Grassroots Applications

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Grassroots Applications
J Satyanarayana
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What is a Grassroots Application?

• An Application that is
• 1. RELEVANT
• 2. ACEESSIBLE
• 3. AFFORDABLE
• 4. SUSTAINABLE
• to the millions at the bottom of the
  pyramid

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Relevance

• Makes economic sense
• Improves Agricultural Economics
• Improves rural livelihoods
• Improves quality of life
• Provides better healthcare
• Improves functional literacy
• Ensures social well-being
• Increases distributive justice

4
Accessibility

• Ubiquitous
• Within a distance, comparable to that for
  workplace
• Assisted
• Designed to be useful for illiterates
• Local Language Interface
• Available outside working hours
• Widely Known

5
Affordability

• Free of cost or at low service charge
• Half-a-days wages per month
• Shared access
• Community Service Centres
• Broadband to village at affordable cost
• APs ambitious project to provide 2 Mbps to all
  villages in 65 weeks
• Rs 100 p.m per kiosk always ON

6
Sustainability

• Economic Viability of Basic Infrastructure
• Public-Private-Partnership for backbone last
  mile
• Economic Viability of Delivery Infrastructure
• Common Service Centres
• Sustainable content
• Demand-driven content
• Entrepreneur-based
• Service-charge based
• Technological Sustainability
• Open Standards essential
• Open Source quite desirable

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An experiment..

• e-Sagu
• Agricultural Information Dissemination System
• Jointly implemented by DIT IIIT, Hyderabad
• Problems of 1000 Cotton Farmers in 3 villages
  addressed
• Encouraging results in 1st year
• Methodology
• Local Coordinators take digital pictures of each
  field every week
• Send to Experts Group at Hyd through CD
• Advice sent over Internet

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Thank You

• ceo_at_nisg.org