The Partnership – The LifeLines concept was born at OneWorld UK and is implemented in partnership with our sister centre, OneWorld South Asia together with grassroots organisations from across India. Funding and cutting-edge technology for the project has been provided by British Telecom and Cisco Systems.

An award-winning service used by farmers and teachers in thousands of villages to access expert knowledge where info and training are scarce.

LifeLines Agriculture

For farmers in rural India, advice on how best to protect their crops or livestock is thin on the ground. So if disaster strikes, or the farmers are faced with problems they’ve never encountered before, their hopes of saving their family from destitution can literally depend on access to clear information about what to do.

• LifeLines has received more than 220,000 calls and answers 300-400 questions per day.
• More than 60 percent of queries are from farmers requesting urgent advice.
• Some 96 per cent of farmers said they were satisfied and 70 per cent reported that the advice had delivered farming improvements.
• An early sample study of farmers across three villages revealed a consistent increase in product quality and productivity, leading to a 25-150 per cent increase in profit for the farmers.

LifeLines Education

Tens of thousands of teachers in remote, rural India don't have access to the training and teaching materials they need to educate their students. This toll-free platform is enabling teachers in West Bengal and Rajasthan to tap into the knowledge of subject-matter experts around the country.

• Over 10,000 teachers have used the service
• Teachers have asked about subjects like History, Geography, Physical Science, Maths, English, andHindi, as well as classroom management and policy and administration
• More than 25,000 questions and answers have been added to the database
• All queries are answered within 24-48 hours.