Farm technology bound for Africa

(L-R) Professor Paul van Gardingen - Director, Research Into Results; 

Professor James Smith – Edinburgh University Vice Principal; 

Alistair Carmichael; Dr Andy Frost - Director, Research Into Results 

and Dr Alan Tollervey - DFID Agriculture Research Team Leader

18 August 2014. An Edinburgh research group is to receive £10.8 million from the UK Government to provide leading-edge agricultural technology in Africa. The group will receive their funding over six years from the Department for International Development (DFID) for their Social Enterprises for Economic Development (SEED) programme.

Research Into Results (RIR) will make the latest agricultural innovations available to small businesses in 10 east and southern African countries. The group will then mentor these businesses to help them grow and find private investment.

RIR has already delivered pest-free crops, improved crop storage systems and a developed a mobile phone app that advises farmers the best time to plant their crops.

SEED will support the commercialisation of new agriculture technology in markets accessible to at least 500,000 small-scale farmers.

• SEED aims to turn promising research into commercially viable technology. 
• It has the potential to make more than half a million farmers become more efficient, helping them to feed their families and work their way out of poverty.
• The programme will be based in Rwanda and work in 10 countries
• SEED seeks to enhance the flow of investment-ready proposals that reach investment funds and banks. 
• By working with a range of partners, SEED will develop new enterprises to help take technology to market. 
• It aims to overcome the investment gap that can stop promising research turning into valuable technology.

The SEED Programme will develop technology-driven social enterprises whose products and services increase the profitability of smallholder farmers. There is a substantial, unmet need for ambitious social enterprises in Africa. SEED is an ambitious programme. It aims to be a game-changer, to create viable social enterprises for the benefit of smallholder farmers. Dr Andy Frost Director of Research Into Results

Research Into Results (RIR)
Centre of African Studies

Related:

Technology Development Assistance for Agriculture: Putting Research into Use in Low Income Countries

By N Clark, A Frost, I Maudlin & A Ward

Routledge, 2013; 200 pp.

How should development organisations, donors or indeed national governments attempt to support the development of new technologies for agriculture? In the last few decades, billions of dollars have gone into research labs and universities to support technology development, but in low income countries, particularly in Africa, the benefits for rural populations can be hard to detect. Such a situation motivated the UK’s Department of International Development to try a new approach, under its Research into Use (RIU) programme.

The RIU Best Bets initiative was much more hands on than simply providing grants for research work. In attempting to secure value for money for its investment in developing a number of farming technologies, it sought to engage private sector actors in processes that put these technologies in the hands of farming communities. This book reviews that work, featuring case studies from across sub-Saharan Africa, and making recommendations for how this work should inform future funding of technology development.

INNOVATION INTERMEDIARIES IN AN EVOLVING SMALLHOLDER AGRICULTURAL SYSTEM IN KENYA

• Title: BEYOND KNOWLEDGE BROKERAGE: AN EXPLORATORY STUDY OF INNOVATION INTERMEDIARIES IN AN EVOLVING SMALLHOLDER AGRICULTURAL SYSTEM IN KENYA

• Authors: CATHERINE W. KILELU, LAURENS KLERKX, CEES LEEUWIS, AND ANDY HALL
• Description: APRIL 2011, 43 pages.

This document resulted in part from research supported by the Research into Use (RIU) programme, funded by the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID) for the benefit of developing countries.

The recognition that innovation occurs in networks of heterogeneous actors and requires broad systemic support beyond knowledge brokering has resulted in a changing landscape of the intermediary domain in an increasingly market‐driven agricultural sector in developing countries.

This paper presents findings of an explorative case study that looked at 22 organisations identified as fulfilling an intermediary role in the Kenyan agricultural sector.

The study identified various organisational arrangements of innovation intermediaries with some organisations fulfilling a specialised innovation brokering role, even as other intermediaries take on brokering as a side activity, while still substantively contributing to the innovation process. Based on these findings the authors identify a typology of 4 innovation intermediation arrangements, including:

1. technology brokers, 
2. systemic brokers, 
3. enterprise development support and 
4. input access support.

The results indicate that innovation brokering is a pervasive task in supporting innovation and will require policy support to embed it in innovation support arrangements. The paper is not normative about these arrangements.

Research into Use: Managing Africa’s Medicinal Plants

March 30, 2010. Research into Use’s (RIU) pocket guide and policy brief series has produced a brief that outlines the need to find ways to sustainably manage Africa’s medicinal plants. RIU continues to illustrate how complex subjects can be explained simply to policy makers and the importance of effective scientific communication. The aim is to encourage partners in both the developed and developing world to invest more in communication efforts helping useful technologies become more widely adopted.

The brief ‘Future Health: Sustainable Management of Africa’s Medicinal Plants’ highlights that eighty per cent of Africans use traditional treatments made from wild native plant species and one-third depend on them entirely. As populations go up so to does use; over-exploitation is rampant. Control is imperative to sustain forest resources before they are lost, potentially denying millions access to medicines.

Four projects awarded funding in RIU's Best Bets programme

The Research Into Use (RIU) 'Best Bets' programme, which tests out an innovative, competitive funding mechanism, is providing around £5 million of grant aid for a number of large-scale technology promotion activities. These are expected to achieve significant developmental impact through private sector involvement.

The four successful projects in the first round of the 'Best Bets' programme represent a total investment of £1.5 million. 

Over 100 project proposals were submitted in the response to the call for projects in East, Central and Southern Africa. From these, 8 were short-listed and the final 4 were selected at an event in Nairobi, Kenya, on 26-27 November 2009, when candidates pitched their proposals to a panel of high-powered business leaders and research experts. The winning projects are:

Safe and affordable armyworm control tools in East Africa (led by CABI Africa) - for establishing a system for the production, supply, distribution and marketing of safe and affordable armyworm control tools in Tanzania and Kenya over the next 18 months. This pest attacks pasture and key crops such as maize, sorghum, millet and rice. The total area of crops prone to attack in Tanzania and Kenya is estimated at 2.1 million hectares. Part of the project involves armyworm forecasting which aims to help villagers predict armyworm outbreaks and tackle the problem before it gets out of control.

Improving access to NERICA rice seed (New Rice for Africa) in Uganda (led by NACCRI, The National Crop Resources Research Institute, Uganda) - to support the scaling up, production and delivery of high quality NERICA rice seed by local seed companies working with smallholder farmers and to implement a marketing strategy to stabilise demand. Rice is becoming increasingly important as a food and cash crop in Uganda. NERICA rice varieties are high yielding and have relatively low water requirements. Their use will support government initiatives for improved food security and income generation.

Farmer-applied biocontrols and seed treatments in Kenya (led by the Real IPM Company Ltd) - for promoting yield improvement through farmer-applied biocontrol seed treatments in maize, sorghum and millet. This project aims to increase productivity for small-scale farmers who save their own seeds by using a mycoherbicide to control the parasitic weed Striga and encouraging seed priming.

Resources and information for smallholder farmers and young people in East Africa (led by Farm Input Promotions Africa; FIPS-Africa) - for a private sector-led extension service to address climatic threats to food security, empowering smallholder farmers throughout East Africa to put research into use. Working with input-supply companies and research centres, demand will be created for new varieties of crops and improved fertilizer blends, and outputs from a selection of successful RNRRS projects will be used to improve soil, crop, and livestock management. In addition, various youth-focused media (comic books, radio programmes and interactive SMS) will provide young people with ideas for generating income through agricultural activities.