Full Coverage: communications

28.01.2008 First of its kind in India, the Rajasthan State Cooperative Department has launched the ‘Kisan SIM card’. Farmers can now get free tips on various aspects of farming from weather updates to guidance on livestock rearing to crop infection through SMS and voice messages.

28.01.2008 Google Inc’s YouTube has recently made all its videos available on certain latest generation mobiles. With the service being offered initially in 16 countries besides the United States and 10 languages besides English, it hopes to reach out to even more people.

23.01.2008 Recently in north India’s prosperous state of Punjab, another telemedicine project has been inaugurated. Using the modern Broad Band VPN technology, the tele-linking will be used to make available the health facilities and expert opinions to those in need of urgent medical attention in far-flung areas.

21.01.2008 Bangladesh’s caretaker government has made substantial cuts in the rentals and tariffs of submarine cable. The country has a very low Internet penetration, where only 0.3% of the population can access it. It is now hoped that by this move more people will be able to use it.

18.01.2008 With computerisation of local governing bodies, e-governance in India is likely to take deep roots. If central government accepts the recommendations submitted by an expert group, some 250,000 panchayats will go online over next three years, benefiting grassroots organisations and bringing in transparency.

14.01.2008 Bitcomp, a software company known for developing software for agriculture and forestry, has come out with a unique SMS service for farmers in Finland, Poland and Czech Republic. Known as RemoteAdvisor, the service is based on centralised Internet application called WebWisu.