To ensure food security, farmers must have access to quality seed, in adequate quantities. The government of Ethiopia acknowledges this, and has responded by investing in improving the seed sector. However, as this example shows, not all challenges can be overcome by technical training and new technologies alone. A large seed cooperative union was faced with a problem that seriously affected their very existence. And the solution was not technical.

“I see mindset shifts being promoted by CDAIS says Gemechu Nemie, director of the Ethiopian Animal Feed Industry Association (EAFIA) and a key member of the livestock feed safety and quality innovation niche. And this is the sort of change that the CDAIS project is beginning to engender, as partners start to implement approaches that better promote innovation in agriculture, by inspiring small and simple personal revolutions… Ethiopia is one of eight CDAIS pilot countries, and within each, several ‘niches’ or ‘innovation partnerships’ have been selected.

This tool  helps the design of comprehensive capacity development interventions aimed at strengthening mainly functional capacities. The purpose of this tool is to  provide an overview of the different options in terms of capacity development modalities that an innovation partnership can consider while developing the action plan.

The multi-stakeholders Assessment Form is a tool to enable  the different actors creating a partnership to ask systematic questions to a potential partner to ensure a good fit with the goal, vision and needs of the partnership. This tool can be used at the development/ starting point phase of the partnership to explore a potential relationship.

The Outcome mapping factsheet provides a series of steps to gather information on the outcomes of the process initiated by capacity development for agricultural innovation. This tool provides an overview of the outcome mapping methodology used for planning and assessing projects/programmes oriented towards change and social transformation. A simplified version (three stages and 10 steps) is proposed, based on the original IDRC methodology and experiences from the application in the CDAIS project.

This tool is designed for reviewing the partnership to assess whether it is achieving the goals of the individual actors or partner organisations. It is essentially a ‘health check’ of the innovation partnership. This tool can offer an opportunity to the partners to reflect on the value of the partnership from their own organization’s perspective. It also helps to assess what-if any- changes would improve the effectiveness of the partnership and to agree as a group to any revisions to the partnership agreement taking into account the findings of the review process.

The goal of this tool is to help facilitators examine the roles that women and men play in an innovation partnership and to better integrate their specific needs and priorities in the interventions planned for the innovation partnership. Gender analysis of the innovation partnership can also be done throughout project implementation to monitor how men and women are integrated and benefit from the project and to reduce the gender gaps.

This book collects 24 stories of change from the EU-funded CDAIS project. Launched in 2015, the overall objective of CDAIS is to make agricultural innovation systems more efficient and sustainable in meeting the demands of farmers, agri-business and consumers. The stories are about the eight pilot countries - in Africa, Asia and Latin America - in which CDAIS operates. Countries and title of the 24 stories are provided below, with date of last update for each story.

Angola:

01) From farm to agri-business (February 2018)

The Synthesis Document, here in its Hindi version, provides a synthesis of concepts and principles of the Common Framework developed under the Tropical Agriculture Platform (TAP). The objective of the TAP Common Framework is to promote better coherence and greater impact of capacity development in support of agricultural innovation in the Tropics. Developed in 2015 through a highly participatory process, it was agreed that the Framework should provide conceptual underpinnings and practical guidance.

This study identifies, characterizes, evaluates, and validates promising agricultural innovations on wheat and faba bean crops along their value chains. It particularly addresses the following four research questions: ▪What constrains are likely to adversely influence efficiency, productivity, marketability, and market performance of wheat and faba bean in Ethiopia? What is the level and sources of efficiency and productivity of smallholder wheat and faba bean producers? Which innovations are promising to enhance productivity and profitability of wheat and faba bean along the value chains?