Socio-technical design principles for a multi-stakeholder agriculture extension information system in Ethiopia

Though the importance of design knowledge is becoming critical the effort to producing prescriptive knowledge in the information and communication for development domain is limited. Such knowledge addresses the requirements of local development contexts, practices, and priorities and balance the issues of generalizability and specificity through contextualizing the design principles (DPs). This research shows how such contextualized design knowledge can be produced to address the challenges presented by socio-technical contexts in the Ethiopian agriculture extension information service system. The knowledge produced is grounded on insights from kernel/reference theories and complemented with knowledge from empirical observations. The research identified six DPs to address four design requirements: (1) supporting stakeholders’ networking; (2) developing information content that meets the needs of the local context; (3) improving accessibility of agricultural extension information to stakeholders; and (4) enhancing adoption and effective use of the information system. The DPs to address the above socio-technical requirements fall into principles to improve: (1) actor-to-actor networking; (2) agriculture extension information system content development; (3) the accessibility of information; (4) device accessibility; (5) accessibility of interfaces; and (6) effective use and adoption of the (AEIS).