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Pro-poor innovation highlighted at IFPRI conference
Posted: July 10, 2008
The International Service for National Agricultural Research (ISNAR) division of the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) held a conference on "Advancing Agriculture in Developing Countries through Knowledge and Innovation" on 7–9 April 2008 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
The conference provided a forum for exchanging ideas and experiences on knowledge and innovation for development among researchers, practitioners and decision-makers from the public, private and civil sectors, and to identify areas for further research, advocacy and cooperation. It was attended by almost 200 people, mainly from sub-Saharan Africa. In a plenary panel session on the final day, Ann Waters-Bayer from the Prolinnova International Support Team gave an invited paper on "How can technological and socio-institutional innovation processes have more impact at the local level?" (MS word document; size : 47 KB). This gave an opportunity to introduce the vision and concepts of PROLINNOVA. Tesfahun Fenta and Amanuel Assefa from the PROLINNOVA-Ethiopia coordinating NGO AgriService Ethiopia, Teklu Tesfaye from the Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research (EIAR) and Chair of the PROLINNOVA-Ethiopia Steering Group, and Working Group member Elias Zerfu from ISNAR attended the conference and displayed posters on local innovation in the lobby of the conference venue. A summary of the conference can be found under www.ifpri.org/events/conferences/2008/20080407.asp
New resource: PID in Spanish!! / Desarrollo Participativo de Innovación – publicación en Español!
Posted: May 27, 2008
Maria Omonte, working with Prolinnova-Bolivia, has recently compiled a publication on PID in Spanish. Besides an in-depth discussion on PID and its practice, it also brings an introduction on Prolinnova in general. The document hopes to trigger reflection and discussion on the role technicians and policy makers are to play towards a more supportive role to farmers' own development efforts.
A timely and well elaborated document for those working in Spanish!!
For any comments or suggestions, please contact the author at: mariaomontef@yahoo.es
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En un esfuerzo por entender y reflexionar sobre el rol protagónico que los agricultores deben tener en el proceso de desarrollo social y la importancia de partir de sus conocimientos y su experiencia, se presenta este documento, DPI: Desarrollo Participativo de Innovación, que es la compilación de varios documentos, la mayoría de ellos producidos por Prolinnova, por Maria Omonte, de Prolinnova-Bolivia
El objetivo de esta compilación, lograda en nuestro idioma, es dar una información general, pero sustancial de lo que es y significa el Desarrollo Participativo de Innovación (DPI), como enfoque y metodología de trabajo. Este material, puede ser la base para discutir, reflexionar y orientar el trabajo de los técnicos, investigadores, decisores políticos y otros, hacia un real aporte a la vida de los agricultores, ayudándoles a ser protagonistas de su propio proceso de desarrollo.
Comentarios y sugerencias son bienvenidos, y pueden ser enviados directamente a la autora: mariaomontef@yahoo.es
The document can be found in the Andes Regional Programme section of this website and also available below in:
(Word Document; size: 317kb)
(PDF format; size: 404kb)
South Africa Event Announcement: Good Practices Exhibit
Posted: April 30, 2008
As part of PELUM South Africa's Food Sovereignty Indaba (important meeting) on 20-21 June 2008 in Pietermaritzburg, KwaZulu-Natal, to bring together producers, consumers, retailers, chefs, NGOs, government and other stakeholders to explore ways to make SA's food and agriculture system more sustainable, PELUM and Prolinnova-SA will be co-hosting a Good Practice Exhibition "Sustainable Technologies and Processes for Improved Livelihoods". View the detailed event announcement.
Support from Rockefeller Foundation for continued piloting of Local Innovation Support Funds
Posted: April 24, 2008
Earlier this month, the Rockefeller Foundation (one of Prolinnova's core donors) confirmed its interest in supporting a second phase of Piloting Local Innovation Support Funds (LISF) by Prolinnova. These pilots aim at finding best ways to make resources available directly to farmers to experiment and innovate, where needed jointly with support agencies and researchers. Initial pilots in five countries (Cambodia, Ethiopia, Nepal, Uganda and South Africa) have given indications of the potential of the LISF approach but many issues need to be addressed and studied to ensure that LISFs become sustainable over longer periods of time. The new phase will have three main components: the actual pilots including major attention to M&E of their functioning and impact, capacity building at farmer and staff level and dissemination of findings and policy dialogue to ensure longer term local support. The Rockefeller Foundation will contribute USD $1,330,000 of the total budget for this phase of just below USD $2,000,000. The Prolinnova DGIS-supported country and international budgets, together with country specific donors, will provide co-funding. The funding allows three new countries (Ghana, Kenya, and Tanzania) to join the Piloting LISFs sub-programme of Prolinnova.
The 2008 International Partners Meeting successfully completed
Posted: April 16, 2008
 The 2008 Prolinnova International Partners Meeting has just been completed in Tamale, Ghana. The meeting brought together 33 advocates of participatory innovation development (PID) from 22 countries including farmers, NGOs, and staff of government ministries and extension agencies, research organizations and universities. The meeting extensively discussed experiences in the various countries with participatory innovation development, formulated lessons learnt and mapped out strategies to strengthen this important component in the Prolinnova programme. The Director General of the Ministry of Agriculture presented the key note address during the opening session confirming his support for PID. He later joined other guests and invitees including the Regional Minister for Northern Ghana in visiting the information market showing the work done in the various Prolinnova countries.
 The meeting provided ample opportunities to review and discuss recent development and challenges within Prolinnova. Participants thus looked at the relevance of PID for climate change adaptation, reviewed the attention to gender concerns in their activities, re-strategized efforts to integrate PID into curricula for centers of higher learning and discussed ways to improve existing M&E efforts. In a separate session, the findings of the first phase of the FAIR Action Research on Local Innovation Support Funds were presented as formulated during a three day writeshop with partners involved just prior to the main IPM event.
A full report of the IPM will be prepared and posted at this website before the end of May. All decisions taken during the meeting have been summarized in the 2008 Prolinnova Action Plan (MS word document; size : 66 KB) already available on this website. In the final evaluation participants stressed that the meeting, in spite of a few logistical hiccups, has been a great event for learning and joined planning and thus a source of inspiration for the year to come. Nepal has been kind enough to offer to host the 2009 IPM.
For more details, you can visit the IPM 2008 sub-site. More photos and output documents will be posted soon. For those who wish to upload photos and documents to the IPM 2008 sub-site, please email me at jonathan.dayrit AT iirr.org.
More photos of the 2008 IPM in Ghana.
Innovation by communities confronting HIV/AIDS: new sub-project
Posted: March 6, 2008
A subgroup of Country Programmes within Prolinnova jointly developed ideas for learning and action related to Participatory Innovation Development (PID) in the face of HIV/AIDS. In January 2008, the HAPID (HIV/AIDS and PID) subproject was launched. The initial two years are funded by the Netherlands Directorate for International Cooperation (DGIS) under the Community-Led Natural Resource Management programme implemented jointly by Prolinnova and COMPAS (Comparing and Supporting Endogenous Development). The Prolinnova programmes involved initially in HAPID are those in Ghana–South, Mozambique and South Africa.
The local organisations responsible for coordinating the HAPID activities in each country are:
- Ghana–South: ECASARD (Ecumenical Association for Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development)
- South Africa: FSG (Farmer Support Group), University of KwaZulu-Natal
- Mozambique: VetAid.
The HAPID subproject is guided by an international team composed of Brigid Letty (Prolinnova–South Africa), Romuald Rutazihana (Prolinnova–Mozambique), Ann Waters-Bayer and Chesha Wettasinha (Prolinnova International Support Team, ETC EcoCulture), Carolien Aantjes (ETC Crystal) and Michael Loevinsohn (Applied Ecology Associates). View self-introductions of the HAPID international team.
A new sub-section has been created on (this) Prolinnova website for HIV/AIDS and PID under Thematic Programs. Learn more about HAPID here.
Farmer
First Revisited: reflecting on farmer innovation
Posted:
January 14, 2008 / Updated: March 5, 2008
Several Prolinnova partners were invited to
the 3-day workshop "Farmer First Revisited: farmer innovation
and agricultural research and development twenty years on" organised
by Ian Scoones, John Thompson,
Robert Chambers and their team at the Institute of Development
Studies (IDS), University of Sussex in
Brighton, UK, on 12-14 December 2007. The workshop brought together
about 80 people, some of whom had been part of the initial Farmer
First workshop at IDS 20 years ago, some who were at the Beyond
Farmer First workshop 15 years ago and several younger people
who are applying participatory approaches to farmer-led research
and development in agriculture and natural resource management.
All participants prepared
papers, which were posted on the website (www.farmer-first.org)
and distributed for them to read, but the papers themselves were
not presented. Instead, discussants presented 10-minute inputs
with key points and critical issues in each cluster of papers
and facilitated parallel discussion groups. To kick off the workshop,
scene-setting presentations were made by Robert Chambers on the
history and future of Farmer First, Andy Hall (UN University)
on agricultural innovation systems, and Jacqui Ashby (CIAT) on
methodological innovation and institutional change (Ian presented
on her behalf because illness prevented her from attending). The group discussions, based on the papers prepared before the
workshop, dealt with Farmer Participatory Research, engaging
with markets, the politics of knowledge, participatory learning
and impact assessment, public/private linkages, the future of
extension, farmer organisation, institutionalising participation
in public organisations, networking and partnerships for change,
and changing agricultural education.
The summaries of the discussions are posted
on the website, and a running documentation of the workshop process
appeared each day in the weblog (http://community.eldis.org/.5993f6ac/Blog),
along with video clips of interviews with some of the participants,
including Robert Chambers himself. A wiki-timeline was set up
on the Web, into which anyone – whether workshop participant
or not – could insert past milestone events and publications,
as well as key issues, challenges and opportunities for farmer-led
innovation in agricultural R&D. The timeline was also enriched
by participants writing and posting cards on "wallpaper" along
one wall of the meeting room at IDS; this information likewise
went into the digital version on the Web. In this way, IDS managed
to involve many people who would have loved to join the workshop
but could not be invited because too large a number of participants
would not have allowed the relatively informal and interactive
character of a workshop.
The most stimulating part of the workshop was
indeed the interaction with other people who are passionate about
farmer-led R&D, not only during the group discussions but
also during the open-space activities such as the information
market, the coffee breaks and the joint meals. The papers presented
by Prolinnova (including PROFEIS) partners are posted on the
Farmer First website (search for first authors: Amanuel Assefa,
Ann Waters-Bayer, Assetou Kanoute, Awa Faly Ba, Betty Del Rosario,
Elizabeth Vargas, Lydia Sasu, Oliver Oliveros and Scott Killough),
as is Ann's input as discussant on the topic "Creating demand
and increasing accountability: the role of farmers' organisations".
But even more important would be to look at some of the contributions
from other organisations from which Prolinnova could learn, especially
those dealing with power relationships in partnership building
and institutional change.
Later in 2008, IDS plans to
bring out a book with highly edited highlights of papers and
workshop discussions. The Farmer First website remains open for
posting of further papers on farmer-led innovation, and the blog
remains open for further bashing around of related ideas and
views. Links have been made between the Prolinnova and Farmer
First website, so that these complementary networks on interactive
science and technology development to alleviate poverty can enrich
each other.
Elizabeth Vargas, the Prolinnova Oversight Group member from Latin America, summarised the key points that she took home with her from the workshop [View document] (MS word document; size : 32 KB)
Welcome
to new Country Programme in Mozambique
Posted:
January 11, 2008
On 11 December 2007,
the Prolinnova Oversight Group (POG) officially welcomed Prolinnova Mozambique into
the international Prolinnova community of practice. The idea
for this Country Programme (CP) was born in a workshop organised
by VETAID-Mozambique in December 2006, which brought together
the main stakeholders in agricultural research and development
in the country to share experiences in promoting farmer innovation.
A two-person interim core team from VETAID and another local
NGO (ADCR) facilitated planning of inception activities, including
training in concepts and methodologies of Participatory innovation
Development, identifying and cataloguing farmer innovations,
information sharing, awareness raising and policy advocacy, and
strengthening the multi-stakeholder platform. The overall aim
is to build capacities in Mozambique to
practise a more participatory approach in agricultural R&D.
This CP, like the programmes
in Kenya,
the Andes and
francophone West Africa,
is not among the original nine CPs receiving core funding from
the Netherlands Government. All these new programmes therefore
have to pool existing resources of partners in pursuit of a common aim and raise funds for further support needed. Prolinnova Mozambique has
the additional task of translating materials from English to
Portuguese and vice versa to be able to communicate better with
other members in the international network.
At the very time that the POG
was deliberating on its inclusion, Prolinnova Mozambique without
external funding was holding a coordination meeting of VETAID,
ADCR and other partners in the country, to discuss activities
implemented in 2007 and to plan further activities in 2008. These
will be presented in a new page for Prolinnova Mozambique ,
which will soon be opened up on this website.
Sixth
POG meeting in Brighton
Posted:
January 11, 2008
Because so many
people from the Prolinnova Oversight Group (POG) were invited to
the Farmer First Revisited workshop in Brighton,
the POG took the opportunity to hold a meeting of these people
immediately before the workshop, on 11
December 2007. Enough members were
present to be able to form a quorum. The highlight of the meeting
was the decision by the POG to accept a new Country Programme
(CP): Prolinnova Mozambique (see related news..),
based on a proposal submitted by a multi-stakeholder platform
coordinated by the NGO VETAID. In addition, the POG refined the
criteria and procedure for including new CPs in the Prolinnova
community of practice; reviewed the CP and international support
activities including multi-country initiatives such as FAIR (piloting
of Local Innovation Support Funds) and curriculum development;
explored the current and potential relationship between Prolinnova
and farmer organisations at national and international level,
e.g. Via Campesina and IFAD (International Federation of Agricultural
Producers), for which Betty Del Rosario is the Asian coordinator;
and commented on the draft guidelines for quality assurance in
international publications from Prolinnova.
The POG welcomed Monica Kapiriri
from Uganda as
new POG member, who starts her term in January 2008. Monica s
first POG meeting will be in early April 2008, together with
the next International Partners Meeting, which will also provide
an opportunity for other Prolinnova partners to meet her. The
POG now consists of Scott Killough and Betty Del Rosario as co-chairs,
Oliver Oliveros as third external member, Elizabeth Vargas from Latin
America, Moni Ung from Asia,
Bassoum Souleymane from francophone Africa,
Monica Kapiriri from anglophone Africa,
and Will Critchley from the International Support Team.
Relevance
of Prolinnova for Asia-Pacific presented at APAARI
consultation
Posted:
January 7, 2008
Upon invitation of the Executive
Secretary of APAARI (Asia-Pacific Association of Agricultural
Research Institutions), Pratap Shrestha, Country Coordinator
of Prolinnova-Nepal, represented the international Prolinnova
programme in an Expert Consultation to Review Progress of Agricultural
Research Networks and Consortia in Asia-Pacific, held on 8-10
October 2007 at the National Academy of Agricultural Research
Management (NAARM) in Hyderabad, India. The consultation was
organised by APAARI in collaboration with the Indian Council
of Agricultural Research (ICAR) and the International Crop Research
Institute for Semi Arid Tropics (ICRISAT). The purpose was to
review the progress of various regional research networks and
consortia that work in partnership with APAARI or independently,
and to devise a strategy for future collaboration involving various
stakeholders in order to meet the emerging research needs identified
by APAARI members. Pratap is the Executive Director of LI-BIRD
(Local Initiatives for Biodiversity, Research and Development),
the NGO that facilitates the Prolinnova-Nepal programme. He made
a presentation on the Prolinnova Global Partnership Programme
under the GFAR (Global Forum on Agricultural Research) and its
relevance for the Asia-Pacific region.
APAARI-Prolinnova
presentation October '07 (PDF
file; size : 135 KB)
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