December 2004
News from the other Stakeholders
Civil Society Organizations
Civil Society OrganizationsProfile Article: IRTECO - Irrigation Training and Economic Empowerment Organization
Though our life depends on agriculture, very little efforts so far have been seriously put on ensuring sustainable water management and agribusiness projects. Farming practices associated with poor irrigation and agronomic skills has put our farmers to a continuous environmental degradation that has greatly impeded social and economic development in the rural economy of Tanzania.
IRTECO is a Non Governmental, non-profit making Organization established in October 2000 with aim to contribute efforts towards poverty reduction through enhancing irrigation and economic empowerment skills to small-scale farmers (men and women) in irrigation potential areas, through pooling experts together to deliver better irrigation and economic empowerment services.
IRTECO's specific objectives are to strengthen and support self-reliant irrigation improvement activities, promote environmental management, undertake research on resource efficient agriculture (REA), marketing of Agricultural produce and support establishment of a network of irrigation and agribusiness network at national level. The main target group is Small scale self- organized formal and informal groups and individual men and women, leaving in rural and peri-urban irrigation areas in Tanzania who stands to gain from farm yield, improved land use, and better environmental conservation. It puts emphasis on capacitating the Target Groups on the primary responsibility for integrated water resource management and sustainable agriculture by signing and executing short-term contracts with the target communities, the strategy that provides a better route for a long-term sustainability of agricultural activities in the programme areas. It guides and supports the formation of the Network of Irrigation and Agribusiness Groups by sensitizing both formal and informal Water Users groups (WUGs) and Associations (WUA) for ensuring maximum agricultural production in the areas.
Mission: "Leading organization in delivering participatory skills on irrigation and economic empowerment with gender and HIV/AIDS mainstreaming to poor strata population in irrigation potential areas in Tanzania" and the
Vision is: "Contribute towards improvement of the standard of living of small-scale self-formal and informal organized initiatives of small scale farmers in irrigation potential areas by delivering water, land use management and environmental skills in the area".
Performance overview: Poverty reduction is a long-term commitment that needs combination of various development techniques to ensure a continuous increase of income of the population. IRTECO in collaboration with the government, NGOs and farmers has contributed to this end by carrying out the following are some key activities:
Land and water management improvement
Through its learning and action strategies, farmers have learnt that, terracing by itself increase the production twice as much as the situation before. Crops that have been planted on terraces are performing much well as compared to those planted on the steep slopes. Application of water on terraced land has proved much easier and water infiltration and moisture retention capacity has been improved. For fertility improvement, the applied farmyard manure on a conserved land stays in place due to the reason that the steep land has been converted into a flat land. At the area without conservation stunted crops of different varieties are easily seen. Other associated activities include: Survey and design of irrigation and water harvesting systems, Conduct dialogue meetings on land and water resource, training village para-consultants on sustainable agriculture, train groups on conflict resolution water management and establishment of home stead and group tree nurseries.
Temperature moderation and sustainable agriculture
Farmers have been mobilised to strengthen the multi-storey agroforestry system. Introduction of agroforestry system including catchment afforestation and river bank protection and planting of trees at home staid areas improved the temperature. This package includes planting of multipurpose tree on the same land with crops increased number of farm products in terms of fruits, medicine, fuel wood and timber. The animal that are kept within the same area are fed by the crops remains and produce farm yard manure that could be applied on land to improve the soil fertility and therefore utilized by the plants/ crops. This circle creates a good environment for organic farming and hence improved sustainable agriculture.
Strengthening the communication and networking between irrigation and agribusiness groups
This is done through preparation of training materials and dissemination to the target groups, networking and exchange visits.
Provision of planning and leadership skills
This includes appraisal, preparation and guide the approval and translation of project documents as well as train and support CBOs and groups in the formulation of Community Action Plans (CAPS) and Group Action Plans (CAPS) project proposals. It also supports to conduct evaluations of community and donor supported projects/programmes for advising on more future success and facilitates different PRAs sessions at grassroots levels.
National and International collaboration: IRTECO is very much involved in some relevant governmental programmes among others the Task Force of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security responsible for resource allocation and investment at local authorities level. IRTECO is a member of African Stockpile - Tanzania Branch and has been able to contribute to IPEN and GAIA discussions especially on areas concerning biological agriculture. Under collaboration with SODNET Kenya, IRTECO was supported by Norwegian Church Aid to participate to An Eastern African Position meeting about a global convention on water held in Nairobi that was attended the Eastern and horn countries. The concept of Irrigation and Agribusiness groups network fits with principles of the African Social Forum. As an open space forum, ENDA has supported IRTECO in attending different meetings and is fully committed in facilitating principles regarding culture sovereignty and agrarian movements at farmer groups levels. IRTECO also contributes to informal consultations regarding Pan African Engagement on G8 commitments to Africa.
Challenges: Interpretation of several national and international policies in line with indigenous farmers' competence needs intensive joint trainings. Weak link of elements of agricultural cycle i.e. production-value adding-marketing - policy in supporting small-scale farmers and agribusiness groups in solving the problem of poverty in rural areas. Lack of demand driven savings and credit Fund to allow sound accessibility for investment loans to facilitate a sustainable irrigation and agribusiness groups network. Sometimes there is conflicting interests between domestic use of forest resource and public interest on environmental protection that leads to over-harvesting of trees for domestic purposes which causes diminishing water discharge from the source.
Mwadhini O. Myanza
IRTECO Tanzania
GFAR CSOs Focal Points Meeting, Mexico
The GFAR Secretariat organized a Civil Society Organizations meeting on 25th October in Mexico City, during GFAR 2004 Statutory Meeting in Mexico City (22nd-25th October). The meeting was presided by GFAR Vice-Chair Ms. Monica Kapiriri and attended by all GFAR farmers' organizations and NGOs regional focal points. The main objectives of the meeting were to provide for CSOs an opportunity to a) develop a plan of action that will enable them to contribute to the implementation of GFAR 2004-2006 Business Plan and b) to share and exchange information on recent developments in agricultural research in their sub-regional or regional constituencies.
Each FOs and NGOs Regional Focal Point briefly reported on their activities at national, sub-regional or regional level and the extent to which they were involved in various ARD processes in their respective regions. CSOs representatives also highlighted, during their presentations, priority issues in their respective regions, what actions need to be carried out to address these as well as on-going initiatives that could contribute to the process.
GFAR Executive Secretary made presentation of the Business Plan highlighting activities to be led or championed by the CSOs under each pillar of the plan. He reported that during the consultative process undertaken in developing the business plan, it was suggested that the issue of CSOs engagement in all of GFAR's activities be made a cross-cutting issue i.e. CSOs involvement should be reflected in all 4 pillars of the BP namely: i) Inter-regional Collaboration, ii) Collaborative Research partnerships, iii) Advocacy and Public Awareness and Strategic Thinking and finally, iv) Information and Communication Management Systems. Also, a brief overview of the DURAS Competitive Grant was presented to the group by the project coordinator. The main objective of the presentation was to clarify to the group the procedures, rules and regulations of the competitive grant in order to increase CSOs participation in the second call for proposals.
During the afternoon session, the discussion focused on i) CSOs roles and responsibilities, ii) the structure of working groups and iii) resources needed to mobilize the CSOs in the implementation of the business plan.
ASFARNER Workshop on Biotechnology
Asian Farmers Network (ASFARNET) in collaboration with the International Service for Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA) convened a workshop on "Biotechnology Promotion and Exchange on Agriculture" during November 28 -1 December in Bogor, Indonesia. The workshop was attended by representatives from FAO, Bogor regional authorities, ISAAA, national and regional farmers groups, Indonesian Biotechnology Research Centre and regional seed associations. Some important issues that were discussed during the workshop include:
- views on Agri-biotechnology through genetic engineering
- a need for more farmers' education on the benefits of the agri-biotyechnology in the product quality, production system efficiency and product continuity
- direct field observations to several Biotechnology Research Centres and private companies
- experienced-based discussions between farmers on the implementations and biotechnology-crops marketing
- developing ASFARNET Plan of Action
To view the proceedings of the workshop, please click here
ASFARNET
GFAR Stakeholder Committee of the Generation Challenge Program
The 1st GFAR Stakeholder Committee of the GCP meeting was held in Rome, 29-30 November. The Committee, during the meeting, developed their annual program of work and selected the Chair and Vice-Chair to serve for a period of one year. The Committee acts in an advisory capacity, and is expected to facilitate the articulation, promotion and presentation of the views of various stakeholders to the GCP governance and management structure in order to contribute to the policies, strategies, research priorities, and program activities of the GCP. The proceedings of the meeting can be found here.
GFAR Secretariat
c/o FAO, SDR, Viale delle Terme di Caracalla - 00100 Rome, Italy
Tel. +39.06.5705.3413 Fax +39.06.5705.3898
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