Innovation Platforms in the Aquaculture Value Chain in Egypt was presented at the National Aquaculture Innovation Platform Workshop, Cairo, 19-20 February 2014. It is a CGIAR Research Program on Livestock and Fish that aims to increase the productivity of small-scale livestock and fish systems in sustainable ways, making meat, milk and fish more available and affordable across the developing world.
The presentation was given in January 2009 and introduced why a new approach for livestock development for poverty alleviation was desirable, innovation, innovation systems and value chains, building of innovation platforms, learning-oriented monitoring and evaluation, and scaling up and out.
This innovation story narrates the experience of Improving Productivity and Market Success (IPMS) project on innovative banana value chain development in Metema district, Amhara, Ethiopia. The project introduced banana production systems in the district for the first time in 2005. IPMS together with the stakeholders provided support along the banana value chain on production, in put supply and marketing.
Self Help Africa was mandated under the project “Expanding Utilization of Roots, Tubers and Bananas and Reducing Their Postharvest Losses” to implement activities tailored at achieving output 4, “Skills in entrepreneurship, agribusiness and collective action developed for selected actors (men, women and youth) in specialized ware potato markets” among 4 target potato associations (PA) in Eastern Uganda.
As Part of the Livestock Livelihood and Markets Project (LILI Markets), two innovation platforms were implanted in the project sites. First thought to be a mechanism to promote and enhance communication and networking across value chain actors as well as providing them with a platform for addressing common problems the platform, although new, has already surpassed its expected role; it has now become an important element of interaction and problem solving stage among the value chain actors, including the government.
The sustainable agricultural intensification research and learning in Africa (SAIRLA) project is a five-year program (2015–2020) funded by the UK Department of International Development. The project seeks to generate new evidence and design tools to enable governments, investors and other key actors to deliver more effective policies and investments in sustainable agricultural intensification (SAI) that strengthen the capacity of poorer farmers’, especially women and young people, to access and benefit from SAI.
Between 2012 and 2016, in collaboration with research and development partners, ILRI undertook specific action research and capacity development interventions to address identified challenges and generate evidence for wider applicability along the pig value chain. The work was funded by three major bilateral donors, the European Commission/International Fund for Agricultural Development (EC/IFAD) and Irish Aid.
In developing regions with high levels of poverty and a dependence on climate sensitive agriculture, studies focusing on climate change adaptation, planning, and policy processes, have gained relative importance over the years. This study assesses the impact of farmer perceptions regarding climate change on the use of sustainable agricultural practices as an adaptation strategy in the Chinyanja Triangle, Southern Africa.
Cross bred cow adoption is an important and potent policy variable precipitating subsistence household entry into emerging bulk markets. This paper focuses on the design of policies that create and sustain milk-market expansion among a sample of households in the Ethiopian highlands. In this context it is desirable to measure a household's `proximity' to market in terms of the level of deficiency of an essential input. This problem is compounded by four factors.
The central question in increasing productivity and generating incomes in African agriculture is how to move from technology generation to innovations that respond to constraints of agricultural production along the value chains. This question was considered in the context of subsistence agriculture, smallholder production systems, inefficient marketing and investments by the private sector, a preponderance of public interventions, and inadequate policies.