Continuing education for farmers

   On Monday, 25 February IT trainings for farmers in the Glavinci library and in the Internet center of the Jagodina library started.

   In the second group of farmers from Glavinci (the first group completed the training successfully) are people who do not have any computer skills. The teacher, Bojan Novic, is teaching them how to use Windows operating system, opening and sending e-mails, picture downloading, using Google as a search engine, and visiting the agricultural websites and the website of Serbian Ministry of Agriculture.

   For farmers who do not have libraries in their villages, the training is being held at the Jagodina library. The group consists of farmers with basic computer skills, but who cannot find the right information about the state subsidies, filling in agricultural forms, selling and buying on the Internet. The teachers have made booklets based on different levels of knowledge, so farmers can revise at home what they learn at the libraries.

Some of the farmers at the training in the Jagodina library asked about agricultural websites in foreign languages because they were aware of the fact that latest information and news regarding agriculture came from the United States, Germany, the UK, etc. The teacher explained that it was possible to visit foreign websites and translate the texts with Google translate or similar tools.

Of course, the translation would not be perfect, but at least, it was possible to understand the texts in general. They wanted to see how it worked and visited two sites: http://www.agriculture.com/ and  http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/a/agriculture/index.html . They were satisfied with the result.

Lecture on blueberries announced the opening of the village library in Majur

Due to the great interest of our farmers to start growing blueberries, on Saturday, 23 February two more lectures -Growing and marketing of blueberries to the European market- were held. The lecturer was Ivan Djuknic, the owner of the Agricultural cooperative Prima borovnica from Belanovica. The lectures were held in the villages of Majur and Glavinci.

Ivan Djuknic is the owner of the Agricultural cooperative Prima borovnica from Belanovica and a successful breeder of blueberries in Serbia. His lectures on conditions for growing blueberries on specific markets (Russia, the United Kingdom, and the Netherlands) and good purchase price of products caused great interest of farmers.  Serbia has excellent conditions for growing this crop.

Blueberries are planted at a spacing of three meters between rows, and in the row itself the spacing is 1.20 to 1.50 meters. Depending on the density of planting, 2,300-2,500 plants per hectare and needed. The yield per one shrub ranges from 5 to 7 kilos. The yield per hectare is 12 to 15 tons. The advantage of growing blueberries in Serbia is the quality of fruit at the time of the harvest.  Blueberries in normal conditions in Serbia can be harvested in the middle of June. At this time in Europe there are not many blueberries, which allow us to cover the gap that exists at that time in the market.

It has also been proved that the quality of Serbian blueberries has advantage compared to other producers’ blueberries. The blueberry development strategy in Serbia should be having plantation in warmer areas at lower altitude, with emphasis on early blueberry varieties. We import high-quality seedlings of American varieties: Duke, Bluecrop, Spartan and others. They are early and medium-early varieties that showed best result in growing in Serbia. At the same time they are varieties mostly grown all over the world. They are known for the excellent quality of its fruits.

Successful blueberry growers from Jagodina, Gvozden Dzelatovic and Nenad Petrovic talked about their blueberry plantations, the challenges and best practices.

The lecture on blueberries in Majur is the first AgroLib Ja project activity that the Jagodina library carried out in this village. On that occasion, the opening of the village library in Majur was announced. Farmers were invited to the lecture through the AgroLib partners, the Agency for Small and medium Enterprises and Registered Agricultural Households, and the president of the local community of Majur, Bojan Cvetkovic.

The locals showed great interest in such lectures. And after the official presentation, they introduced the AgroLib Ja project team with topics for possible future agricultural lectures, that would be significant and useful for the people in this local community.

Also, they expressed satisfaction with opening of the library branch in their village. 

Truffle plantations – business of the future

A special food item of the future will be wild meat-mushrooms and the best and most profitable among them is the TRUFFLE.

It grows underground on the roots of woody plants and their production in the world cannot meet demand, therefore their price is very high. Serbia is an area rich with truffles and has favorable climate and great development opportunities in this area. Therefore, a special place belongs to truffle plantations on farms, small plots where the entire families are able to earn decent income on their own properties. 

The lecturer Milan Beader, Doctor of Agricultural Science and director Green Laboratory Investment Fund, with his partner Zarko Jankovic, were answering a detailed series of questions about the conditions for plantations, the production itself, and purchase. There were those who were interested in the Company that started the truffle business in our country. 

Computer training

      At the Glavinci village library, on Monday 18 February 2013, computer training for the first six farmers from the area started. The trainees are not only locals, but also people form surrounding villages where there are no libraries.

    They had positive work atmosphere, the trainees had different level of computer knowledge, so the lecturers Jelena Dimitrijevic and Bojan Novcic were very busy. Some of the trainees wanted to start with basics, while others wanted to start with using Skype and social networks.

All of them got a booklet that they would read at home and find out more about computers use. 

The training will last for a week, an hour a 

day. Since there are many people who applied for the training, the training will last for one more week.

    

The Glavinci Library, within the third series of computer training, got three books on IC literacy from the National Library. These are: Желим да научим Интернет (I want to Learn How to Use the Internet), Желим да научим Ексел (I Want to Learn How to Use Excel) and Први корак (First Step).

Jagodina Library at the Regional Conference in Macedonia

Jagodina Library at the Regional Conference in Macedonia

The Jagodina Library participated at the Regional Conference Public libraries encourage innovations in the community on 14 and 15 February 2013 in Radovis, Macedonia. Except from librarians, representatives of local governments and Macedonian Ministry of Culture attended the conference in order to encourage dialogue and networking between national and local policy makers and librarians.

Public Library Braka Miladinovci in Radovic, Macedonia hosted two-day Regional Conference about innovative services in public libraries and their contribution to social and economic development and improvement of [people’s lives at both local and international level. The Conference organizers were EIFL-PLIP: Public Library Innovation Program and Public Library Braka Miladinovci from Radovis.

On the first day a panel discussion about problems and future development of Macedonian librarianship was held. The discussion was encouraged by good practice examples of the libraries in the region. The projects of the Zavidovići Public Library (Bosnia and Herzegovina), the Public Library Radislav Nikcevic, Jagodina (Serbia), the Public Library Braka Miladinovci (Macedonia) and Regional Public and University Library Goce Delchev-Stip (Macedonia) were presented. Also, EIFL-PLIP mission and vision of the development of libraries was presented by Ramune Petuchovaite, the PLIP (Public Library Innovation Program) manager for public libraries.

Except from the managers of national library institutions in Macedonia, other participants were Robert Angelovski, Head of Department for Cultural Heritage Protection in the Republic of Macedonia, mayor of the municipalities of Radovis and Konce, and representatives of the Ministry of Culture in charge of the development of librarianship in Macedonia. The Director of the Public Library in Jagodina, Vesna Crnkovic talked about new services in agricultural libraries.

 Inspired by the examples of regional libraries-innovators, the government and libraries representatives in Macedonia discussed the problems in Macedonian librarianship, methods of funding libraries and possible projects that would support the development of library activities in the Republic of Macedonia.

On the next day, there were around 30 participants from Macedonia and the region who presented their papers. At the session Public libraries address the needs of local communities, the director of the Jagodina Library presented the paper Project AgroLib Ja-fostering cooperation between the library and local community. The project of the Jagoidna Library has attracted a lot of attention in Macedonia, which is Serbia’s neighboring country, since agricultural and economic situation in these two countries is very similar and the Public Library Goce Delcev in Stip replicated the AgroLib Ja project and named it Support for Farmers.

According to Ivanka Sokolova, the organizer of the Conference and the manager of the project Creative minds create opportunities for employment: Support for the unemployed, the public libraries in Konce, Kavadarci and almost the whole of Eastern Macedonia, which has a vast agricultural territory, showed greatest interest in Serbian project.

The Conference was conducted in a great atmosphere with the conclusion that it encouraged a constructive dialog with authorities and regional cooperation of librarians. The need to organize such and similar conferences in the region, that would encourage cooperation and exchange of knowledge and experiences between librarians in the Balkans was expressed.

Innovations in Agriculture – Truffle Plantations under Hazelnut Trees

Agricultural lecture within the AgroLibЈа project

         The Jagodina Public Library on Wednesday, 13 February 2013 continues with agricultural lectures within the AgroLib Ja project.

The topic:

 Innovations in Agriculture – Truffle Plantations under Hazelnut Trees

The schedule of lectures:

•         At 17:00 at the Public Library „Radislav Nikcevic“, reading room, 1st  floor;

•         At 19:00 at the Glavinci library.

The lecturer is Dr. Milan Beader, director of the Green Laboratories investment fund.

We are expecting you!

Macedonia Advocacy Conference 2013

     Director of the Jagodina Public Library, Vesna Crnkovic, will showcase the AgroLib Ja project for farmers at the event organized by the Public Library Braka Miladinovci in Radovis, Macedonia, in a two-day national conference (14-15 February). The conference is funded by EIFL-PLIP. Representatives of national local governments and national ministries, and librarians have been invited to attend the conference. 

     The emphasis will be on sharing knowledge about library services that use IC technology and on encouraging dialogue between policy makers and libraries.

     Besides the Jagodina Library, there will be three other EIFL-PLIP partner libraries  at the event. They are Zavidovići Public Library (Bosnia and Herzegovina) presenting their Youth Corner which serves vunerable youth; Public Library Braka Miladinovci presenting their employment training and information service, and Regional Public and University Library Goce Delchev-Stip (Macedonia) presenting their mobile training and information service for farmers.

AgroLib Ja presented in Pancevo, Serbia

 

On 30 October 2012 Public Library Radislav Nikčević (Jagodina, Serbia) presented their successful AgroLib-Japroject and online marketplace at a reception in the Pančevo City Hall.

 

The event was hosted by Pančevo City Council’s Department for Village and Rural Development and Pančevo Public Library. Presidents of local community councils and farmers’ associations, librarians and directors of cultural centres from southern Serbia were present.

 

Pančevo is the administrative centre of Serbia’s South Banat District. Ms Vesna Crnkovic, director of Public Library Radislav Nikčević, recommended the launch of a service for farmers, modelled on AgroLib-Ja, in Banat.

 

A real story of an AgroLib market user

Ms LJiljana Vulic, who was made redundant due to economic crisis decided to take incentives from the state and start an old hand-made craft business, but it was not very successful.

She registered on our webiste www.agrolib.rs/pijaca and her business improved. A local TV station has recently made a story about her and a local newspaper Novi Put published an article about Ljiljana's business.

Ms Ljiljana is very grateful to Jagodina Public Library and the project Agrolib  for helping her find her place in the Serbian market. Some time ago, Jagodina library celebrated 103rd anniversary. As a sign of her gratefulness, she baked a cake with a logo of the Agrolib project and brought it to the library as a gift. Everyone was pleasantly surprised. 

Article about mat-weaving and AgroLib user  Ms Ljiljana Vulic 

Decorative items

A few words about our online marketplace AGROLIB

Agrolib market (www.agrolib.rs/pijaca) is online marketplace where users can advertise their produce and services and share their experiences regarding agriculture, handicrafts and rural tourism.

Website AgroLib market is for people seeking or offering produce and services in the
domain of agriculture, rural tourism and old crafts. All site users, including unregistered users
have the ability to search the product database, database of registered users and the ability to
view their profiles. After successful registration and account activation users are able to
independently regulate certain activities. Users with an active account can edit their own data
about themselves, their businesses and their products within their user profile. The user must enter the produce name, type must be selected from chierarchicaly ordered structures and must enter the product description. As a part of the reach text editor, a user can use the program for file managing. With this program, they can upload a photo (jpg, png or gif) to the server and include it in the description. Each user has its own
folder.

Ongoing preparations for a new village library branch

            

      Preparations for our new library branch in the village of Majur are in progress. The City Assembly of Jagodina has renovated the space and purchased the furniture for the new village library. 

      We need to resolve the heating issues and some other details, so that we can start supplying the library with books and other library material. Also, we are going to set up 4 computers for free Internet access, one for the librarian and the other three for users. 

      This is going to be the fifth modern village library in the Jagodina municipality. 

AgroLib – Ja project at the IFLA Conference in Helsinki 2012

International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) is the leading international body representing the interests of libraries and information services and their users. It is the global voice of the library and information profession. It was established in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1927. Now,  IFLA has 1,600 members in about 150 countries all around the world.

The biggest event in the library world is certainly IFLA General Conference, which is held every year in August, in one of member states of IFLA. This year’s 78^th IFLA General Conference was held in Helsinki, Finland, from 11-17 August 2012.

A delegation of distinguished librarians from Serbia participated at 78^th IFLA conference. This year’s IFLA theme was Libraries Now! – Inspiring, Surprising, Empowering.  Some 4,000 participants from over 100 countries attended the conference. Serbian delegation was led by Dejan Ristic, acting director of the National Library of Serbia; other members of the delegation were: Tatjana Subotin-Golubovic, Ivana Nikolic and Tanja Tasic from the National Library of Serbia, Jasmina Ninkov, Mirko Markovic and Predrag Djukic from the Belgrade City Library, Vesna Crnkovic from the Public Library “Radislav Nikčević” in Jagodina, Nebojsa Vasic from the Public Library “Stevan Sremac” in Nis, Beba Stankovic from the Public Library “Ilija M. Petrovic ” in Pozarevac and Vesna Crnogorac from Serbian Library Association.

Director of the Public Library “Radislav Nikčević” presented the project about revitalization of rural libraries in the municipality of Jagodin- AgroLib Ja (Agricultural Libraries in Jagodina) at two sessions.

At the session New directions for public libraries in the developing world, organized by NGO Beyond Access,the director of the Public Library in Jagodina, Vesna Crnkovic introduce the audience with the success and challenges of the project AgroLib Ja, which aims to help farmers, through the network of rural libraries (agricultural literature and new information technologies), to obtain desired information on agricultural production and competitions and subsidies offered by the state.

http://express.ifla.org/node/5888

This project has been implemented by the Public Library in Jagodina in cooperation with the Town Assembly and the Agency for Small and Medium Enterprise and Registered Agricultural Households from Jagodina. The Agrolib Ja project partner was the Rural Development Support Network of Serbia, the project by the Ministry of Agriculture, which ended a few months ago.

The other session the director of Jagodina library, Vesna Crnkovic participated in was Social Networking for Agricultural Research, Education and Extension Service: an International Perspective and presented her paper Agricultural Rural Libraries in the Era of Information Technologies.

A librarian at the service of the users

The municipality of Jagodina and its 52 villages

      Besides the lecturers themselves, project partners, i.e. the Agency for Small and Medium Enterprises and Registered Agricultural Households participate in all lectures organized by the AgroLib Ja team. 

      At one of the lectures, the farmers’ attention was drawn to the deadline to apply for incentives for fattening of young cattle. Our colleague Ruzica Popovic, who works atthe library branch in Glavinci, took a very responsible task. 

      She informed farmers, who fatten young cattle, from Glavinci, Ivkovacki Prnjavor, Bresje, Lestar, Medojevac, Dragosevac ,Topola and the surrounding villages to submit applications on time and bring all required documentation in order to receive incentive payments. 

AgroLib Ja farmer's cattle

      The deadline was 31 January 2013. This expands the role of librarians. It is not just the job of book publishing, but much more than that, because librarians assist their users in finding the information they need.









http://www.agrolib.rs/?p=3036

Lecture on apitherapy

Dr. Stojkovic 

 On Friday, 1^st February, in a crowded room at the Jagodina library, a lecture on apitherapy was held. Apitherapy involves treatment with honey, royal jelly, pollen, bee wax and bee venom. 

    According to our guest Dr. Ljubinka Stojkovic, therapy is completely natural and safe for human health. Dr. Stojkovic is a general practitioner and professional phytoterapsit and apitherapist. She chose phytotherapy and apitherapy and got license in June 2009 by the Ministry of Health and became the only licensed therapist. 

    In her office WIZARD in Nis, she treats her patients according to the methods of both classical and traditional medicine. There are a lot of people who were cured of diabetes, cancers of all kinds, psoriasis, infertility, growth failure in children, rheumatoid arthritis, etc.

 The purpose of the lecture was to introduce prevention of viral infections with products from the honey pharmacy, since winter brings viral infections and respiratory tract infections. 

    After the lecture, visitors were able to get information they needed regarding their health or health of their family members and friends, or to get recipes from Dr. Stojkovic for preparing natural products based on herbs and bee products.

Discussion after the lecture

A beekeeper and the speaker

 Attentive audience