Task Force for the Assessment of a National Agricultural Information Infrastructure

The USAIN Executive Council established this taskforce with the purpose to develop a white paper to:

document the important role and contributions of agriculture and agricultural information to the well-being of society;
identify current players and systems in the U.S. agricultural information environment;
review national and international trends in information technologies, standards, and user demands; and
suggest options and opportunities for developing a more efficient, coherent, and collaborative infrastructure.

It is expected that this white paper will provide USAIN Members with the documentation and wording we may need to make official statements to government officials, to promote a national agricultural information agenda, and to gain new resources for special initiatives.

The members of this taskforce are: Barbara Hutchinson (Chair), Constance J. Britton, Diana Farmer, Anita Ezzo, Randy Heatley, Susan McCarthy, Sheila Merrigan, Mary Ochs and Amy Paster, Luti Salisbury (Ex-Officio), and Olivia Vent (Consultant).

This committee had brainstorming sessions at ALA mid-winter and at AgNIC meetings to gather input from USAIN members. A draft of the report will be presented at the 2006 USAIN conference at USAIN conference, Cornell, Ithaca.

With partial funding provided by USAIN, Barbara Hutchinson attended an FAO Consultation meeting in Rome in October 2005 entitled: The International Information Systems for Agricultural Science and Technology: Review of Progress and Prospects. This aims and deliberations of this expert consultation meshed in perfectly with the guidelines establish for our taskforce.