Farmers in Asia like to grow cassava because the crop will tolerate long dry periods and poor soils, and will produce reasonable yields with little inputs. Most farmers realize, however, that cassava production on slopes can cause severe erosion, while production without fertilizer inputs may lead to a decline in soil productivity. Research has shown that cassava yields can be maintained for many years with adequate application of fertilizers, and that there are various ways to reduce erosion.
This booklet is the third in the CIAT in Asia Research for Development series. It was based on the experiences of researchers and farmers working with the AusAID-funded Forages for Smallholders Project (FSP) in Southeast Asia from 1995 to 1999. This project was a partnership of smallholder farmers, development workers and researchers who were using participatory approaches to developing forage technologies on farms.
This paper evaluated the implementation of an initiative for promoting risk-based approaches to improve food safety management in Vietnam. A Taskforce of Risk Assessment for Food Safety (Taskforce) was formed and consisted of researchers working on risk assessment and food safety, and representatives of the related ministries of Health and of Agriculture. We used the OECD Development Assistance Committee Evaluation Criteria as a framework for assessing the impact of the Taskforce with five evaluation areas – relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, impact and sustainability.
This presentation describes the sucessful experiences of capacity development for livestock production carried out in Vietnam and Cambodia. This seminar was presented in the 15th International Symposium of Veterinary Epidemiology and Economics in November, 2018. The presentation discuss about transnational research in food safety in low-and middle-inmcome countries (LMIC), the importance of bridging institutions and policies and the reached achivements
A Community Innovation Fund (CIF) is a simple kick-start fund to support farmer interest groups who have limited access to formal financial services for implementing climate-smart agriculture (CSA) practices. A CIF can be implemented as sole fund or as co-investment to community savings and loans groups. In this publication, a step-by-step guide for facilitating a CIF in a community, based on experiences from My Loi Climate-Smart Village (CSV), was provided. My Loi is one of three CCAFS CSVs in Vietnam, where participatory CSA practices are being tested and adopted.
The purpose of this study is to develop a robust, rigorous and replicable methodology that is flexible to data limitations and spatially prioritizes the vulnerability of agriculture and rural livelihoods to climate change. The methodology was applied in Vietnam, Uganda and Nicaragua, three contrasting developing countries that are particularly threatened by climate change. We conceptualize vulnerability to climate change following the widely adopted combination of sensitivity, exposure and adaptive capacity.
The Northern Mountainous Region (NMR) of Vietnam is characterised by great physical, social and cultural diversity. It covers a large geographical area, is home to many ethnic minority populations, has an under-developed infrastructure with low levels of urbanisa-tion, and agricultural production plays a highly important role. Since the 1950s, Vi-etnam’s agricultural sector has had several ups and downs due to being significantly in-fluenced by shifting national policies.
Participatory approaches have been discussed as alternatives to and complementary elements of more conventional research on sustainable land use and rural development in upland areas of Southeast Asia. Following a brief overview of the history of participatory approaches (Sect. 9.1), this chapter discusses the potential and limitations of applying Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) tools to field research practice in Vietnam (Sect. 9.2) and of involving stakeholders in priority setting, modeling and environmental valuation in the Southeast Asian uplands (Sect. 9.3).
Competing models of innovation informing agricultural extension, such as transfer of technology, participatory extension and technology development, and innovation systems have been proposed over the last decades. These approaches are often presented as antagonistic or even mutually exclusive. This article shows how practitioners in a rural innovation system draw on different aspects of all three models, while creating a distinct local practice and discourse. We revisit and deepen the critique of Vietnam’s “model” approach to upland rural development, voiced a decade ago in this journal.
Recent experiences in participatory video-making raise the question of how best to use this medium for enhancing local seed innovation systems. Embedded in a mini-process of participatory action research, two styles of participatory video—scripted and scriptless—were tested and assessed together with farmers and facilitators in Bogra District, Bangladesh.