December 2002
News from the Regional Fora
Europe
Asia-Pacific
EuropeNew manager of EARD-InfoSys+
InfoSys+ the European information system on ARD – a service to EIARD- enters a new phase.
Infofsys+ also presents a new manager as successor of Hubertus Franzen, who gave rise to this network.
Marc Bernard, the new manager is agronomist and an expert in the application of information and communication technologies. After more than ten years of work as soil scientist, and as scientific coordinator West Africa, Mr. Bernard has for the past 2 years been leading the project Rural Universe Network (RUN) at ZADI/Germany and now is the head of InfoSys+.
The network InfoSys+ consists of a network of partners from all over Europe providing data on ARD. Together with Paul Harding, the EIARD secretary, InfoSys+ seeks to evolve the information system into a demand driven platform in order to foster ARD cooperation and function as a policy instrument.
Henning Knipschild
EARD-Infosys+ Technical Coordinator
EuropeThe German Forum for Development Oriented Research (DFOR)
For some time Europe has had a Regional Forum to support agricultural and related research for development. Many of the west European countries have already established national fora for the same purpose. In December 2001 a German Forum was founded. Membership is open to scientific institutes, societies, relevant ministries, organizations supporting research, as well as implementing agencies, NGOs, private firms and other interested public as well as non-governmental organizations. In addition the status of permanent observers has been established, mainly for public institutions, who for whatever reason cannot or do not want to become members.
In September 2002 the DFOR held its first annual meeting and conference in Bonn. DFOR has now 44 members and 11 permanent observers. The conference was addressed by the General Directors Carlos Sere of ILRI and Joachim Voss of CIAT. In addition Uwe Werblow of the EU Commission in Brussels explained their specific programs as related to agricultural and rural development and relevant research. There were good and thought provoking discussions on the statements of all three guests.
The DFOR Conference also adopted a Bonn Resolution, which was forwarded to all members of Parliament in Berlin and to European policy makers in Strasbourg and Brussels. The Bonn Resolution refers to global developments affecting people as well as nature. Persisting hunger and challenges such as climate change and the widening gap between rich and poor call for more, longer term and more efficient work by all parties concerned and involved. To overcome and solve the problems of hunger, the problems of destruction of the environment, scarcity of water and agricultural land, as well as the discrepancy between rich and poor, social tensions, problems of rural migration and urbanization as well as climatic changes more research is needed. Higher priorities and more support are required at all levels. In the Bonn Resolution the members of DFOR agree to improve the relevance and efficiency of research. They support the need for closer national and international cooperation, especially with the poorer countries. They are willing to strengthen training activities for young scientists from all countries, and at the same time to make scientific results of their work freely available to all interested parties. Finally the scientists recognize their responsibility to provide solid information and to contribute to increasing public awareness.
The chairman of DFOR´s steering committee is Chris Bonte-Friedheim, formerly of ISNAR and prior to 1990 of FAO.
The address of DFOR is:
German Forum on Research for Development
Deutsches Forum für Entwicklungsorientierte Forschung (DFOR)
Secretariat
c/o InWEnt (Capacity Building International, Germany)
Wielinger Str. 52
82340 Feldafing, Germany
Tel.: +49 (0)8157.938-0
Fax: +49(0)8157.938-777
Co-Secretariat:
Advisory Service on Agricultural Research for Development (BEAF-GTZ) Zentralstelle fuer Agrardokumentation und information (ZADI).
Dr. Bonte-Friedheim
DFOR Chair
Oliver Hanschke
BEAF/DFOR press officer
EuropeNetherlands Forum on Agricultural Research for Development
The Netherlands Forum on Agricultural Research for Development (NL Forum on ARD) is a multi-thematic, multi-stakeholder initiative operating within the framework of the Global Forum on Agricultural Research (GFAR).
It was founded in March 1998 in response to a joint request from the Netherlands Ministry of Agriculture, Nature Management and Fisheries and the Ministry for Development Cooperation (Ministry of Foreign Affairs). The Netherlands Forum on Agricultural Research for Development is meant to strengthen the response of Dutch agricultural organizations to the following global development challenges:
- Poverty reduction,
- Food safety and Food security,
- Sustainable management of natural resources.
The goal of the Netherlands Forum on Agricultural Research for Development is to enhance dialogue and collaboration between key players (Ministries, research- and development organizations, private sector, farmers' organizations and NGOs) in the agricultural research arena in the Netherlands.
The main objective is to provide a platform enabling dialogue and exchange of experience between various ARD-professionals (policy makers, scientists, consultants, extension specialists, etc.).
More specifically the Netherlands Forum is aimed to:
- Provide transparency of the Netherlands ARD capacity and expertise.
- Regularly provide information on developments in ARD in the Netherlands.
- Improve insight in national and international developments in ARD sector.
- Facilitate active links between national, regional, and international organizations involved in development of ARD policies and programmes in the North and South.
- Ensure input of Netherlands ARD stakeholders in the discussion on priorities and modalities of ARD at the European level (EIARD, EC-framework program) and indirectly to the Global Forum on Agricultural Research (GFAR) and CGIAR.
- Ensure representation of Netherlands Forum representatives at Regional, European and Global meetings.
Main activities are:
- Facilitating information exchange and access to Netherlands ARD capacity via the Web-site.
- Ensuring data update about/ by the stakeholders.
- Organising meetings to exchange information, discuss viewpoints and improve contacts between different ARD stakeholder groups.
- Maintaining dialogue with European Forum on ARD and other relevant organizations.
Organization
Steering Committee consists of a number of representatives from different stakeholder groups:
Chair:
Mr. B. Huijsman (Wageningen UR)
Members:
Mr. J. Daane (ICRA)
Mr. R. Delnoye (Agriterra)
Mr. A. de Jager (North-South Centre)
Mr. W. Heemskerk (KIT)
Mr. D. Kievit (VNO-NCW)
Ms. V. Prsic (IAC - Wageningen UR)
Mr. W. van Vuure (Wageningen UR)
The Netherlands Ministry of Agriculture, Nature Management and Fisheries supports the Executive Secretariat at the International Agricultural Centre (IAC) in Wageningen.
For further information please contact Ms. at the Secretariat Netherlands Forum on ARD:
P.O. Box 88, 6700 AB
Wageningen, The Netherlands
Telephone: +31.(0)317.495237 234
Fax: +31.(0)317.495395
Web site: www.ard-forum.nl (under construction) and www.iac.wageningenur.nl/services/networks/forum.htm
Vesna Psic
Netherlands Forum on ARD Secretary
EU Experts Group on Livestock Coordination Meeting
Brussels, Belgium
7-8 November 2002
The focal point of the Livestock Facilitating Function (LFF) participated in the 26th Co-ordination meeting of the EU Experts Group on Livestock matters in Developing Countries, held in Brussels 7 – 8 November 2002. The Group discussed research for development issues on livestock matters. The LFF focal point presented the recently established Facilitating Functions (FF) at GFAR on Rural Knowledge, Rural Innovation for the Support and Development of SMEs and Livestock Health and Production, funded by IFAD. On behalf of the Italian Ministry of Health, the LFF focal point invited the Experts Group to organize the next meeting in Rome in March 2003. The LFF of GFAR will play the role of facilitating mechanism for the involvement of R&D stakeholders interested in livestock development.
Sub-Saharan Africa2nd FARA Plenary
Dakar, Senegal
19-20 May 2003
The Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock of Senegal will host the 2nd Plenary of the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA). The co-hosts are the Senegal National Institute for Agricultural Research (ISRA) and FARA. Participants will come from different institutions/ organizations working in and outside Africa such as the Sub Regional organizations (ASARECA, CORAF and SADC/FANR), the Advanced Research Institutes (ARIs), the NARS, Universities, NGOs, policy makers, private sector, farmers' organizations and donors. The meeting hopes to convene all major stakeholders to review and plan Africa's agricultural research for development agenda, sustainable financing, state of the art on special topics and endorse FARA's strategy and implementation plan. The theme is Sustaining Africa's agriculture through research for development.
Participants can register by filling in the registration form. To facilitate the preparation of badges and other logistical arrangements, registration forms should be submitted before 31 Jan 2003 either by post or email.
Invitations to the Plenary are issued by the FARA secretariat and the Senegalese Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock Interested parties can contact FARA:
FARA secretariat
FAO Regional Office for Africa
P.O. Box GP 1628
Accra, Ghana
Tel (233 21) 675000 ext 4500
Fax (233 21) 7010943
Email:
The conference will be held at the Meridien President Hotel in Dakar, Senegal.
Source: FARA
West Asia & AfricaAARINENA ICT Workshop
Cairo, Egypt
The first of five Regional workshops to be organized in the framework of GLOBAL.RAIS Project, will be held in Cairo, Egypt late February-early March 2002.
AARINENA Secretariat, AARINENA-RAIS Secretariat, GFAR and WAICENT are closely collaborating in order to produce useful documents for the discussion. The base for the discussion will be a study paper on Information Strategy for the West Asia and North Africa Region, commissioned by GFAR to Dr. Ahmed Rafea of the Computer Science Department of the American University in Cairo. The focus will be on progress made until now by AARINENA-RAIS Secretariat in the definition and building of the AARINENA website and on the present collaboration between AARINENA and Infosys in the creation of the dynamic component of the site (database structure), based on NodeXML, which will allow interaction between AARINENA, EARD-Infosys+ and EGFAR. The discussion will be enriched by contributions from other institutions/organizations which have gone through similar processes in building networks (ISNAR, IGAD).
The next step in the organization is to launch an electronic discussion based mainly on the draft of this background document in order to receive comments/inputs from all interested Stakeholders of the Region but also from representatives from other RAIS, sharing their experiences, and all interested experts who wish to bring their point of view or simply aware of particular lessons learned and possible failures/mistakes of other systems.
Once a general agreement of the draft version is reached AARINENA will propose an e-discussion on EGFAR in January to last until the 10th of February in order to have a short period before the Workshop to organize, integrate and summarize all received inputs.
GFAR and AARINENA warmly invite all interested experts who wish to participate in the Workshop, especially coordinators of other RAIS or similar organizations/networks.
All preparatory documents will be available on EGFAR and AARINENA website.
F.B.
Tanareh Ebrahimi
AARINENA–RAIS Secretary
Asia-Pacific7th APAARI General Assembly
Penang, Malaysia
2-4 December 2002
The seventh General Assembly of APAARI, held in Penang 2-4 December 2002, was connected with an expert Consultation on Strengthening of Research Partnerships through Networks and Consortia. This meeting and workshop was following the sixth executive committee meeting of APAARI, held in Bangkok, 12-14 November 2001. This previous meeting was dedicated to regional priority setting for agricultural research in the Asia Pacific region. Therefore this Penang meeting was foreseen as the next step following the regional priority setting exercise undertaken at a regional level.
Key issues during the Meeting
- In his preliminary presentation during the session I, E. Javier forwarded three suggestions for APAARI: (a) to lead NARS towards networks hubs role, (b) to engage development partnerships and not only research partnerships and, (c) to be strong enough to close some declining networks.
- During the session II, an exhaustive presentation of the strengths and weaknesses of the following Research networks has been achieved: (a) CLAN (Cereals and Legumes Asia Network), (b) CORRA/INGER (Council for partnerships for Rice Research in Asia), (c) RWC (Rice and Wheat Consortium), (d) TAMNET (Tropical Asian Maize Network), (e) GoFAR (Asia Pacific Group of fishery and aquatic research), (f) PGR (Plant Genetic Resources in Asia and Pacific), (g) COGENT (Coconut Genetic Network), (h) UTFANETR (Under utilized Tropical Fruits Network in Asia), (i) BAPNET (Banana Asia Pacific Network.
- During the session III, three presentations were made by APSA (Asia Pacific Seed Association), Monsanto and ICBA (International Centre on Biosaline Agriculture) located in Dubai, UAE. The AGNOC representative was not attending the workshop. During the general discussion, the need to engage partnerships with the private sector (e.g., APSA, etc) but also with civil society organizations and development institutions was clearly underlined.
- The session IV was dedicated to the strengthening of Information and Communication Management for Research Networks. Dr Sahdev Singh, acting as newly recruited scientific assistant to the APAARI Executive Secretary, highlighted the main outcomes of the recent ICT expert Consultation on the Development of the second phase of APAARIS and Meeting of the APAARIS Steering Committee, 24-25 October 2002 in Bangkok. The launching of the second phase of APAARIS was fully endorsed. This session was chaired by the GFAR OIC, who also presented the recent achievements of the GFAR web site, mainly the web interface with the set of relational databases, the back-office system and the XML node as a multihost search engine. CAB International presented the collaborative programme with APAARIS achieved through the launching of a "Gateway Function". This Gateway Function is expected to provide a friendly access to selected and classified Internet resources, intellectually evaluated. ISNAR presented then its ongoing activities, mainly in strengthening capacity in the area of ICM and knowledge management. Finally ASTI presented the last progress achieved.
- The session V allowed a presentation of (a) the IWMI Challenge Programme Proposal on Food and Water. A pledge of US $ 70/75 M. is already committed for this C.P., (b) the Asia-Pacific Consortium on Agricultural Biotechnology, APCoAB, and (c) the Inter-regional research network on Cotton.
- A final plenary session, led by Stein Bie and Meryll Williams acting as Chair and co-Chair, backed by specific reports of the various Chairs of the previous sessions, reviewed the key critical issues, which had been discussed and prepared a consensual set of recommendations. The main conclusions and recommendations are about to be available on APAARI website.
ICT Expert Consultation on the Development of the 2nd phase of APARIS
Bangkok, Thailand
24-25 October 2002
The ICT Expert Consultation on the Development of the 2nd phase of APARIS was held in Bangkok, Thailand on October 24 to 25, 2002.
About 10 Information Nodal Points representing APAARI NARS participated, as well as International and Regional Organizations like CABI, FAO, APAFRI, ISNAR and of course GFAR.
Major discussions in the meeting focused on the involvement of NARS in the creation/updating of ARD Databases and the role of National Information Nodal Points (NINPs) in the development of a Database on Agricultural Research and Development Indicators.
Specific issues discussed:
- Present status of APAARI website and reaction from NINPs.
The APAARI home page has been improved and further enriched with new information and links. The site now provides useful information on agricultural R&D activities in the Region such as seminars, symposia, conferences etc…, performs gateway functions and serves as a portal to regional research networks. The objective of this component of APARIS is to facilitate access to information resources in the web, both through search engines and by facilitating access to web sites of institutions that work in ARD and to web sites that are related to specialized topics of ARD. This is only a portal service, and not a database. Access to the web sites of the NARS institutions in the Region is being facilitated. Some of the new features on the site include information on NARS database and links to other regional and global institutions. The publications of APAARI are now available on the website.
An APARIS Update is circulated on bimonthly basis through electronic media to all the APAARI members and other Stakeholders giving information on important APAARI activities, agricultural developments, related events and developments in the Region.
NINPs welcomed very warmly these improvements and reported on different national situations where database structures (on institutions, projects, experts…) are already defined and operational, in order to share their experiences and bring inputs to APARIS.
- Presentation, analysis and possible linkages with other Information Systems.
All International/Regional Organizations, within which ISNAR and CABI, attending the meeting had the opportunity to present their own information systems.
GFAR presented a set of tools, not already online (updates on the Discussion Fora, back Office system, NodeXML), but soon available.
-
Recommendation and Action Plan for the 2nd Phase of APARIS.
An issue that was deeply discussed was the role of NINPs and their Terms of Reference.
The Assembly endorsed the following:- Assess the status and needs of respective NARS, monitor and update to improve relevance and effectiveness of APARIS contributions to APAARI vision and mission.
- Identify, collect, organize and make accessible information systems within the subject scope of APARIS.
- Establish and operate information services for national and regional clientele based on APARIS processed information
- Share skills, knowledge and experiences in the handling and management of information among NINPs.
- Election of the APARIS Steering Committee.
A Steering Committee for APARIS has been constituted with representation from member NARS from three sub-regions, associate members, IARCs, GFAR and FAO. APAARI secretariat will extend the logistic support and coordination to facilitate the functioning of the Committee. The Steering Committee will serve as a decision making body that will direct the development of APARIS in a strategic and technical sense.
Asia-PacificUpdates on South East Asian Forum on Agricultural Research (SEAFAR)
During the last Senior Officers Meeting of the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) Ministers of Agriculture and Forestry (SOMAMAF) held on 8 October 2002 in Lao PDR, the 10-member nations agreed to establish the South East Asian Forum on Agricultural Research (SEAFAR) under the auspices of ASEAN and linked with the ASEAN Center for Agricultural Research Databases (CARD).
SEAFAR aims to facilitate knowledge flow and exchange on agricultural research for development in the Southeast Asian sub-region under the ASEAN framework of mutual cooperation and to serve as a venue for discussing common agricultural research needs in Southeast Asia. Specifically, SEAFAR will endeavour to assist in coordinating sub-regional agricultural R & D; ensure successful partnerships among stakeholders of agricultural research; promote human resource development; and facilitate institutional and electronic fora and knowledge exchange systems.
Under ASEAN procedures, SEAFAR will follow ASEAN protocols and procedures, of which the immediate task is to form a Technical Working Group to be chaired and hosted by one of the ASEAN countries. Discussion on this is going-on. Meanwhile, the SEAMEO Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA) has formed the Interim Secretariat of SEAFAR with the SEARCA Director and Deputy Director for Research and Graduate Studies serving in a concurrent capacity as SEAFAR Director and Executive Secretary, respectively. Several activities in the pipeline include FAO AGRIS- SEARCA Knowledge Management on-going discussion on introducing AGRIS metadata system in Southeast Asia through the SEAFAR CARD Knowledge Network; involvement of Sun Microsystems in providing assistance to SEAFAR CARD in developing the knowledge network's infrastructure design; and CAB International offering manpower assistance to SEAFAR CARD thru a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA), among others. It is hoped that that the SEAFAR CARD Knowledge Network will become a subsystem of APARIS and, hence, EGFAR.
O.O.
Alexander G. Flor
SEARCA
GFAR Secretariat
c/o FAO, SDR, Viale delle Terme di Caracalla - 00100 Rome, Italy
Tel. +39.06.5705.3413 Fax +39.06.5705.3898
E-mail: