WA_planning_review_2012_day3

= West Africa planning and review meeting = toc Back to the event agenda
 * 23-25 October 2012 **
 * Modern City Hotel, Tamale, Ghana **

Mali group presentation 2
Fertilizers and seeds are among major issues. We are working on video materials about how to use local inputs etc. We maintained our research hypotheses to a large extent and discussed the design. How to monitor the seed coops/enterprises for internal quality management? Useful compare with seed enterprises that work on few crops and little training (control).

Our second hypothesis was that crop diversity on farm would change when within the reach of seed enterprises.

Our third hypothesis relates to nutrition etc. - we didn't discuss in detail because we need to discuss this with IFPRI. We discussed system resilience and stability but didn't yet come up with good conclusions. These are indicators for the whole project. Around nutrition, we are thinking about formulating research hypotheses - one could combine hypotheses for care-takers with training for cooking/growing crops. We haven't yet discussed the research design.


 * **Q**: Good presentation. The real issue is where is all of this going to happen? At household level or separated at other scales e.g. with seeds, nutrition...?
 * **A**: We hope to have more time to discuss this. These districts are not too far from each other. Some communes are the same some are different. We'd like to compare communes/villages where we worked primarily on seeds, on land use convention/livestock integration issues or on nutrition. There are communes where 2-3 things will happen at the same time. We need to sit together and compare.
 * **Q**: The proposal on seed systems: What do you propose? Improve the system?
 * **A**: The idea is that the project strengthens the capacity of existing seed cooperatives. We want to strengthen their capacity but in terms of research we want to assess results of that capacity strengthening. You're doing a lot of quality assurance for seeds but not bringing the government's regulatory authority.
 * **Q**: Good presentation but in the intro of nutrition we miss animal products - what is planned about this?
 * **A**: Yes it's clear they're part of it.
 * **Q**: In nutrition education you might want to highlight hygiene.
 * **A**: There is a standard program that includes hygiene.
 * **Q**: This focuses a lot on seeds which is good. We need to look at seeds' dependence on fertilizers. Delays in shipment of fertilizers have some incidence
 * **A**: That's one of the things we don't want to get involved in with suppliers. It's more about politics than research. Detailed knowledge on placements, on timing etc. is what we are focusing on.
 * **C**: Don't forget the CORAF program that is funded by USAid.
 * **Q**: Fodder production: You didn't incorporate fodder production/market in your work. Crop-livestock interactions should also include cattle in Southern Mali
 * **A**: Right now there's no limit. Our second research theme is not well defined and it depends on the choice of sites etc. This will be demand-driven rather than research-driven.
 * **Q**: Are you planning to do nutrition education?
 * **A**: We are doing it already
 * Is that our mandate as Africa RISING? Isn't that something that we should facilitate with development partners?
 * The issue is to combine this with other things. We are using what Dev partners have developed and combining it with other approaches. We are linking this to agronomic capacity. It's a different entry point to crop diversification. This helps target women. In our experience working with small groups of women has a long lasting impact.
 * (Bussie) I can help on research linking with nutrition e.g. nutrient contents of crops grown in different environments.
 * **C**: seeds and fertilizers combined with good practices etc. - combining packages to see how productivity improves - I'm still not very clear about researchable issues on seed enterprises. We are not emphasizing integration enough. When it comes to evaluation we have limited budget and it's more difficult to do this with different technologies

Upper West region group presentation 2
We added entry points such as **market analysis** (collective marketing, input delivery systems, linking farmers to market), **land use and management** (access to land is a gap in the region i.e. access to inputs, labour, technologies), **extension delivery system** (involvement of private sector, training of community livestock workers, extension volunteers), **credit delivery** (giving credit to groups of farmers rather than individual farmers), **processing technologies** (largely female-dominated; to reduce drudgery).


 * **Q**: Good job. Entry points are clear but they are based on the situtional analysis. What will you focus on? What needs to be done is still the researchable issues. About land use and management - you are not looking at local institutions etc. and land-use analysis. Credit: AR will not focus on this.
 * **A**: These are all next steps.
 * **C**: It is good but very development-oriented. I like the labour saving focus.
 * **Q**: There isn't much about bio-physical around issues of drought etc. It should come out more prominently.
 * **A**: We discussed drought, varieties, biomass for livestock, optimizing use for environmental constraints etc.
 * **Q**: I didn't see anything on nutrition...
 * **A**: We talked about quality of nutrition, hh processing to minimize risks...
 * **Q**: Scale of land use and management: what scale?
 * **A**: HH but some of these entry points go out.
 * **C**: Nutrition - there is 0 awareness about aflatoxin in the region and we suspect it might be highly prevalent - perhaps an interesting aspect to consider. The other one is about land use: land availability doesn't appear as a gap. Upper West is very heterogeneous. Land management depends on the sites. CCAFS sites are very different to sites in the Lora district. 15 km away there are sites in Dogo with no land constraint. **You need to tightly coordinate with IFPRI site selection to understand which hypotheses can effectively be tested in which site**.
 * **C**: What is presented here is with a focus on development. We are a research project and have to work on researchable issues, not neglecting biophysical issues.

Upper East region group presentation 2
Sustainable soil/water management. Looking at research areas, we identified the need to work on biomass for livestock. Another research area: drought-resilient crop varieties and striga-resilient varieties. We need to investigate this further. In terms of nutrition we need to research more. Recommended fertilizer etc. will have a direct impact on crops. We also look at how milk could be processed. We need simple machinery. Land preparation. For rice there's a lot of biomass that goes to waste. We looked at another area: biomass for compost. We talked about fertilizers and nutrient management.
 * **Q**: What did you say about nutrition? Are you looking micro-nutrients? Nutrition is not about NPK.
 * **A**: We are looking at milk processing... What goes into the soil also affects what we eat. In the group, we didn't specifically include nutrition. We were talking about nutritional qualities of crops. Once we know they apply fertilizers etc. If we process maize, how much protein remains etc.? We want to follow up with this...
 * **C**: Quality is not just about nutrient elements but also about residues. We are going into intensification. We need to work on nitrates, nitrites etc. as important aspects to monitor.

Northern region group presentation 2
Instead of having soil fertility management and soil conservation we work on integrated soil/water management. We also worked on the debate surrounding nutrition. We need to sensitize - that is clear. The issue is that farmers will save quality inputs to the market and eat less good products. The way food is prepared is important. It'd be good to collect a baseline study highlighting nutritional status. Within our target sites we could introduce fruit trees and work on eating patterns looking at traditional social cultural constraints. We worked on a conceptual integration framework and looked at some cross-cutting interventions e.g. value chain development, land & water right systems and institutional arrangements.
 * **C**: This is a lot to ask to ask us to think outside the box but we are beginning to expand the box.
 * **Q**: Research ideas are not linked among themselves.
 * **A**: Yes it should be interlinked.
 * **Q**: The conceptual framework is there but is the next step about consolidating research questions?
 * **A**: That is today's task.
 * **Q**: Why don't you talk about impact?
 * **A**: We measure development impact but when looking at RO3, delivering and scaling, we need to develop tools etc. to scale up & out in collaboration with dev partners. Some activities have to involve development partners right away.
 * **Q**: Crop-livestock system integration. Every farmer in the systems we look at has crops and livestock. Shouldn't we look at the intensification rather than the integration of these systems?
 * **A**: The integration we're looking at is about synergy. e.g. integrating another sort of fodder legume could help integrate further. Once you reach a high level of productivity, you need to work on sustainability.
 * **C**: There is sthg on animal agriculture about intensification. If you intensify the production w/ e.g. sheep or cattle, you might end up with some issues of managing grazing etc. We need to focus on waste and reducing environmental production.
 * **C**: There is an issue about land. What informs the discussion is that we were talking about SH farmers working on x piece of land and that's what we focus on. The land use management we are talking about is in fact farm land management. We must all get on the same page.

Northern Region group presentation 3

 * Hypothesis 1: **Strengthening value chain will intensify crop-soil-livestock systems through improved technologies and institutional components**
 * Adding value to the raw agricultural produce and by-products through processing and packaging
 * Identify and improve linkage of crop-livestock value chain actors through R4D platforms.
 * Hypothesis 2: **Improved integration of crop-soil-livestock and water resources and food processing techniques in farming systems will reduce natural resoeurce degradation and enhance food and nutrition security**
 * Pilot testing amendments (micro-dosing)
 * Evaluation soil & water conservation measures etc.
 * Assess pathways that will enhance quality and quantity and transfer of animal manure
 * Test available materials in feed formulations for livestock production
 * Assess water, feed resource quality available and demand
 * Testing and validating systems components technology including mechanization and crop residue management
 * On farm evaluation of validated technologies in mixed crop-livestock systems
 * Identifying existing constraints and opportunities that will enhance integration of crop-livestock systems
 * Document food consumption patterns and traditional methods of food preparations for retention and nutrient quantification
 * Identify innovations in food preparation and new food product that will incorporate animal...
 * Comments**:
 * Q: I'm not clear if the two activities under hypothesis 1 will allow you to confirm/reject that hypothesis.
 * A: That's not yet finalized but we have some additional information.
 * Q: Who's taking the leadership on the writing team
 * A: ??
 * Q: The activities seem not to be related to hypotheses
 * A: ??

Upper West Region group presentation 3

 * Hypothesis 1: Adoption of biophysical technologies under favourable institutional arrangements will lead to intensification
 * Inventory of existing technologies to select best-bet technologies
 * IPM to minimize pesticide and environmental degradation
 * Integrated soil fertility management (including crop residue and manure management)
 * Inventory and promotion of appropriate land preparation methods
 * Integrated housing and feed gardens
 * Hypothesis 2:
 * Inventory, evaluation, promotion of the most efficient existing processing technologies
 * Introduction, evaluation and promotion of food commodities (crop and livestock)
 * Strengthening community seed production systems (food-feed, crops, vegetables etc.)
 * Formation of farmers' business groups and reactivation of existing groups
 * Train on improved food utilization for nutrient retention and bioavailability
 * Comments**:
 * **Q**: I don't see the way you will integrate these technologies that address components at farmer and community level.
 * **A**: We have to work on this
 * **C**: You can research on nutrient availability but cannot train on this.
 * **C**: Reports are not milestones - it should be e.g. 10 people formed / reactivated...

Upper East Region

 * Hypothesis 1: Effective combinations of component technologies addressing location-specific, priority commodities will improve HH productivity and nutrition and enhance income.
 * Baseline survey
 * Diagnostic survey
 * Yield gap survey
 * Establishment and operation of MSPs
 * Introduce, test and validate technologies (crop varieties, livestock, soil and water management)
 * Hypothesis 2: Tested and piloted combinations of component technologies commodities are more likely to be adopted by HH to increase income and improve nutrition.
 * Market sector analysis
 * Introduce, test and adapt labour saving devices
 * Evaluate nutrition and processing quality characteristics
 * Assess and improve processing methods
 * Training on all components of the value chain
 * Q: Hypothesis: "... is more likely to be adopted" - more likely than what? What do you measure when you say more/less likely?
 * A: Against past failures around technology push. It could come from the baseline too.

Mali group

 * Entry points and integration around seeds, land and fodder, nutrition. For each of them there are institutional/process issues to facilitate adoption
 * We want to test individual hypotheses and overlaps e.g. seeds + nutrition, land + seeds etc. We want to have sites where we come up with the maximum integration between seeds, land and nutrition.
 * Hypothesis 1: Seed - tress - information
 * Strengthening cooperatives' capacity for production of planing materials and business skills will create seed enterprises
 * We discussed farm typologies... one of the underlying principles is that we relate technologies to specific households.
 * For tailoring combinations we hope to work on specific issues on resource access and availability. For comparisons across regions etc. it would be nice to have a generic type of typology but that needs to be discussed further with the IFPRI team.
 * 2nd hypothesis is around land access and fodder productivity. Main objectives integrate with sequencing and integration, but also scalability etc. issues.
 * There is rarely a landscape-type assessment of ecological issues and resources available.
 * Third hypothesis around nutrition - we reformulated our hypothesis: Provision of preparation methods with new products combined with nutrition education (incl. hygiene) leading to more diverse and complete meals given to children. When we train people, women use right away meals for their children.
 * Comments**:
 * **Q**: Value chain analysis might be missing here?
 * **A**: It's covered.
 * **Q**: Based on the 3 circles, water is not as explicit in the integration.
 * **A**: It's in the responsibilities, in fishery work planned and in community level activities looking beyond the farm scale.
 * **A**: It's in the responsibilities, in fishery work planned and in community level activities looking beyond the farm scale.

Next steps (Asamoah Larbi)
We have discussed several issues / hypotheses etc. I feel we need some work integration. We have so many things on the plate that we need to be a bit more selective. Looking at our work from a regional angle, we need concept notes and action plans (plans for year 2 to 5). NRM activities take 2-3 years.
 * We'll start looking at concept notes.
 * We'll first start with writing teams in October, pulling it together. The concept notes for each region will look at outcomes, how to achieve them, processes to work on them. The writing team should not exceed 5 people for each region.
 * Then we'll meet for 1-2 days to draft concept notes
 * These concept notes will be circulated to all partners for comments
 * We'll revise CN/ extract cross-cutting issues by December
 * We'll assign budgets to activities in December
 * We'll develop activity protocols and design
 * We'll finalize site selection (Nov-Dec 2012)
 * We'll have a steering committee meeting (Jan 2013)
 * We'll develop a project document explaining what the project is all about in the region.

Final comments by participants

 * The workshop provided an opportunity for knowledge sharing and for identifying possible partners but limited time for working.
 * We all enjoyed the workshop and sthg that came out clearly is the aspect of integration between crop-soil-livestock emphasized. It's much clearer in our minds now. We kind of feel that the time was too ample - we felt we had too much time and people spoke too long/too much.
 * Keywords on the table: time (waste), all things coming up again; at least there is the opportunity to have multi-disciplinarity approaches about networking.
 * We are happy about the way we came together. Africa RISING supposedly integrates crop & livestock but it has also integrated different disciplines. Regarding those who are not bi/tri-lingual, we have to listen to them so that they can be understood. Some contributions were difficult.
 * Good engagement from partners. Well facilitated and fertilized sessions.
 * The research framework is generic. Activities that need to be done seem to be getting much clearer. What you've come up is that we are moving sometimes (in the workshop) very slowly, which is frustrating at times.
 * We believe this has helped internalize Africa RISING. The workshop was too long. 2 days would have been enough.

Final comments and close by Irmgard Hoeschle-Zeledon
We have come to the end of 3 long days of workshop. Thank you very much for your hard work and commitment. You have done a good job considering the working conditions in this place. I personally feel that this workshop has been important to bring us all up on the same level about what has been done over the first year. Due to our mandate we went separately so the review of the first year was helpful. This workshop provided the best opportunities to know what we have to do in the near future in order to get Africa RISING going.

I said on Tuesday that our objective is to leave with a clear picture of what we'll do in the next 4 years with an advanced work plan for year 2. That objective was too ambitious. The picture is still not clear and the work plan is not yet there. There was an over estimate of what we can do with such a large group. Most important next steps have been highlighted by Asamoah Larbi.


 * I would like you to recommend looking at the wiki because the program document that was distributed will be revised, updated, improved over the next few days (and posted there). Look at that document and read the research part of it.**

I am glad that Eva mentioned that we have to address the needs of different household types. When I heard all presentations I thought they related to all that could be done but we are addressing different farm and family types.

I was missing a bit the 'what is new/different', which is what USAid is asking all the time. You are the experts but what is new is that we aim at integration of farming components.

Thank you Ewen, Asamoah and his team for the workshop.