Do information portals need to be sustainable?

There are NGOs and donors creating internet-based information portals and knowledge nodes in an attempt to help marginalised producers to have access to more information on agricultural techniques, prices and service providers, etc. This is, in principle, a valid effort and certainly any improvements in this front will benefit those who depend on such markets. However, things get a bit less clear when this effort is analysed using a sustainability lens.

For me, the question of how sustainable any of these spaces have to be within the context of a pro-poor market development project is resolved when I think about the definition of facilitation as the creation of conditions for public and private market actors to lead the market development processes on their own.

Take the example of interest forums (or multi-stakeholder platforms): we promote them with the objective of creating good conditions for market actors to:

• come together to gain a joint vision of the market
• identify blockages and opportunities
• undertake collective activities and strategies to tackle blockages and exploit opportunities

Whether the forum continues after the project ends will depend on the needs and interests of the actors who participate in it. Even if the forum dies, there are many things that remain and that are more important than the forum itself; for example: new connections, new contracts, more trust, more confidence, new business models, new ways of thinking, new organisations, new experiences with new technologies and techniques, knowledge on how to influence policy-makers, etc.

The same is true for knowledge portals. As long as market actors (both public and private) are collaborating to improve how knowledge is produced, circulated, accessed and used on a regular basis, it does not matter if the knowledge portal we created continues or disappears because new routines, platforms and spaces will emerge. However, form an investment perspective, we do need to make the case of how the portal will contribute to structural market change.