Points of View
Putting integration into action

Has agricultural research turned a corner? Have new, participatory approaches re-established its relevance in rural development? Or will rates of adoption and impact continue to frustrate scientists and donors alike, and leave farming communities with little return on the millions invested? For one group of scientists at least, there is still a flame of hope. Agricultural research can, they believe, have an impact, but only if it is integrated within a much broader understanding of natural resource systems, the communities that depend on them, and the policies that govern their management.

At a recent workshop hosted in Aleppo, Syria, by the International Centre for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA), representatives of nine of the Future Harvest centres joined with staff from national agricultural research institutions from around the world, to discuss how the theory of Integrated Natural Resource Management can be put into practice. New Agriculturist asked for their Points of View on this new, wide-ranging approach, its potential to make a difference to the lives of rural communities, and the challenges it may entail.

A changed agenda...

"It's a changing situation we are in. In the past we were not asked to have impact. We were asked to make development of new technologies, new interventions, that could possibly alleviate production constraints. It's only in the last five to ten years that we have started to look really at the whole farm system, at the livelihood and income generating opportunities. At what are the logjams that prevent people moving forward."
Steve Twomlow, ICRISAT, Bulawayo, Zimbabwe

"In the past we were mainly interested in increasing productivity. Now our goals are more complex. We are aiming at producing sustainable livelihoods, at reducing poverty, and these types of issues are in fact much more complex than the simple task of increasing productivity."
Dyno Keatinge, Deputy Director General for Research, ICRISAT, Hyderabad

...working with farmers...

"In the old days researchers used to stay in their labs, write research papers and jiggle test-tubes about, but these days you really have to work with farmers, and understand what they see. These days scientists are realising that someone who manages the land, and actually spends every day of their life walking up and down the field, has something very useful to say about it. That is something that has changed quite recently in scientific communities, who are working very hard to try and use what farmers know, as well as what scientists know."
Simon Cook, CIAT, Colombia

"Rural people don't know everything, people from the outside have many good ideas, but they often lack the knowledge of how to fit those specifically to circumstances within villages. Just looking back over how much has been achieved in the last ten years, almost despite policies, communities have taught us an enormous number of important lessons as to how things can change, and if we can help to spread those more widely, then there is the chance for a real sea-change, a movement towards sustainability, which actually brings economic development at the same time."
Jules Pretty, University of Essex, UK

"We have changed our approach dramatically. We now have a strong participatory approach, not only in trying to find appropriate varieties which have drought tolerance, but as well, we listen to the inhabitants about how we can have these varieties, but with the proper traits which they need. Meanwhile, there is a lot of dialogue with them, of how to utilise indigenous knowledge, which they have, on utilisation of water; on how they dealt traditionally with the biodiversity, which is a treasure which they have. All this indigenous knowledge, our scientists translate this, and introduce it into packages, which will benefit the community, but also benefit humanity more, because it will become an international public good."
Adel El-Beltagy, Director General, ICARDA

"When we talk about research, even during the planning stage and the implementation stage, farmers will have to be involved. As long as farmers think that it will be to their benefit, I am sure that they will be interested to involve themselves, taking more of their time and money as well. Because what they see now is just a very dim light; they see that their children are in a hopeless situation. But if they can see that there is a chance of changing the situation now, then that is an entry point into the farming community I think."
Abiye Astatke, ILRI, Ethiopia

"We have realised throughout all the years that we have been working in Africa, that African farmers understand their natural resources extremely well. So by working with them, having them be scientists just like us, in effect, what they bring is their knowledge of the local circumstances, and what we bring is this ability to integrate among different scientists who have very different ideas about what needs to be done, and that enables us also to integrate, for example, between farmers who are in the upper parts of watersheds and those who are in the lower parts of watersheds, and beyond that, integration between countries."
Anne-Marie Izac, Director for Research, the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF), Nairobi

...in multidisciplinary teams...

"If you look at our successes in the past, they are really quite few and far between. And part of the problem is that we are not really tackling the true dimension of the difficulties that people are facing in such environments in which we are working, such as in sub-Saharan Africa. Farmers and farmers' families deal with complex issues in a difficult world, and if you are trying to design solutions to the sorts of problems they are facing, you have to take into account a whole range of different dimensions in addition to the ones that you may have particular expertise on. So it is very necessary to develop a team which has multidisciplinary skills and then you have a better chance of designing a solution that will not only work for the farmers, but will be acceptable to them as well."
Dyno Keatinge, ICRISAT, India

"Integrated Natural Resource Management is about different researchers with different expertise integrating among themselves and integrating properly into the communities so that they can begin, together with the community, to learn about more effective ways of managing the resource base that that community depends on."
Joachim Voss, Director General, CIAT, Colombia

"Even though we talk about agriculture, it is much broader than agriculture as I see it. And probably as researchers we can't cover everything, but we'll have to bring the different players together, so that some sort of solution can be found. But in all aspects, the central point will be the farmers. For a farmer, he has to think of so many things. It is not just the grain yield of wheat, or the grain yield of barley. He also thinks about the health of his children, their education. It is not just productivity in one line, or markets in another line. Everything will have to be in a system, as one system."
Abiye Astatke, ILRI Ethiopia

...within social and political structures...

"If you come in with a technology, you have to look at the implications. And, for example, first of all you have to look at is it really profitable, because farmers have to invest in it, and will it really bring something significant so it will really help them out. But also at the community level, it can create conflicts. So that is something you have to look at with the whole community. You cannot just do it with one household alone. So you have to discuss this with the community first, and only when we can come to an agreement can we develop this kind of thing on a larger scale."
Francis Turkelboom, ICARDA

"The advantage in many parts of Africa is, people still have very strong family and kin and clan and community relations, which they can build upon, to help solve common problems. Now one of the things that scientists and extensionists can help do is to help promote that, and help to build it to help solve common problems."
Jules Pretty, University of Essex, UK

"We do this with the national partners, and we do it with the local communities, and we don't do it alone. And this is again a part of the opening up of the International Centres, to work with different communities, as well as national programmes, and even sometimes, officials and policy-makers. Because a package is not only the outcome of the scientific technology package, it is a policy package, plus a technology package, which will make a difference in relation to Integrated Natural Resource Management."
Adel El-Beltagy, Director General, ICARDA

"The management of natural resources is not just a localised process. It is something that involves a lot of interaction between stakeholders of different economic sectors, and also of different administrative levels. Because to be able to attain a goal, everybody has to pitch in, and do their part. If you don't have a favourable policy or good market links, a local production project won't make it."
Nathalie Beaulieu, CIAT, Colombia

"For me it was one of my greatest satisfactions having farmers say, 'Since you have been working with us, the mayor's office listens to us and takes what we have to say into account.' We have seen progress for example in the water supply, the electricity and the contact between the mayor's office and the villages. So I think that it is a good contribution, and I hope it is going to be adopted by many municipalities and it is going to help democracy to be more active."
Nathalie Beaulieu, CIAT

...is a challenge!

"Scientists need to work in a much more participatory manner with farmers and farming communities. As part of that, and the part of it that is probably least well done and understood, is that it also requires that scientists understand the rules and the principles and the cultural context of participation and social organisation...If you are going to effectively work on community empowerment and community participation, you really need to start off understanding what the local rules of participation and the local forms of organisation are, and what form for what kinds of purposes. If you do that, and you build on those, then you are much more effective than if you try to replace them with forms of organisation which are alien to the community."
Joachim Voss, Director General, CIAT, Colombia

"[Researchers] are becoming increasingly aware of it. It's not something that comes naturally to bio-physical scientists, because they are not used to thinking in those kind of terms, but increasingly in the CGIAR system we have very good social scientists who work together with the bio-physical scientists, in order that those kind of things begin to happen, so that the impact of the bio-physical sciences is very much strengthened by applying the sciences in the appropriate way."
Joachim Voss, Director General, CIAT, Colombia

"We have a paradigm now, working with communities, working with farmers; the understanding of the paradigm is there, but the capacity to transfer that paradigm into actual research on the ground in not there. And the patience among the donor agencies and the development institutions to build that capacity is not there. They are quite impatient to say, 'We want to have the implementation of the paradigm right away', but if you don't have the capacity ... It's the capacity particularly of the national agricultural research systems, of extension systems, of local NGOs and those institutions at ground level that have to take up this new way of doing research and working with communities. You need the vision, the investment and the time, to build that capacity which is needed for such a very complex research agenda."
Aden Aw-Hassan, Agricultural Economist, ICARDA

"On the one hand, it means you require a little bit more resources to perhaps get some decent quantifiable data that you can write up and present as a paper for peer review, which is required for your own career progression. But it also takes a strong stomach sometimes, to let the farmers have their head. When they start to race away from you and actually go down a track that you never thought of, you've got to actually become extremely flexible in your mindset."
Steve Twomlow, ICRISAT, Zimbabwe

"I think that the major challenge for researchers is that they have to get to learn to enjoy working with farmers, and to appreciate the local knowledge. I can assure you that once you get over that initial nervousness of perhaps making a fool of yourself with farmers, once you build trust within a community, it can be extremely exciting, and very nerve-wracking. Because once they learn to sprint, you'll never catch them."
Steve Twomlow, ICRISAT, Zimbabwe