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How to create and nurture effective partnerships
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Presented by Micter Chaola, Catholic Relief Services (Malawi), at the Africa RISING Program Learning Event, Lilongwe, Malawi, 5-8 February 2019
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How to create and nurture effective partnerships
- How to create and nurture effective partnerships Micter Chaola Catholic Relief Services Africa RISING Program Learning Event 5 – 8 February 2019 Lilongwe, Malawi
- Introduction • Outline: – What CRS and A.R. have done together – Successes; Constraints… – Suggestions for expanded collaboration with development partners • What CRS and A.R. have done together: – Systems to restore/enhance productivity of soil • At farm level • Cereal – legume intercropping • Doubled-up legumes • Cereal – agroforestry systems (gliricidia) • 3 years of collaboration in Zambia • Additional collaboration in Zimbabwe • Joint presentation of results at CTN conference (2018)
- Successes / constraints Successes • Joint identifications of improved production systems for smallholder farmers (on-station and on-farm res.) • Promotion of improved systems thru CRS programs • Significant adoption by SHF in E. Zambia, S. Malawi • Joint presentation of R&D outcomes (CTN) Constraints • Attempted collaboration in Malawi failed due to lack of funding in both partners • It was a struggle to maintain collaboration in Zambia and Zimbabwe due to lack of funding • Uncertainty of continuity of research programs due to fluctuating donor priorities (both CRS and AR) • Admin issues in both AR and CRS
- Suggestions for future collaboration • Research projects that wish to collaborate with NGOs should have some funds to cover their own collaborative activities at least (staff time, field travel, etc.) • e.g., “Innovation fund” in GLDC project •NB: Most NGOs do not have flexible discretionary funds • NGOs to include research organizations / activities in development projects • Research and NGOs jointly seek funding from donors? • Research and dissemination of findings is a long-term process. Need some system to secure funding for longer-term collaboration
- Africa Research in Sustainable Intensification for the Next Generation africa-rising.net This presentation is licensed for use under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Licence. Thank You
Editor's Notes
- A.R. is Africa RISING In this presentation we will discuss what CRS and A.R. have done together, the successes we have had, and some of the constraints we have faced. After that we will discuss some options for strengthening collaboration between research organizations and development partners in the future We should note that CRS feels that this kind of collaboration is extremely beneficial because it: Helps NGOs gain new knowledge Helps to ensure that the technologies we are promoting are technically sound and practical for farmers It enables scientific results and outputs to be scaled immediately and quickly Picture: Africa RISING staff, CRS and partners in Chipata, Zambia.
- Successes: Our collaborative work with CIMMYT in Zambia (and to a lesser extent in Zimbabwe) helped us to identify improved intercropping systems that would increase biomass production and improve the soil, while not reducing maize grain yields significantly, even in the first year. The doubled-up legume systems also increased food and income production from the first year CRS was able to immediately start disseminating the most promising systems in our projects both in Eastern Zambia and in southern Malawi (UBALE). We have observed significant adoption of these improved production systems by smallholder farmers both in Zambia and southern Malawi. We are also seeing adoption to a lesser extent in Zimbabwe (we have not had a big project in Zimbabwe to promote adoption up to now, but spontaneous adoption is occurring out of the on-farm trials) CRS and CIMMYT jointly presented research findings on crop yields and biomass production, as well as farmer perceptions of the different cropping systems at an international conference (Cracking the Nut) in Guatemala in June 2018. Constraints: We tried to establish collaborative research on the use of doubled-up legume systems in southern Malawi (gross margins and soil impacts) with A.R. staff at Chitedze, but this was not successful because neither A.R. nor CRS had the additional funding necessary to support the collaborative research. It has been a struggle to sustain the collaboration in Zambia because the USAID funding for A.R. was very much reduced. It was a struggle to maintain the collaboration in Zimbabwe because the CRS funding was reduced in the second year. In both cases the work was continued mainly because of the strong commitments of both partners – who each made sacrifices in order to sustain the collaboration (and also support from the USAID mission in Zambia) This issue highlights the need for long-term funding commitments. The process of collaborative research, followed by scaling adoption, requires multiple years of continuous work. Uncertain funding levels can make this a very difficult and fragile process Additional administrative difficulties that we encountered included the facts that: CG Centers do not like to deal with small amounts of money (e.g., less than US$ 100,000). However, the amounts required for collaboration, and which NGOs can contribute – are often much less than that, and The resolution of institutional differences on ownership of intellectual property rights from collaborative work can cause considerable delays in contract signing due to the need to get the legal departments in the two organizations to agree on contract language. Photo: Maize/Lablab intercropping, Chipata, Zambia
- The GLDC is the Grain Legumes and Dryland Cereals Center-wide Research Project of the CGIAR. It is led by ICRISAT. It has an “innovation fund” of around US$ 100,000/year to support collaboration between research centers and NGOs. This fund is allocated annually through a competitive process. Most NGOs do not have “discretionary funds” outside of their donor-funded projects. This limits their flexibility to start new collaborative projects when opportunities arise. CRS is lucky in that we do have quite a lot of “discretionary” funding that allows us to support these kinds of collaborative processes. However, projects and country programs have to request “discretionary” funds on an annual basis – which is a problem for collaborative activities that take multiple years. For the above reasons, it is important for both research organizations and NGOs to build in funding for collaboration in their project proposals right from the beginning. Alternatively they could jointly seek funding from donors if/when they have strong and innovative ideas for high-impact collaborative work But the bottom line is that programs that include both research and dissemination components will require funding over multiple years if they are to be successful. For this reason, longer-term funding mechanisms need to be found or developed. Photo: Maize/pigeon pea intercropping plot, gm/cc on-farm trials, Zimbabwe (CIMMYT/CRS)
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