1. 26 September 2011 – Issue number 1
HIGHLIGHTS
Welcome to the eternal city. • 9:30 in the Italian Conference Room,
Etienne Wenger, a globally recognized
Welcome to the Second Global thought leader in the field of social learning
AgriKnowledge Share Fair and theory, communities of practice and their
application to organizations, will deliver a
welcome to IFAD headquarters keynote address on “Communities of
practice and strategic capabilities”.
• 11:00 in the Oval Room, Sam Dryden from
Nine months ago, on a the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation will
chilly January morning, present their agricultural development
the share fair steering strategy and Kevin Cleaver will present
committee and a group of IFAD’s Strategic Framework 2011 - 2015.
other colleagues, met for
a visioning session. At • 15:30 – 16:30 visit the chill-out corner and
that meeting, we have a chat with Etienne Wenger.
discussed the event's
• Take advantage of over 25 sessions training
format, themes,
session to acquaint yourself with a wide
audiences and agreed that
range of knowledge-sharing methods and
we would organize an social media tools.
"out-of-the-box" event.
We did our best to live up to this commitment. And hopefully this is PROGRAMME CHANGE
reflected in the Share Fair programme. • Graphic facilitation session will take place
Considering that the inaugural session is on the second day, the cocktail is from 14:00-17:00 in the DINING ROOM.
on the third day and it finishes on a Thursday, I guess we can consider the
second edition of the share fair an "out-of-the-box" event! SHARE FAIR WEB AND
But all kidding aside, as the saying goes, "the proof is in the pudding", SOCIAL MEDIA PRESENCE
and over the next 4 days we'll see whether we managed to live up to our One of the trademarks of the share fair brand is
vision. Rest assured that we put all our energy and passion into it. social reporting. The share fair has a
contingent of social reporters who will use
An event about YOU and for YOU
social media (Twitter, blog, Facebook, Flickr,
Now we need YOU - we need YOU to make this a FUN and Blip.TV, YouTube, podcasting) to report live
MEMORABLE event. Try to attend as many sessions as possible. Use from the various sessions. We'll be using
the tent as a meeting point. Meet up and connect with people in the chill- #sfrome. Tweeps.... you’ll have your 5 minutes
out corner. Gather up your courage and use the speakers’ corner to share of glory every time you tweet using #sfrome,
your thoughts and ideas. as your tweet will appear on the beautiful
We ask you to ponder on a fundamental question - what is the value and twitter wall!
impact of such events. We want to hear your views and we’ll do so at the If you have colleagues who were unable to
closing ceremony. attend the Share Fair, please let them know that
they can follow some of the sessions via
webcast at http://sharefair.ifad.org. You can
Anticipation find the webcasting programme at http://
www.ifad.org/events/sharefair/index.htm
by Nancy White
Aaaaaaannnnnntttttiiiiiicccciiiippppaaaaatiiiionnnn. That is my theme for
the last five days as I watched and participated in a tiny way in the
preparation for Share Fair Rome, hosted at IFAD. Until you “peek behind
the curtain” you have no idea of all the preparation going on, how many
people, how many TASKS are involved! Then it all comes down to today
when everyone arrives and the responsibility for success transfers from

2. the magnificent planning team to US, the Share Fair-ers. So here is my #Sfrome tweets
three steps to Share Fair participation magic.
1. Plan AND be prepared to be flexible. Scan the agenda and mark the
“don't miss” sessions. Mark a few mystery sessions - things new to you
that might open a new window of learning. At the same time, as you
wander through the fair, watch for the unexpected. The gift of being
surprised by something you didn't know you cared about or needed is
fantastic.
2. Connect with familiar AND new people. Introduce yourself to at least
two new people every day. Identify who you want to follow up with. Use
that powerful method, the coffee break, to connect.
3. Share your sorry AND ask for what you need. While the structure of
the Fair sessions offer certain content, we all have knowledge to share
AND we all need other knowledge. Ask and offer at least once a day. And
to those of you who for some reason think what you have to offer isn't
valued by others, test that assumption and make more offers!
So the stage is set. As we thank all the Fair organizers, the responsibility
now shifts to us. As online community guru Howard Rheingold likes to
say “ what it is --> is --> up to us”. Let's make the most of it!
The story behind the session
number
by Beate Stalsett
Browsing through the Share Fair programme you might have noticed that
every session has a number, and you probably asked yourself: “what is
the logic behind these numbers?” Someone asked me if it signified
number of minutes of each session. Well, the answer is no. I believe that
would have been very unfair to proposal number 1.There is a very simple
logic behind the numbers.
As you all know by now, the Share
Fair Steering Committee received
300+ proposals for this year’s
event. 300+! We were thrilled by
the number of proposals, and
needed to have a solid system for
keeping track of them when we
were doing our thorough selection
process. Patti (who I have voted to
be the Steering Committee’s most
structured person) suggested
immediately to give the proposals fixed numbers, and so we did. The
numbers are simply the unique identifier for the proposals, based on the
first list we received. Nothing more, nothing less.
When I think back of the first version
of the Excel list, I am very excited and
happy to see how our graphics team
has shaped it into this beautiful
programme that you are holding in
your hands today. All these numbers,
names, links and comments have been
turned into a colourful, easy to read
overview of the event. It should be
easy to find and select the sessions
that interest you the most.

3. On a personal note, what I am looking forward to the most, is to finally
meet the people behind the names and numbers in this list who have been
our companion for the last couple of months. I am looking forward to
finally attend their sessions, and to listen to their stories in person. Taking
this event from paper to reality has been an intensive but fun journey, and
I hope the coming days will reflect this.
Why did I submit a proposal for
the Share Fair ? Because I want
to learn
by Armine Tukhikyan
I come from Armenia, a beautiful country with high mountains, deep
gorges and alpine meadows rich in ancient monuments and historical
sites. However, the landscape is often spoiled with garbage scattered
here and there. Plastic is a disaster: bottles and bags are everywhere in the
countryside.
Waste management is not the strongest part of our municipal services.
Indeed, waste is removed regularly in most of the urban areas, but what
happens next is less encouraging.
We do not have recycling plants, dumpsites do not comply with
international standards, and we lack waste separation facility and
mechanism. And as you may imagine, the situation is much worse in rural
areas.
In 2010, my organization, Urban Foundation made the very first attempt
in Armenia to address this issue. We started with one community and
installed special bins for PET bottles. We launched a massive public
awareness campaign. And you know what, it worked! The municipality
and other stakeholders welcomed and supported the initiative.
However, despite this first success, there are still a thousand question left
to be answered particularly, how to reduce the use of plastic shopping
bags. I will be sharing my story on 27 September from 16:00-17:00 in
the Speakers’ corner in the tent. And I look forward to discuss waste
management related challenges with my peers on 28 September from
16:00-17:00 in the Oval room.