This paper presents an analysis of stage 1 training service provided in the Northern Horticultural Zone to nine Farmer Based Organisations (FBO’s) in the West Mamprusi District of the Northern Region in Business Capacity Building from October, 2008 to December, 2010. Farmer Based Organisations (FBO’s) of 450 farmers consisting of 65.10% males and 34.90% females were trained by the authors under the Millennium Development Authority (MiDA) Agricultural Project.
This publication, consisting of several modules, includes participatory research approaches for examining a wide range of questions regarding if and how farming practices are being modified to deal with a changing environment, and the constraints and opportunities these changes pose for both men and women.
Based on international literature, preliminary experiences in a three-country West African research programme, and on the disappointing impact of agricultural research on African farm innovation, the current paper argues that institutional change demands rethinking the pathways to innovation so as to acknowledge the role of rules, distribution of power and wealth, interaction and positions. The time is opportune: climate change, food insecurity, high food prices and concomitant riots are turning national food production into a political issue also for African leaders.
This review seeks to assess the usefulness of innovation systems approaches in the context of the Integrated Agricultural Research for Development (IAR4D) in guiding research agendas, generating knowledge and use in improving food security and nutrition, reducing poverty and generating cash incomes for resource-poor farmers. The report draws on a range of case studies across sub-Saharan Africa to compare and contrast the reasons for success from which lessons can be learned.
Sustainable intensification of smallholder farming is a serious option for satisfying 2050 global cereal requirements and alleviating persistent poverty. That option seems far off for Sub-Sahara Africa (SSA) where technology-driven productivity growth has largely failed. The article revisits this issue from a number of angles: current approaches to enlisting SSA smallholders in agricultural development; the history of the phenomenal productivity growth in the USA, The Netherlands and Green Revolution Asia; and the current framework conditions for SSA productivity growth.
This paper assesses why participation in markets for small ruminants is relatively low in northern Ghana by analysing the technical and institutional constraints to innovation in smallholder small ruminant production and marketing in Lawra and Nadowli Districts. It is argued in this paper that for the majority of smallholders, market production, which requires high levels of external inputs or intensification of resource use, is not a viable option.
Poverty, environment, social development, and gender are important cross-cutting themes of the World Bank and government investment programs, especially within the Sustainable Development Network (SDN). For developing sectoral strategies and programs, economic, environment and social assessments are undertaken, however, these are usually done separately, and most often gender issues are not included.
The devastation caused in Philippines by Typhoon Reming was the trigger for the Government request to FAO for the project “Strengthening Capacities for Climate Risk Management and Disaster Preparedness in Selected Provinces of the Philippines (Bicol Region)”. This technical project summary report provides a consolidated overview about the specific project activities, the implementation processes, main findings and the establishment of institutional mechanisms that were established to promote ongoing collaboration between farmers, agriculture extension workers, researchers and local governme
This Module is the third in a series of four that address capacity development competencies in FAO. It is intended to enhance FAO’s practices in designing, developing, delivering and evaluating its activities in support of learning in Member Countries, while ensuring that learning leads to sustainable capacity development.
This module is the second in the series designed to improve Capacity Development (CD) approaches in projects and programmes of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). It includes examples and tools to support endogenous CD processes in the areas of FAO’s mandate. Practitioners also may draw on the other Learning Modules (see box 1) which cover tools from disciplines such as organization analysis and development, learning event planning, facilitation and instructional science.