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A Virtual Research and Extension Communication Network (VRECN) is a set of networked electronic tools facilitating improvement in communication processes and information sharing among stakeholders involved in agricultural development. In developing countries, research and extension personnel within a ministry of agriculture, in consultation and collaboration with key stakeholders, can develop and implement a VRECN. The tools are artifacts of a planned and ongoing process of stakeholder involvement in mapping communication- and information-sharing relationships and identifying critical relationships that require improvement to reach agricultural development and food security goals. Creating a VRECN in a developing country requires a planned process of stakeholder engagement, multi-stakeholder assessments of communication and information needs, and collaborative workshops to determine the desired characteristics of a VRECN, management relationships, and development partnerships. Six steps are to conduct project preparation, information technology assessment, and VRECN prototype development; identify product and services for VRECN; create VRECN prototype and directory; evaluate product and services; identify and secure staff support; and evaluate project. A number of tangible products result from a preplanned process for creating a VRECN, particularly through efforts to establish stakeholder needs assessments and collaborative working groups. (YLB)

A wide variety of incentive and disincentive programs are presented in an effort to stabilize the population and prevent bankruptcy of physical, economic, and social resources, particularly in countries like India and China. Following an introduction, the document discusses several programs, including (1) the use of small one-time payments for individuals who become sterilized and to family planning workers or doctors for each acceptor recruited; (2) incentives that improve welfare such as deferred incentive schemes like the "No-Birth Bonus Scheme" by private industry or government pension programs, in which accounts are credited with later collection contingent upon success in having a small family; (3) community development incentives in which whole villages are rewarded with development programs if the birth rate falls; (4) penalization of large families by imposing costs or withholding benefits; (5) emergency measures such as India's compulsory sterilization and China's one-child policy; and (6) expansion of the role of other incentive and disincentive schemes such as paying women to remain childless longer and developing programs to improve the lot of women. Also provided are four data tables illustrating countries offering small, one-time payments; average number of living children of women undergoing sterilization; fertility declines of all of India and the Tea Estates with and without "No-Birth Bonus" schemes; and Singapore's birthrate from 1960-1982. (LH)

Papers on science and technology libraries which were presented at the 1985 International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA) conference include: (1) "UAP (Universal Availability of Publications) and User Training for Categories of Grey Literature" (Dieter Schmidmaier, Mining Academy Freiberg, East Germany); (2) "Resource Sharing in Science and Technology Libraries in India" (S. K. Taneja, Department of Science and Technology, India); (3) "Information and Technology Transfer to Developing Countries" (James E. Beverly, U.S. Agency for International Development, United States); (4) "The Domesday Project: An Innovative Use of Optical Disc Technology by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)" (Peter Armstrong, BBC-TV, United Kingdom); and (5) "Optical Disks--An Emerging Technology for Libraries" (William R. Nugent, Library of Congress, United States). (THC)

Gender differences in health and education are a concern for a number of developing countries. While standard theory predicts human capital should respond to market returns, social norms (e.g., disapproval of women working outside the home) may weaken or even sever this link for girls. Though many studies have examined the link between women's wages or labor force participation and investment in girls, two significant problems are the possibility of omitted variables bias and reverse causality, and difficulty in identifying which of several mechanisms (returns, bargaining power, income, etc.) link the two. To overcome these problems, we provided three years of recruiting services to help young women in randomly selected Indian villages get jobs in the business process outsourcing industry. Girls in treatment villages were more likely to be in school and had greater measured BMI. We argue that the design of the experiment (providing opportunities almost exclusively for young, unmarried women rather than current mothers) allows us to rule out that mechanisms other than increases in the returns explain our results.

Sixteen papers are presented. Topics covered include language teaching, discourse analysis, code switching, phonetics, language and cultural identity, and descriptive and comparative studies. All presenters were from the Asia-Pacific area of the world. Papers include: "The Baba Malay Lexicon: Hokkien Loanwords in Baba Malay" (Anne Pakir); "Pronouns in Japanese: Their Functions and Meaning" (Yasukata Yano); "Code Switching and Code Mixing as a Communicative Strategy in Multilingual Discourse" (Mary W. J. Tay); "Teaching English as a Foreign Language in India: A Socio-Functional View" (Shivendra K. Verma); "Language Education and Literary Creativity in English: a Tale of Two Cities" (Agnes Shun-Ling Lam); "A Study of Scientific Palatography: A Comparison of English and Japanese Palatal Consonants by Dynamic Electropalatography" (Tsutomu Oyabu, Richard L. Dusek, Mitsuaki Yoshinaga, and Sadahiko Ikeura); "A Study in the Adequacy of Data for Strategy Analyses in Spoken Discourse" (E. Berendt and H. Takahashi); "The Use of Aspect in Papua New Guinea English" (Anne-Marie Smith); "Language Attitudes and the Social Order in Hong Kong after 1997" (Gail Schaefer Fu and Pui-to Lu); "A Proposed Descriptive Framework for the Pragmatic Meanings of the Particle "la" in Colloquial Singaporean English" (Loke Kit-Ker and Johna Low Mei-Yin); "Working for an English Syllabus for Senior English Majors in China's Tertiary Institutions" (Hu Zhuanglin); "Interpretation of Anaphora in English and Japanese in Sentences with Prepositional Phrases" (Shuzo Yamanaka); "On Japanese Onomatopoeia: A Functional Approach" (Hisao Kakehi); "English-Chinese Code Switching of Primary School Children in Singapore" (Kay Cheng Soh); "A Comparative Discourse Analysis of English and Japanese" (Makoto Oshima); and "On the Acquisitional Strategies of Complex Sentence Formation: Examples from Japanese and English Speaking Children" (Katsutoshi Ito). (Each chapter contains references.) (NAV)

This paper argues for a rational system of varied tuition rates in India that will raise a greater proportion of the revenues required to fund higher education while reducing inequities by decreasing costs for those less able to pay. The paper begins with a review of competing views of education under different economic systems, one view justifying total government support of education and the other full coverage of costs by the individual beneficiaries of the system. India, like most nonsocialist economies, combines these approaches, following a system developed over many years; this system is described in the second section of the document. In the third section the rationale and operational significance of discriminatory pricing of tuition is discussed. The current uniform fee structure produces unequal costs (in terms of ability to pay) and unequal benefits, and should be replaced by a system keyed to family income. Such a system would equalize both costs and benefits for all without altering admissions policies or levels of education furnished students. The actual fee paid would be a variable percentage of the actual cost of education. The distribution of incentives like scholarships, discussed in the report's final section, would also be discriminatory under the plan, though merit would also be recognized. (PGD)

Papers on administrative libraries which were presented at the 1985 International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA) conference include: (1) "Administrative Libraries and Universal Availability of Information: Comments from a Developing Country" (Diekolola Awosika, Nigeria); (2) "Automatic Indexing and the Dissemination of Information" (Wolfgang von Keitz, West Germany); (3) "Libraries and the Universal Availability of Information: Is Videotex the Missing Link in Information Services? (International Development, Examples and Perspectives)" (Gary L. Harris, West Germany); (4) "Administrative Libraries and Universal Availability of Information with Special Reference to India" (M. K. Jain, India); and (5) "Literature Data Banks for Institutional Libraries. A Critical Comparison between Conventional Information Media and the Possibilities Offered by EDP (Electronic Data Processing)-Supported Legal Information Systems in Europe" (Gerhard Kruse, West Germany). (THC)

The five papers in this collection on art and music environments in developing countries were presented at the 1984 IFLA general conference. (1) In "Developing an Art for Life's Sake," Gavin Jantjes, a black South African artist currently living and working in the United Kingdom, offers personal viewpoints on issues relating to the art of the Third World and African contemporary art in particular. (2) In "The Designer in a Developing Country and the Information He Needs," H. Kumar Vyas (India) describes the stages which an artist goes through in transforming ideas into actual design concepts, and specifically addresses the lack of available information about a Third World country's own cultural heritage and steps that have been taken at the National Institute of Design to help students systematically design methods of collecting information. (A detailed checklist entitled "Designer's Method for Documenting Traditional Craft Environment" is included.) (3) In "Vision et Recherche des Formes: Une Contribution Informelle a la Discussion" (Vision and the Search for Form: An Informal Contribution to the Discussion), Arnold Pacey discusses the social and esthetic aspects of design and situations which arise in developing countries when the traditional design does not lend itself to technological innovations. (4) In "L'Esthetique des Arts du Quotidien: Images de l'Afrique Noire et des Caraibes" (Esthetiques of Art for Daily Life: Images from Black Africa and the Caribbean), John Magnus (United Kingdom) focuses on the cultural links between countries on the two sides of the Atlantic Ocean as they are reflected in popular art forms. (5) In "Problems in Collection and Preservation of Music Data in Kenya and Suggested Solutions to the Problems," W. A. Omondi (Nairobi) discusses the present state of documentation in Kenya; the need to document traditional music and dance; the operations of the government's proposed Central Research Committee; and the development, dissemination, and propagation of traditional music and dance. (THC)

Intended for college teachers of geography, especially those teaching about developing countries, this publication contains background information about urban conditions in India. Historical and contemporary accounts of urban planning are provided for three Indian cities. The city of Jaipur was built by a maharaja in the 18th century, long before the British became a major urban force. The study of this city allows geographers to see the development of a planned city, in a unique region of India, over a period of 250 years. Delhi, the second city studied, became the capital of India in 1912, and New Delhi was created during the 1920's and 1930's to satisfy the particular needs of the British. The study of these cities focuses on the collision of Indian and colonial forces during the last 100 years. The third city studied is Chandigarh, a city that is entirely post-independence and, therefore, noncolonial. Built for Indian purposes to Indian specifications, but admittedly mainly by foreign architects, it allows geographers to identify both the aspirations and the reality of urban India during the last 25 years. (RM)