The Government of Burkina Faso embraced innovation in agriculture many years ago, thus CDAIS could build on solid foundations. Six innovation niche partnerships were selected, each working on very different types of innovations, technically, socially or organisationally, and facing contrasting challenges for capacity development.
Results in Ethiopia show positive outcomes from CDAIS activities, proving the benefits of integrating functional capacity strengthening across individual, partnership, organisational and national levels. Common to all these levels are
There have been clear changes in Guatemala and, according to those involved, outcomes exceeded expectations. These have resulted from the strengthening of functional capacities across individual, partnership, organisational and national levels, using processes that have evolved since the CDAIS project began in 2015. Of the four selected innovation niche partnerships in the country, the conversations here explore the experiences of avocado producers in Sololá, led by AIDA, the Association for the Integral Development of the Altiplano.
The CDAIS project has been an accelerator of processes, with results that have spread from community to governmental levels. Those who have been involved consider that CDAIS was a key reason for these changes, having arrived as a springboard in 2015. Of the four partnerships in Honduras, these conversations explore the experiences of potato producers in La Esperanza, Intibucá, home to almost 70% of national potato production. Since 2015, much has changed for them: from a small group of growers, eight associations have become consolidated organisations.
The policy environment for agricultural innovation in Lao PDR has never been better. Agricultural development is high on the agenda at the most senior levels of government, and the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry recently published a strategy framework that lays out multiple pathways for innovation. Based on the work to date, CDAIS National Innovation Facilitators are well positioned to continue shaping the agricultural innovation process long after the project ends.
Rwanda has benefited from ‘hard’ agricultural invest ment projects in the past two decades, promoted by a supportive and responsive government in collaboration with various donors and development actors. CDAIS looked to increase the impacts of such investments through strengthening ‘soft’ skills in three innovation niche partnerships surrounding significant public, private or donorfunded infrastructure developments, and linking this to organisational and national levels.
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.
On 5 May 2018, the Association for Integrated Development of the Altiplano became formally established, and avocado farmers celebrated. “Today, we are so happy to have consolidated our consortium of eight producer associations from different municipalities in Sololá” explains Don Andrés, community leader and lifelong farmer. “Farmers from San Andrés Semetabaj and other communities around Lake Atitlán began to talk about growing a new variety of avocado some time ago. But since the CDAIS project came, so many things have changed.
The ‘dry corridor’ is a region of guatemala that covers part of the departments of Baja Verapaz, Zacapa, El Progreso, Jalapa, Chiquimula, Jutiapa and Santa Rosa. It is vulnerable to drought and, in some parts, communities lack food security, with a high level of extreme poverty. Malnutrition is a significant problem, especially among young children and their mothers.
From the Maya to modern times, beekeeping has been a much respected rural activity in Guatemala. Then in recent years, production increased and a national association was formed. But internal disagreements soon saw a fall in production and sales. Then thanks to CDAIS, producers across the country asked for and were given, a new space to gather. And there they rediscovered their common interests and goals, and have re-established their original organization, to excellent effect.