1.1. Introduction
1.2. The Changing Perspective of Productivity
1.3. Linking Research to Development
1.4. Identifying Needs
1.5. Types of Research Problems
1.6. Assessment
In the past, it has sometimes been argued that research to increase agricultural output is likely to be more cost-effective than research to increase efficiency in its use. No doubt, similar arguments have been advanced for forestry and fisheries. In the current climate of opinion, however, such views are open to serious criticism, even though there is not much quantitative evidence to discount them.
The relentless increase of population pressure, the urgency of environmental conservation, the accelerating migration of people from the countryside to cities, and the declining rate of increase in yield potentials reflect only some of the considerations that call for greater efficiency in the exploitation of what is already available, whether from land, freshwater or the sea. The problems extend from harvesting, through storage and processing to distribution, marketing and final use and they have wide implications for poverty alleviation and sustainable production.
There seems little disagreement about the general validity of statements of this type. The primary issue for this study is the extent to which international research could make a bigger contribution to solving problems in these areas and, within the wide range of possibilities, what additional aspects it would be appropriate for the CGIAR Centres to undertake.
Consistent with our terms of reference (see Appendix I), we start by discussing the need for international involvement in research on harvest and postharvest problems. We proceed to summarise current Centre activities in these areas and to analyse the extent to which the current overall effort is appropriate. Finally, we suggest possible future roles and strategies for the CGIAR, having regard to the priority that might be accorded these problems in relation to competing demands for resources.
The report of a previous study, "Food Crop Utilisation and Agro-Industrial Development" (Hulse, 1990) has provided background material for the present study. We have also taken fully into account the replies to a questionnaire prepared as part of the first phase of the present study and distributed to the Centres and various other organizations with an interest in harvest and postharvest research. Replies are summarised in Annex II.
Following the higher crop yields associated with the green revolution, attention by the international community has increasingly been turned to post-production losses that impede the realisation of its full potential in terms of food availability. Earlier attention to postharvest problems, such as drying and storage, has gradually been expanding to include processing and marketing, a context in which productivity is being interpreted as more than simply yield.
It is now increasingly accepted that the overall purpose of achieving sustainable productivity in agriculture, forestry and fisheries would be better served by analyzing the "utilisable production" of the whole chain that links the producer to the consumer. This chain is being influenced by a number of gradual changes, which include the following shifts in emphasis.
· From a regulated to a liberal trade environment, in which governments are moving from a business role to one of policy setting and infrastructure development. The aim is to reduce transaction costs, while encouraging development of a more active private sector with access to greater resources, especially credit and information.· From a paradigm of "technology development" to one of "business development", in which the type and quality of the product is determined primarily by the effective market demand and not by the available technology.
· From an approach based on the primary production systems to one that also features the secondary products demanded by the consumer. This approach includes both the production cycle of the primary producer and the market-centred processes that transform the primary product into secondary ones.
· From durable primary products, such as grain crops, to perishable ones such as roots, tubers, fruit, fish and vegetables, calling for increased attention to problems of storage and shelf life.
· From minimising losses in the primary products to maximising diversity in the secondary ones. The aim is to bring about more efficient use of the primary products, while adding value and generating income at each stage in the production-consumption continuum.
· From a view that agro-industries are separate from production systems to one that recognizes their value in the conservation of natural resources, through providing alternative sources of income to disadvantaged rural people.
Among assessments of the need for greater emphasis on post production problems, the report of a recent workshop on progress in global agricultural research and development (USAID, 1995) contained the following comment:
"If the development community is going to take the goals of poverty and food security seriously, it will have to pay considerably more attention to marketing and utilisation than it has in the past".
Likewise, a workshop sponsored by ATSAF (1995) on small-scale food processing stressed the importance of linking crop improvement to the value added through processing, thus providing greater opportunities for employment, as well as greater incentives for investment by farmers in new technology. Other, similar comments, covering the whole sequence of harvest and postharvest activities, have been widely echoed by donor agencies and have featured strongly in the information collected for the present study.
If the need for greater emphasis in development programmes on post-production problems is accepted, questions then arise about the needs for research to support such initiatives and, within those research needs, whether there are problems that transcend the location-specific needs of individual communities or countries and lend themselves to an international approach.
Against a background of the production-consumption continuum, research relevant to postharvest problems would include activities focusing on the pre-maturity stage (e.g., the protein or starch component of crops) extending to research on policy, marketing, processing and storage, as determined by consumer demand. It would also need explicitly to include a gender perspective, in that men and women play intricate, complementary, and competing roles in the utilization part of the continuum.
This study briefly discusses how such needs might be identified and proceeds to give examples of the types of research problem for which solutions, new research methods, or new approaches might be sought through international research. We make no attempt to list all those areas where such needs might arise.
1.4.1. Links with National Research Systems and Other Organizations
1.4.2. Location-specific Problems
There can be little doubt that demographic changes are leading to changes in patterns of demand that have the potential to stimulate a range of income-earning activities stemming from the products of agriculture, forestry and fisheries. These issues are particularly important in relation to low-income people in general and to women, in particular, who commonly have dominant roles in rural societies in a wide range of postharvest activities and processes. Greater investment in international research in this post-production chain of the production-consumption continuum could be undertaken effectively, however, only if it were in response to carefully identified needs at the consumer level. Any strategy designed to increase such investment would have to ensure that adequate mechanisms were in place to ensure its efficacy.
Established mechanisms for discriminating among the needs of producers to identify areas for international research could not necessarily be extended to incorporate similar mechanisms for correctly prioritising consumer needs. For example, in agricultural research, the strongest linkages between international activities and national programmes are often facilitated through channels provided by the respective ministries of agriculture.
For matters relating to consumer needs, however, a wide range of other government departments would have to be involved as well as NGOs and private sector businesses ranging from the artisan to the multi-national company. Moreover, there are already many other organizations, such as national and international development agencies, universities and research institutes that are involved in identifying weak links in the chain of activities leading to the successful end use of primary products, whether from crops, livestock, fisheries or forests.
Consequently, working relationships that have been built up over the years for identifying researchable issues relating to productivity would need to be supplemented by other relationships, giving access to a wide range of organizations concerned with processing and marketing, including agro-industries. Amongst these, large commercial companies often feel constrained to become involved in exploring new processes for use in developing countries, or new sources of supply of raw materials, because of the commercial risks involved. It might well be that there is a role here for an organization, such as the CGIAR, to act as a catalyst in bringing together groups of interested parties to do exploratory work that might be considered to be too risky for any individual enterprise.
There are also questions of identifying those areas of wide applicability that would merit international attention. Commonly, some problems that are clearly identified at the national level are described as location-specific. With many such problems, however, it is possible to identify principles of wide applicability that can form the basis of a worthwhile international approach. From their work on production systems, the Centres have already gained considerable experience in developing broadly applicable methodology for tackling location-specific problems. Similar principles apply to many post-production problems.
For example, CIAT's work on cassava has shown that strategic outcomes and understanding can be derived from a systematic approach to location-specific, post-production problems, where the primary research has been undertaken by national organizations. Centre specialists can relate these results to principles derived from wider experience, such as in gender analysis, and so tease out strategic principles that can be applied elsewhere.
There is little reason for supposing, therefore, that problems in the post-production part of the continuum are inherently more location specific than those related to increased productivity. Indeed, as the work of the Centres on productivity has evolved it has become increasingly apparent that strategic research at the international level needs to be complemented by adaptive research at the national level to solve location-specific problems.
1.5.1. Urban Consumers
1.5.2. Limited Demand
1.5.3. Limited Shelf-life
1.5.4. Limited Supply
By 2025 it is projected (FAO 1995) that some 43 percent of the population of the least-developed countries will be urbanised, presenting complex problems for the supply and distribution of food. Incomes of certain segments of the urban population are rising, leading to increasing demand for more expensive foods such as fish, horticultural, livestock and forest products (e.g. spices), as well as for other products that provide a varied diet and are processed to offer greater convenience.
In contrast, the majority of urban dwellers in most developing countries remain disadvantaged, with limited purchasing power, requiring the efficient distribution of low-cost, easily prepared, but nutritious food. Cheap or subsidised wheat flour, maize meal or milled rice, which are often imported, have progressively replaced more traditional crops, such as sorghum, millet, and cassava, because of their advantages in terms of ease of preparation, cooking time, storability and general convenience.
The challenge is to find ways in which international research can help towards meeting the urban consumer's evolving needs, within the wider interests of the country and its economy. There are, for example, major policy issues relating to the weight to be given to developing industrial exports to pay for imported food, as distinct from working on local products so that they compete more favourably with imports. Likewise, there are problems relating to the availability of primary products used as raw materials in the supply of food, some of which we illustrate below by reference to specific examples.
There seems to be little doubt that changes in the patterns of demand are limiting the production of some traditional crops, such as cassava and sorghum, in many developing countries.
CGIAR support for cassava is based on its importance as a staple food for large numbers of people, especially low-income groups. Its broad agro-ecological adaptability, drought tolerance, and indeterminate harvest date, mean that it is widely grown and commonly used as a food security crop at the household level. Crop improvement and pest control have featured strongly in research programmes but, in general, demand for the crop and its products has not increased in line with the potential for increased production.
A further consequence of the lack of attractive secondary products has been a growing preference for higher value commodities such as maize, wheat and rice for which increasing demand cannot always be met, either at the household or the national level. This threat to the image of cassava could result in reduced incentives to producers to increase their yields, leading to declining production and a worsening of food shortages. In many developing countries, it is unlikely that further development of the crop will be successful unless full attention is paid to its end uses as food, animal feed and as an industrial raw material.
In this example, a key research need is to identify and rationalise the current and projected needs of the multiplicity of end users and to match the available primary and secondary products of the crop more precisely to meet those needs. One approach would be to invest greater resources in research on the properties of available clones and of those that could be derived from plant breeding programmes. Another would be to promote greater investment in processing techniques that would adapt the products of improved varieties more closely to the needs of end users. Both might be seen as part of a revised strategy in which greater emphasis is given to post production problems in a more comprehensive approach to commodity research.
Like cassava, sorghum has traditionally been produced and consumed mainly by the rural poor, where it has served to meet an important food security need. Although progress has been made in improving productivity and yield stability, sorghum's performance relative to more popular food crops, such as rice and maize, has been modest.
In India, the main yield increases have been obtained in the rainy-season crop which results in a softer and less lustrous grain, with lower consumer acceptance than the post rainy-season crop. Grain from the post rainy-season crop is used for traditional food preparations such as unleavened bread. In contrast, the lower value, higher yielding rainy season crop is increasingly being used as an animal feed, particularly as the poultry industry is rapidly expanding. Since the 1960s, the area under sorghum production in India has declined markedly but the total production has stayed about the same owing to increases in yield.
There is no question that the yield of certain sorghum hybrids has increased, but it is less certain to what extent there have been corresponding increases in the "utilisable product" or in the benefits to resource-poor farmers or urban consumers. A broader understanding is required of the postharvest characteristics that influence acceptance of sorghum in the various markets that relate to food, feed and industrial use. Only in this way could the range of problems be identified and appropriate research strategies developed.
In contrast to cassava and sorghum, where increases in production appear to be limited by demand, milk provides a good example of a product where demand is continually expanding, but supply does not respond because of the need for rapid delivery of the primary product. Many strategies have been developed to overcome the constraint that milk must either be consumed or processed within a few hours of harvest. Traditional products such as rubbery salted cheese, parmesan cheese, natilla, yoghurt and ghee represent just some of the available strategies for increasing the variety and shelf-life of milk products and thereby expanding the potential market.
However, the farm-gate price of milk is a function of many factors which can be analysed to give a theoretical spatial boundary outside which the production of liquid milk for the fresh market is not attractive to producers. Farm cooling from body temperature to 18 degrees C (temperature of "cold water") and transport in insulated chums could expand this threshold, whilst local refrigeration and transport in refrigerated trucks could expand it even further.
Much dairy research currently focuses on improving the efficiency of established dairy farmers, i.e. those already lying within the feasible economic "milk-shed". Even with improved breeds, nutritional regimes, forage crops, health measures etc. the potential for increasing milk production on a regional level by more than 5 % per year would seem optimistic.
In comparison, the investment needed to develop and implement postharvest technology that would serve to expand the milk-shed boundary could give a greater return. Not only would the milk market then be open to many previously excluded potential producers, but they would be well placed to benefit from the experience of established producers in the same production area.
The numerous researchable questions that surround opportunities of this type are such that they are unlikely to be tackled by any national programme on its own. It might well be, however, that a concerted international approach could bring together the necessary critical mass to develop innovative methods of handling milk that would serve to expand the functional producing areas and so benefit producers as well as consumers.
These underlying principles clearly apply to a greater or lesser extent to other perishable products, such as fish, fruit and vegetables, where the problems are similar and solutions equally urgent.
Although limited demand and limited shelf life can act as major constraints to the availability of both primary and secondary products, there are many examples where availability of the primary product is the limiting factor, and research is required to develop secondary products from alternative sources. This type of problem has been recognized for a long time in relation to the availability of suitable flour for making bread but, increasingly, it is becoming true of fish.
Conventional fish stocks are under pressure, with total world supply generally recognized as having reached a plateau at about 100M mt. Broadly speaking, in Asia demand for fish very much outstrips supply, in Africa demand and supply are about matched whereas, in some areas of Latin America, supply exceeds demand and the excess is used for fish meal (animal feed). More must be made of the available resources to meet the food needs of an expanding global population and to avoid irretrievable over exploitation of conventional stocks. Consequently, there will be an increasing need to use for human consumption a wider range of fish, such as small pelagic species, currently used for fish meal.
Little is known about many of these species, either as a food item or in relation to the requirements of processors and exporters. There is an urgent need for systematic research to define fish species in terms of these properties and to build up a greater understanding of the likely processing and handling characteristics of a wide range of species, in relation to features such as storage life, and product and processing options. At present there is no international mechanism for organising the necessary co-ordination or leadership that would be required to implement ideas of this type.
In the past, the international community has given strong support to "productivity" research as a primary area of concern, and the benefits of such work have been well documented. Increasingly, however, attention has been turning to the work needed to ensure that the potential benefits from increased productivity are more fully realised through reduction in postharvest losses and diversification of end uses.
The changes required are closely related to broader development issues, such as improved marketing and distribution systems, and much of the research required is adaptive in nature. Nonetheless, some of the researchable issues transcend the needs of individual communities or countries and lend themselves to an international approach. There is, therefore, a strong case for increased support for such research by the international community, in which many organizations, including the CGIAR, might have an important role. Before discussing the implications of this assessment, however, we first take a broad look at past and present contributions made to research on harvest and postharvest problems by the CGIAR Centres.
