Material support

The DEVECOL/Africa Ver. 1.0 CD was designed and programmed in 2000 with financial support from the U.S. Agency for International Development, specifically the Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance of the Bureau for Humanitarian Relief and the Office of Sustainable Development of the Bureau for Africa. USAID support since then has made it possible to improve maps, expand the digital library and move the resource onto the Internet as Geo e-Links Africa.

Peter H. Freeman & Associates supported the conceptual and early design work of the DEVECOL information system (see background papers) as well as the assembly of data bases and map design.

Mark Champney & Associates provided interface programming support for DEVECOL/Africa CD Ver. 1.0 that exceeded their contractual obligation.

United States Geological Survey EROS Data Center cooperated in providing World Data Base II data sets. Numerous entities have offered both digital and hard copy files of case studies: the World Resources Institute, the International Institute for Environment and Development, and the Centre for Information on Low-External-Input and Sustainable Agriculture, and the International Resources Group, Ltd, among others (see Partners)

  Ideas, advice, encouragement

Advice, critiques and encouragement from the following individuals have been critical to the development of DEVECOL/Africa. Dr. Ray Meyer, Mike McGahuey and Paul Bartel, all from USAID; Dr. Hari Eswaran, US Department of Agriculture World Soil Resource unit; Dr. Freddy Nachtergaele, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations; Jessica Graef, Food Security Resource Center at Food Aid Management(FAM) and her successor, Trish Schmirler; and Chris P. Reij, Free University, Amsterdam.

Continous collaboration with Food Aid Management and its Food Security Resource Center during 1999 to 2003 was crucial to maintaining the orientation of DEVECOL/Africa to the field worker in Africa and the numerous private voluntary organizations that comprised FAM's membership. (USAID ended support for FAM in August 2004.)

All ideas have their origins in life experience. Peter Freeman traces the origins of DEVECOL to his graduate studies in Turrialba, Costa Rica at the Inter-American Institute of Agricultural Sciences (now CATIE) in the early 1960's and to two of his professors in particular: Dr.Joseph Tosi Jr. and Dr.Gerardo Budowski.