AGMARIS manual : a guide to designing, installing, and monitoring a site - specific, provincial AGMARIS in the Philippines

This guide to the installation of a provincial-level Agricultural Marketing Information System (AGMARIS) is the product of experience gained under a joint Agricultural Marketing Improvement project between USAID and the Philippine Bureau of Agricultural Statistics. Central to the AGMARIS is a systematic approach for assessing and responding to the market information needs of farmers and traders at the provincial level and Philippine policymakers at both national and local levels. Farmers producing perishable commodities such as fruits and vegetables would be the main beneficiaries of such a system. Before installing an AGMARIS in a given province, a Marketing and Information Needs Assessment (MINA) is conducted to investigate the marketing system of each priority commodity and determine the information needs of each type of market participant; this includes examining the flow of agricultural commodities from the farm level to terminal market centers. Based on the MINA, a site-specific AGMARIS is then tailored to local conditions and information needs. Preparing and installing the AGMARIS involves eight principal steps that require 2-3 months to complete, and are followed by two further steps: troubleshooting and monitoring. Attachments to this manual explain ways to conduct reconnaissances under different situations and describe in detail the assessment approaches applied to Market Centers and Trading Centers. (Author abstract, modified)