research collaboration (local and global). |
| Technology foresight tools for identification of future technology. |
| Portfolio development or management for educational and career. |
| Google analytical for monitoring digital repository performance. |
To Automate AU libraries using Koha ILMS to facilitate sharing of digital library resources with a unified ‘Online Union Catalogue’.
WORK PLAN:
| Implementation of Koha – Open Source Integrated Library Management Software in all NARES libraries. |
| Online services to users of library through creation of user friendly interface – Online Public Access Catalog (OPAC). |
| Developing centralized platform for providing cloud like service to NARES libraries to enable them to use koha for their library operations and local user services. |
To strengthen the Krishikosh platform- a digital repository for dissemination of agricultural knowledge generated under NARES.
WORK PLAN:
| Development of tool for knowledge management (Bibiometric analysis, Scientometric analysis, Text-mining including Natural language processing and copy detection system). |
| Tools for batch uploading of the documents in the digital platform. |
| Analytics for Krishikosh repository (Google analytics, webometrics, Semantic analysis and technology foresight). |
| Tools for notification of document uploading (Mobile Application). |
To sensitize the stakeholders through capacity building programmes / workshops knowledge management in the networked digital environment and introduce new knowledge delivery models like MOOCs.
WORK PLAN:
| PJTSAU, Hyderabad is responsible for Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) on Library Science: Content development, Hosting, Management and Certification including organization of capacity building programme/workshop on MOOCs. |
| ICAR-IARI will organize capacity building programmes/Workshops for the LIS professionals of SAUs in Haryana, Punjab, Uttarkhand, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir states. |
| ICAR-IVRI will organize capacity building programmes/Workshops for the LIS professionals of SAUs in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Rajasthan and North-East states. |
| PJTSAU, Hyderabad will organize capacity building programmes/Workshops for the LIS professionals of SAUs in Telengana, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Chattisgargh, West Bengal and Gujarat states. |
| TANUVAS, Chennai will organize capacity building programmes/Workshops for the LIS professionals of SAUs in Tamil Nadu, Andra Pradesh, Kerala, Karnataka and Odisha states. |
To work on Altmetrics which are complementary metrics to traditional and citation-based metrics and sensitize the stakeholders through capacity building workshops.
WORK PLAN:
| The Lead Centre and Consortium Partner Centres (PJTSAU, ICAR-IARI, ICAR-IVRI and TANUVAS) will work on Altmetrics tools to traditional and citation-based metrics. |
| ICAR-IARI will organize capacity building programmes/Workshops on Altmetrics tools for the stakeholders of SAUs in Haryana, Punjab, Uttarkhand, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir states. |
| ICAR-IVRI will organize capacity building programmes/Workshops on Altmetrics tools for the stakeholders of SAUs in Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Rajasthan and North-East states. |
| PJTSAU, Hyderabad will organize capacity building programmes/Workshops on Altmetrics tools for the stakeholders of SAUs in Telengana, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Chattisgargh, West Bengal and Gujarat states. |
| TANUVAS, Chennai will organize capacity building programmes/Workshops on Altmetrics tools for the stakeholders of SAUs in Tamil Nadu, Andra Pradesh, Kerala, Karnataka and Odisha states. |