This document discusses communities of practice (CoPs) for farmers and farmer organizations. It defines a CoP as a group that comes together to share common interests or solve problems. There are three aspects to a CoP: the domain (subject matter and learning agenda), the community (who participates), and practice (activities like trainings, study circles, and market information sharing). Potential CoP activities proposed include farmer profiling, local meetings, exchange visits, and documentation. The document also mentions governance of CoPs and partnerships between CoPs in the Africa Conservation Tillage Network, including those focused on academia, equipment, farmers, women/youth, and conservation agriculture dissemination.

1. CA Communities of Practice for Farmers and Farmer Organizations
Laikipia Stakeholders Meeting
30thOctober 2014
Janet Cox Achora- KIM Manager ACT

2. What is a Community of Practice
Group of people
who come together to
share a common concern,
a set of problems, or
interest in a topic
Anew model for connecting people
to learning, knowledge
sharing, and collaboration

3. Three aspects of a CoP
The domainof COP
This aspect identifies the subject matter of the CoPand
spells out the learning agenda.
Has three aspects
1. The aspect of community
Who should be a member of the CoP?
how does their participation affect the group?

4. 2. The aspect of practice
What should the participants do together to learn and benefit from the CoP?
Examples of activities
Trainings in certain agricultural skills could be facilitated for/by the CoPmembers
Study circles around demonstration fields to act as learning sites
Access to market information
Commodity groups will be facilitated to enhance market linkages

5. 3. The aspect of convening
who will take leadership of the interaction fora,
how can the partnership sustain productive enquiry,
who are the external stakeholders
what are their roles
what resources are available to support the process.
Group facilitators are identified by the CoPmembers and these can then be capacitated through training and supported with extension materials

7. Proposed Activities
Profiling of the farmers in the CoPs to create a baseline
Local interaction meetings
Exchange visits between groups
Documentation of all activities

8. Hold meetings

9. Learning from each other

10. Drama Groups-educational

11. Post Harvest handling facilities

12. So who Governors the CoPs ?

13. Pillars of Good Governance

14. Good and bad Governance

15. Building Partnerships and Linkages

16. CoPs in ACT
Academia and researchers (COPAR)
CA equipment manufacturers, suppliers and service providers (COPMSSP)
Farmers and farmer organizations (COPFFO).
Women and youths in agriculture (COPWYIA).
Developers and disseminators of CA (COPDD).
All of the ACT CoPs are represented by their leadership usually the Chairperson and Secretary, to the Annual or Extraordinary General Meeting of ACT