ET_2012_R&P_EarlyWinIntro

= Ethiopian Highlands Annual Review and Planning meeting = Go back to the event agenda
 * 17-18 September 2012 **
 * Info centre break out room, ILRI Ethiopia, Addis Ababa **

Quick feeds (Alan Duncan)
Working on value chain analysis, feed assessment tool (FEAST), feed technology prioritization (Techfit) to rank feed technologies according to the context and SLATE (for livelihood scoring). Strong engagement with partners between May (inception workshop) and synthesis workshop early September.

FEAST - used in Gitlo (Horro woreda) to derive % of income from various activities, understand seasonal feed calendars (in a graphical way), seasonality of prices, assessing constraints and opportunities. Next stage: how to move through with interactions.
 * Outputs**: Understanding of feed issues and options, entry points for intensification etc.


 * Question and comments**
 * How does it fit together with other quick wins?
 * With seasonality, feed market seasonality?
 * The function of trees as a function of feed, how we could we use other incentive If farmers want to invest in trees

Quick water (Charlotte MacAlister)
Objective: to provide a tool which can be used to support the spatial targeting of ag intensification practices to areas where the biophysical and livelihood conditions are likely to sustain long term development. Water is used as entry point. This project worked through identifying trajectories to sustainable intensification: what was done so far (MERET --> AgWater), checking consistency across initiatives, identifying indicators for ag intensification. Identifying development trajectories for Ethiopia looking at resources, demand and production systems.

8 different broad trajectories e.g. integrated natural resources conservation based crop-livestock systems intensification (including soil erosion and nutrient depletion as the major focus)... For each of these trajectories, identifying indicators / proxies (to go for this trajectory), and giving simplified reasons for selection. Transforming indicators into maps - combining layers (indicators) into trajectories into a mapping toolbox. Stakeholders involved want to develop their own trajectories - they want to select their own indicators - that would be the next step.


 * Question and comments**
 * We are asking where the validators came from? they came from existing program
 * The indicators are all national data
 * Socioeconomic, they came from market access data. We used only national map
 * From the regions they want to have regional map and data
 * Can we use the tools in different area, if the data available the process is the same, sure we can use this tool and as long as the data fed in to the model
 * Can we include probability....we can include probability layer
 * Can it be used to indicate the impact? Yes it can be used

Integrating pulses in crop-livestock interactions (Geletu Bejiga)
Farmers in Arsi (Bale) have adopted various practices (improved wheat, herbicides etc.), moving to monoculture and ending up with bad results from monoculture systems. There are opportunities for e.g. double cropping using Gena (April-July) and Bona (July-December). Animal by-products = source of energy and crop by-products = feeds. Objective of this project: break mono culture system, intensify and diversify crops. The project trained 500 farmers who received seeds. In the end no time for inception workshop, training etc. going directly to the field. Inception workshop 30 May 2012 (at the end of field work). Training of DAs in June 2012 (528 farmers and 17 DAs rained). Crops and varieties identified: Fava bean, field pea, lentil, kabuli chickpea. Total farmers expected to participate: 5000+. Farmer field days organized. This project is linked to another project on //rust resistant wheat varieties for achieving food security in Ethiopia//. Farmer field days in all districts will be organized in October.


 * Question and comments**
 * The question was whether Bale high land is suitable for beans?
 * Yellow rest was very severe b/c of the culture and various reasons this where we introduced crop rotation (If you intensify the crops in different seasons that might help)
 * Crop, draft animals farmers give priority for draft animals, this should be included in three projects
 * Tree cropping and technology transformation

Tree-crop-livestock interactions (Aster Gebre-Kristos)
Can agro-forestry contribute to address major development challenges in Ethiopia? The ET gov't has launched an initiative to plant trees - ICRAF will be involved in this. Major objectives of this project: to document local knowledge about integration, best bet tree species and management options, needs for development of tree seeds etc. We considered degree of intensification in Wolaita, Tigray, Arsi, ecology and climate, (un)successful sites for planting trees. Methodology: AKT5 software. local knowledge training over 2 weeks, capacity building of seven local experts. Results: What do farmers know and explain well? They can explain complex processes about e.g. causes of loss of tree cover, what works well where or not... Identification of which tree species are good for inter-cropping or not. Common drivers: income generation, ownership etc. Challenges: lack of knowledge on tree management, renting land for farming, lack of access to seedlings of appropriate tree species, long bureaucratic chains to utilize native species of trees (tenure). Organized a feedback session with farmers. Have various options, increase quality of seedlings, develop enabling environment, establish partnerships (e.g. national platform meeting in July 2012). Some cross-cutting issues coming up from that meeting: weak cross-sectoral integration/collaboration among various institutions, challenges of livestock free grazing system... Embed Research within development - we have to act know in spite of imperfect knowledge, build on what we know, use iterative structured learning to refine matching and reduce risk, deliver results as methods and tools and a community of practice, awareness creation.
 * Recommendations from this project**:


 * Question and comments forwarded**
 * How to up- scale—we said famer to farmer visit is best method to scale-up and to mobilize the community
 * Issue related with tree grazing, This is a major problem we found out
 * It is possible to mobilize the community?
 * Without control grazing mechanism we will not be successful
 * Trees mechanism system is important to have
 * Let’s us plant tress where they belong to
 * How do you really convince famers to plant trees? b/c they are long term plan
 * They are some specious trees which could serve in short term like, fodder specious tress....
 * Lessons learned, the methodology to start with farmers, understand the first what they don’t what and want to do
 * The degree of intensification, in Tigray, Wolaita and Asela, especially in Wolaita it was very good
 * We set some criteria’s for farming practices and site selections
 * We used tree crop and land scape approach
 * We used tree crop and land scape approach

Research for development (Diego Valbuena)
Whose demand? on the spectrum between others'- and farmer-led. Diversity, but farmers are not the same; systems perspective (farming depends on where); participation (background, engagement and better targeting). Site selection and description --> diversity description --> identification of options --> institutional and technological work --> sharing lessons --> Impact assessment. And M&E/document this all the while. Step 0: broad view Step 1: farmers discussions, construction of typologies and quantitative analysis Step 2: stakeholder discussions, CGIAR expert knowledge on tech and endogenous technologies, institutional options. Step 3: Market of technologies ('tech market day' for farmers to decide what tech they want to use), local M&E, innovation platforms. Step 4: Village market of technologies (market day but this time farmers showing what they got out of it) and regional market of technologies. Step 5: Impact assessment via household surveys and stakeholder discussions. Can all these steps be relevant to improve situation of farmers. Looking at M&E, we need to monitor: who participated, what tech or combination they selected, why they selected them, impact of these tech in overall farm productivity and link basket of tech and institutions.


 * Question and comments forwarded**
 * We had a lot of interesting discussions, about how to scale up and out
 * We might not need to scale up the research but we need to scale up the process
 * How is the idea of typologies, we can start with smaller with farmers, look for diversity etc. just checking the technology farmers adapt is good
 * Is this typology something similar with what IWMI is doing? We are interested to see we have varieties...diversity in the urban area...it is complimentary
 * We are talking about adoption, we do need to think about the technology that we are using and what farmers are going to do
 * We have to leave the room to let farmers think and adapt technology
 * The landscape should be included in the process when we are talking about farm level
 * We would call it household level or typology level?