Africa, Changing Lives: Making Research Real, Development & Aid, Food and Agriculture, Headlines

Q&A: Finding New Ways To Reach Farmers

Interview with Frances Kimmins, director of Policy and Partnership for the Research Into Use Programme

PRETORIA, Aug 22 2008 (IPS) - When beekeepers in central and eastern Uganda got vouchers to go online at internet cafés, their most popular query was how to treat bee stings. A local agricultural information provider replied in Baganda, the local language.

In Kenya, horticultural entrepreneurs and researchers lobbied the Ministry of Agriculture to update a clause in the Pesticides Act. This allowed a local company to market a natural pest control package to exporters of high-value products, such as green beans, baby corn and cut flowers, and comply with European Union requirements for no pesticide residues.

In Tanzania, where the cheapest transport is donkeys, a comic book explains how to improve their performance through taking good care of them.

The key here is information: tailored to farmers and to policy makers, requested and delivered through a variety of ways, from computers to comics, and based on research on natural resources funded by the UK's Department for International Development (DFID).

Coming up with creative ways to share agricultural information on a large scale is the goal of the Research Into Use programme (RIU) under DFID's Strategy for Research on Sustainable Agriculture.

RIU moves away from the generation of new knowledge to the ways in which knowledge is put to use and, in the process, reduces poverty.

Since 2006, RIU has worked in the regions with the highest levels of poverty – South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. Malawi, Nigeria, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Tanzania and Zambia are all in the process of setting up RIU programmes.

This year, RIU is seeking to fund initiatives to communicate DFID-funded research on natural resources in a further ten African countries. In its search for new initiatives, it is seeking out in particular projects that make use of new communication technologies, such as educational entertainment, and public/private partnerships.

IPS reporter Mercedes Sayagues spoke to Frances Kimmins, RIU's director of Policy and Partnership, and manager of the Innovation Challenge Fund that is calling for proposals.

IPS: Why has research not reached farming communities? Frances Kimmins: Its mainly due to the poor flow of information between those who generate research knowledge and those who need to use it.

The reasons include poor infrastructure in rural locations, inadequate financial and business services, weak incentives for researchers to package and disseminate their results informally, poor incentives for producers, particularly those based in risky environments, to invest in new technologies, and few financial incentives for companies to engage with rural communities.

Moreover, research has remained small scale. You are lucky if you reach one hundred farmers. DFID wants to reach thousands of farmers who live away from urban centers, without roads and telecommunications.

IPS: Isn't that the role of extension workers? FK: Investment by governments and donors on agricultural extension has declined in the last 20 years, in favour of governance and social development. This is a worldwide funding pattern, with the exception of Latin America, especially Brazil – and it is reaping the benefits.

IPS: How can new communication technologies help? FK: By making the gaining of knowledge fun and relevant. This is the exciting part: creating new models of agricultural extension using new communication technologies. Bringing information to the Ugandan beekeepers via the internet is cheaper than using traditional extensionists and can reach larger numbers. People associated with universities and research can become information providers for farmers: we call them info-mediaries, or knowledge brokers.

In Kenya, we engaged policy-makers in democratic ways. This is a new area to explore: what kind of information on agriculture do MPs need to make decisions that can affect millions?

IPS: What are the cotton, fisheries and legume platforms established by RIU in Malawi recently? FK: A platform gathers all players in one sector: producers and buyers, processors and retailers, researchers and government.

For example, cotton is an expensive crop, vulnerable to disease and pests. Farmers need to know when to spray, and even more importantly, when not to spray. A judicious use of chemicals will save farmers money.

The platform can also give the opportunity and the knowledge for farmers to go organic, linking them to markets and buyers, to innovations in the cotton system in Malawi and in the world.

IPS: Will rising food prices create a window of opportunity for African farmers? FK: In the short term, it helps. But food prices are volatile – who knows what they will be like in 12 months? What Sub-Saharan Africa needs is greater ownership of food production and more control over its food security. This should become a major policy goal.

IPS: What is your position on genetically modified crops? FK: We have had no demands for it, yet. Personally, I'd go on a case-by-case basis. The process of genetically modifying crops is not too different from what farmers have done for centuries. It could be a hugely important tool to obtain drought-tolerant crops. It could also distort seed systems. It depends on how it is packaged. The priority for African countries must be to develop biosafety protocols.

IPS: How will you address the specific needs of women farmers? FK: On farm and off farm, women are major contributors to agriculture. Yet it is difficult to hear their voices. We give preference to projects that target women farmers.

IPS: Why is one-third of your budget devoted to monitoring and learning? FK: Researchers don't spend enough time learning, capturing what works and what doesn't. We want a strong emphasis on evidence-based lessons for this programme.