Discussion Forums for the ARD community

Dear All,

Today, we start the last phase of our e-consultation. I would like to thank the 50 participants who sent contributions last week and invite all of you to express your concerns and ideas before Wednesday 23 September, by:

- Answering the 5 questions
We received around 20 contributions to the 5 questions raised last Monday. A lot of useful information has already been generated but we would like to hear from more of you, especially from participants from countries and sectors not sufficiently represented (eg.civil society organisations, donors; and representatives from Eastern and South-East Europe, Russia and other European countries such as the UK ). For details on the questions, please visit http://gcardblog.wordpress.com/2009/09/14/eu1/

- Selecting one key issue to be put forward on GCARD agenda
This consultation aims at preparing the first Global Conference on Agricultural Research for Development (GCARD 2010) that will take place in Montpellier (France) in March 2010. As indicated in the GCARD brochure published last week "the regional electronic consultations are your opportunity to make sure that issues that are important to you are on the agenda" (see http://gcardblog.wordpress.com/2009/09/16/gcard-brochure-now-available/).

In this last phase, we therefore invite you to indicate one issue that in your opinion, should be on the agenda of the conference. Please indicate one topic and, if possible, explain the reason why it is the most important item to be discussed in Montpellier next year.

We will close the consultation at the end of the week. In order to prepare the summary, we invite you to send your contribution before Wednesday. You will find in the attachment a copy of the messages exchanged so far and below a short overview of your answers to the 5 questions.

Best regards,
Olivier Chartier (EUROQUALITY)
Facilitator of the Europe e-consultation
Email: [email protected]
Skype: ochartier.euroquality
Web: http://egfar.org/egfar/website/gcard/regional-consultations/eu
Blog: http://gcardblog.wordpress.com/category/regional-e-consultations/europe/

Overview of answers to the 5 questions

Question 1 drivers and challenges
The table raised a lot of comments with in particular the need to develop regional and local answers to these global challenges (global by nature or common to geographical areas). Among the missing drivers, participants mentioned change in poverty patterns & income inequalities, change in livelihood strategies, change in the research system or policy & institutionnal changes for East Europe (not exhaustive list)

Q2 Does European ARD effectively support global poverty reduction?
The answer from several participants is "partly": Europe is already doing a lot but the impact could be improved. Other participants have more negative opinion. Some are of the view that research is too focused on small and medium size business and not enough on the poor.

Q3 Does European research effectively support poverty reduction in Europe?
We learned one important thing from the answers: many European participants involved in ARD do not have an opinion on this question. This is already an important finding that illustrates a lack of interest of the European ARD community on poverty issues in Europe. The participants who answered are rather negative. The main reason given is the low level of attention given to poverty in the research agenda.

Q4 How to improve civil society participation?
Answers from the participants confirm the findings of the review that there is a strong need for improvement in this area. Among the many suggestions: the research instruments should be adapted to the the participation of civil society (small research projects are not appropriate, objectives should be relevant etc.), civil society should be involved in research programming and there is a need for capacity building on these aspects (both for civil society and scientists).

Q5 How to improve the use of research results?
A lot of ideas have already been shared: systematic involvement of user groups, need to reinforce communication (including capacity building on communication for scientists), involvement of users as research partners (not only at the end of research projects), more vocational training for farmers, changes in the rewarding system of scientists (to balance the importance of scientific publications) and the need to ensure that research answers user needs by facilitating users' representation in research programming. Several initiatives have also been mentioned (ESFIM, Generation Challenge Programme, Swiss Guideline etc.).

am David Wood. My experience in mainly tropical agriculture with a focus on genetic resources. But I once taught ecology in the Faculty of Agriculture, University of the West Indies, Trinidad (following from the work of the crop botanist Purseglove). This gives me a useful perspective on the environmental impact of agriculture in tropical lowlands and mountains. The agricultural research base in Europe will remain essential to feed training and research into tropical regions. But Europe should recognize the value of crop introduction at a time when (too) much is made of `local adaptation' of local crops.

The most important point to raise in the Brussels meeting is the value of introduced crops. This has an ecological basis. If crops are removed from their centres of origin and diversity and introduced to other continents they escape major contraints to production: co-evolved pests and diseases. As a result, around 70% of all crop production in Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa is from introduced crops. Some of these are vital staple crops: for example cassava, maize, common bean and potato in Africa (from the Americas); rice, bananas and plantains in Africa (from Asia). The production value of these introductions is billions of dollars yearly and sustainably.

Programmes of crop introduction would be far more valuable than the current emphasis on `underutilized species' - which are often underutilized for the reason that farmers do not wish to grow them. Transfer of knowledge of use would also be needed. For example, I once managed a chayote (Sechium edule) germplasm collection in Costa Rica. This is a valuable vegetable, but also a valued root crop in Central America. I saw it being grown in the Philippines for use as a vegetable: its value as a root crop was locally unknown. Cassava, too, has vastly more uses in its native Colombia and Brazil that in its area of introduction in Africa. All this was know to colonial botanists such as Purseglove (with hands-on lifetime experience in three tropical continents) but is now subject to severe neglect.

The same `introduction effect' is true for plantation crops (examples tea, coffee, rubber, oil palm, sugar cane, cocoa) that provide work for the poor. It is also true for plantation forestry, with teak, Caribbean pines, and Eucalyptus widespread introductions. Their success is based on pest and disease control by distance, rather than by expensive and environmentally-damaging pestcides.

I would also second Andrew Bennett's argument for a focus on the values of forest, but with a different emphasis. As vast areas of tropical forest are removed from productive use as conservation reserves throughout the tropics, the value of forest agriculture has been ignored or maligned. Shifting cultivation is a very valuable and skilled land use by the resource-poor. It maintains genetic diversity of crops, maintains forest at a productive phase for fauna, and regenerates and renews old forest. Forest agriculture - for example in the pre-historical Amazon region - can maintain large, viable human populations using sustainable indigenous technology. And, of course, forest and managed wood lots are a carbon neutral source of fuel for cooking and drying crops.