3.1. Possible Roles for the CGIAR
3.2. Priorities
3.3. Research Strategies
3.4. Implementation
3.5. Implications for the CGIAR Mission Statement
3.6. Conclusions
3.7. Recommendations
In our consideration of appropriate roles for the CGIAR, we have taken into account the work of a range of other organizations already concerned with research and development in relation to harvest and postharvest issues. A few of these organizations, such as CSIRO (Australia) and IFR (UK), are involved in the more fundamental aspects of research, while others, such as FAO and many other development agencies, are more concerned with adaptive research related to development projects. Many of the latter type of organization would be natural customers for any increased output from the CGIAR in these areas of activity.
We have also taken into account the responses to the questionnaire summarised in Annex II, which cover a broad spectrum of opinions, and show both similarities and differences regarding what the CGIAR should or should not do. Finally, we paid full regard to the analysis of CGIAR activities presented in the TAC Review of Priorities and Strategies (1992). Many of the principles discussed in that document have been assumed in this study, especially those relating to collaboration, training, the transfer of technology and the dissemination of information. Consequently, we have assumed that any changes in the priority accorded to harvest and postharvest research would be accompanied by corresponding changes in directly related activities, such as training. The implications of our conclusions for the CGIAR mission statement are discussed in section 3.5.
Activities at the CGIAR Centres have ranged from path-breaking research within the confines of their own facilities, to development-related activities involving large networks of national and regional institutions in the developing countries. The latter activities are seen by many as entirely complementary to the former, acting as both sounding boards for defining research projects and delivery systems for applying the results. Others argue that the Centres should not act as implementing agencies for development-related national research projects, except where this role is essential to accumulate primary data or validate concepts.
The view we take in this study is that, wherever the balance is struck, the Centres should not depart substantially from their traditional role of promoting international research to generate results of wide applicability. We do not start with any pre-conceived notions of the most efficacious ways in which this might be achieved, but we recognize that experience already gained provides important indicators of the ingredients required for success.
In our opinion, if the full benefits of productivity research are to be realised, there must be complementary attention to efficiency in product utilisation as part of a coherent approach. While Centres, such as IFPRI, have a broad strategic role in looking at policy issues, there is no organization or mechanism for co-ordinating utilisation research in general. Factors relating to the efficiency of utilisation are complex, with many different organizations, operating at different levels (global, regional, country, community etc.) being involved.
On the question of whether or not the CGIAR should now assume a more prominent role in this respect, it is pertinent to ask whether any other organization could readily fill the gap if the CGIAR does not. Much will depend on how the CGIAR sees its future, whether or not there is scope for gradually reducing some of its current activities, how priorities are re-assessed and what the donors are prepared to support. In our view, the CGIAR should move progressively, but selectively, in the direction of a more comprehensive approach to commodity research, in which greater attention is paid to meeting needs in the post-production part of the production-consumption continuum.
In making its recommendations on priorities TAC has, in general, wrestled with various forms of multi-dimensional matrix and tried to define and quantify the constituent vectors. This type of analysis has proved useful in arriving at the relative importance of food commodities, for example, but has been limited in providing an objective assessment of what priority to accord to those aspects which have multiple implications and are more difficult to quantify, such as strengthening national research capacities.
Historically, the CGIAR was quick to realise that any weakness in national research capacities would act as an impediment to the impact of Centre work. Consequently, it had no hesitation in creating ISNAR and defining capacity building as an essential component of all Centre activities. National research systems had to be viewed as an essential link in the chain leading to the adoption of research results in farmers' fields.
It might well be that post-production problems should be viewed in a similar way: that understanding and satisfying demand is as important to stimulating innovation by the producer as is providing appropriate technology with which to innovate. If this is so, the balance of activities within existing commodity programmes would need to be viewed in this light and adjusted, where necessary. The approach would be to identify weaknesses in the production-consumption continuum and promote remedial action in a variety of ways. This, in turn, might lead to a change in the ways in which priorities among commodities are arrived at.
If income generation and food security were the ultimate goals, the availability, quality and price of competing food stuffs in an acceptable form would be of key importance. It would not then be a matter of the relative importance of soybean, for example, but attention would focus on vegetable oils of which the consumer needs a ready supply. Similarly, the food security of the household, especially of urban dwellers, might not depend on the availability of sorghum, but on the total calories derived from cereals, root crops and plantains, or on protein from pulses, fish and meat. This would involve a fundamental change in perspective and our view is that the importance of consumer systems, as distinct from producer systems, can no longer be left out of the reckoning in arriving at priorities.
Such considerations lead to the question of how far into the realm of secondary products the CGIAR should venture. Where, for example, does commodity research end and food research begin? In reality, one merges with the other and the balance within any single programme would need to be assessed on a case-by-case basis.
Similarly, questions arise regarding the "categories of activities" which form the basis of TAC's deliberations on priorities. At present, reference to postharvest problems is confined to a sub-activity of cropping systems, which is itself a sub-activity of "production systems development and management". There is no reference to such activities under livestock, fish or forest products. Moreover, only technological problems are mentioned. We discuss this issue further in Section 3.5.
3.3.1. Critical Mass
3.3.2. Socioeconomic and Policy Research
3.3.3. Collaboration with Manufacturers and Advanced Research Organizations
From its inception, the CGIAR has recognized the crucial importance of the concept of critical mass. The creation of the required concentration of effort can take many forms and can be centralised or de-centralised in its structure. For example, a focal point for promoting collaboration among a multiplicity of different organizations might provide the "missing link" to bring together separate research efforts that have previously been too diffuse to achieve major impact. Providing a focal point or "node" for a collaborative research project can not only serve to concentrate the effort, but can also provide a more attractive basis for donor support, or for the involvement of commercial companies which might, otherwise, regard the project as being too risky.
Much of the experience built up within the CGIAR on promoting and catalyzing more effective research collaboration has been related to problems of productivity. With collaborative research related to harvest and postharvest problems the field of potential collaboration is wider and needs to extend in several directions, including socioeconomic research at the level of primary producers and consumers, policy research involving the appropriate government ministries, and technological research in collaboration with advanced research organizations and agro-industries.
In the commodity Centres, socioeconomic research has predominated over policy research and has been used to help in planning technological research and in evaluating the impact of new technology on productivity, equity and the conservation of natural resources. Policy research has focused mainly on the effects of policy interventions on the adoption of new technology. It has included both socioeconomic and policy components. IFPRI focuses more on the analysis of policy impact, to explain or predict the effects of policy reforms on technological change.
The increasing weight given to markets as determinants of technological change, however, sees technology as only one of the policy-related factors affecting the efficiency of postharvest systems. Global trade policies, for example, provide market opportunities for the export of non-traditional goods, such as perishable products, thus creating the need for postharvest technology that extend their shelf life. In contrast, the importation of subsidised or surplus products from developed countries may impede the development of postharvest enterprises in developing countries. Trading barriers to food and timber products stemming from "clean and green" policies put pressure on pest-control and demand more sustainable logging practices. At the national level, the institutional void resulting from structural adjustment policies is affecting the capacity of governments to ensure true "competitive" environments in "free" markets, impeding direct access to producers' secondary products. It may also impede the development of the rural infrastructure needed to facilitate producers' access to urban markets.
The complex relationships linking global and national policies to local postharvest decisions indicate that policy interventions should be considered in the context of the entire production-consumption continuum. Research strategies focusing on loss minimisation through technical efficiency of postharvest processes should then be expanded to a market-oriented strategy designed to increase benefits for producers, processors and consumers alike. Otherwise, the introduction of improved technology could have unintended effects, as happened, for example, when village-based threshing and winnowing machines in West Africa caused the loss of traditional "gleaning" rights for women, who had previously carried out this work manually.
A research strategy is required that incorporates the capacity to analyse the effects of different policies on behaviourial, technological and institutional changes along the chain linking producers to consumers. Such changes are not only important for increasing the incomes of the rural and urban poor, but have wide implications for the well-being of women. In these respects, the Centres are well placed to use their complementary strengths and build on their accumulated experience in socioeconomic research on production systems.
Centre experience of research on agricultural mechanisation provides some useful examples of the ingredients required for successful collaboration with manufacturers. The CGIAR policy on mechanisation was clearly set out in the Second Review of the CGIAR (1988). Although this policy was written primarily in the context of crop cultivation and harvesting, it could equally be applied to other aspects of the production-consumption continuum, where involvement of agro-industry is important. The salient points of the policy are reflected in the following extract.
The Centres "should be alert to developments in new machinery .......... but we do not see a place for major programmes in research and development of new machines within the System. In this we concur with the argument that, historically, the need for the development of new machinery has generally been met by manufacturers. When economic circumstances are favourable for the use of small machines, the inventiveness of a whole range of manufacturers from the village blacksmith to the multinational corporation, is mobilised to respond to the farmer's needs by supplying appropriate machines at competitive prices. We suggest, therefore, that further work on mechanisation by the System should be limited to testing new implements and machinery, including proto-types ............ The development of appropriate machinery should be undertaken primarily in co-operation with manufacturers."
This policy has been largely followed by the Centres, although some have assumed a more active role than others in responding to the perceived needs of the small producer and have interpreted the policy in somewhat different ways. As a consequence, the subject remains controversial. Critics have drawn attention to the failures, usually associated with "technology push", while protagonists have stressed the role that Centres can adopt in providing a point of access for manufacturers and researchers in industrialised countries to meet the needs of small producers in the developing world. IRRI's application of the collaborative approach to the development of rice harvesting machinery provides a good example.
While recognising the role of manufacturers in developing suitable machines for the small producer, IRRI took the view that the resources available to local engineering enterprises were inadequate for them to respond adequately, on their own, to the needs of the small producer. Accordingly, IRRI maintained an engineering section concerned with testing and modifying small machines. It was the presence of this relatively small unit that led eventually to a collaborative project involving the Centre (IRRI), a donor (ODA), an advanced research institute (Silsoe) and a commercial manufacturer (Shelbourne Reynolds Engineering). The output has been a series of machines based on the stripper harvester principle, giving up to a threefold increase in labour productivity and considerable reduction in crop losses, compared with traditional methods.
There seems to be no reason why the ingredients of success in this example should not be applied to other problems involving collaboration with agro-industrial enterprises. What would be required at the Centre might be only a relatively small investment to create a "focal point" which could serve both to identify needs and to act as a catalyst to make the necessary contacts and initiate projects. Careful thought would need to be given to the nature of such nodes and the expertise required to staff them. It might well be that marketing and commercial expertise would be as important as experience in the relevant natural and social sciences. In reality this would simply be an extension of the capabilities that already exist at some of the Centres and could be seen as a move to more comprehensive commodity research programmes that progressively encompass more of the links in the production-consumption chain of activities, and involve broader multidisciplinary teams in their implementation.
3.4.1. A Change of Emphasis
3.4.2. Centre Strategies
3.4.3. Inter-Centre Collaboration
3.4.4. A Systemwide Strategy
Changing the emphasis in CGIAR priorities and strategies from an approach that focuses on "field" production to one that is based on "utilizable" production in a broader context has implications for all elements of the CGIAR System. It implies reviewing the expertise available to TAC and the Centre boards, as well as reconsidering the pattern of staffing at the Centres, themselves.
The change in overall emphasis would also imply strengthening mechanisms throughout the System for identifying those areas where the Centres are best placed to take action, avoiding duplication of the work of others and harnessing the resources of a multiplicity of organizations in collaborative and participatory undertakings. This would imply establishing close linkages not only with the appropriate organizations in developing countries, but also with a range of advanced research organizations, development agencies and industrial companies involved in relevant areas of work.
Within the CGIAR System, we see IFPRI as having a key role, in that the success of any initiatives designed to promote more efficient utilisation of primary products would ultimately depend on international trade- and national development-policies that foster related areas. Maintaining strong links between IFPRI and the other Centres in their responses to the changes of emphasis would be an important implication. For example there would be an increasing need for studies aimed at refining methods of assessing product systems, including the needs of end-users and industrial companies, trade and market requirements, and transport and distribution infrastructure.
The required change of emphasis would apply not only to research projects, but also to the System's role in "fortifying national organizations". It might well affect, for example, the strategies recommended by ISNAR in its advisory capacity to national research systems. Training programmes at the individual Centres might also need modification to capture the revised perspective which, in turn, would imply a need for Centres to harmonise their philosophies in this respect.
Centre responses to the questionnaire (Annex II), as well as our own assessment of their current activities, suggest that strategic differences in their approaches and opinions are largely associated with differences in their mandates. This is to be expected, and indicates that a de-centralised approach is appropriate, with each Centre developing its own strategies for research on harvest and postharvest problems, within a broad framework of support from the CGIAR. Centres will need to review their programmes against a background of the proposed change in emphasis to identify areas that might need changing or strengthening. It is essential that their programmes should be fully responsive to changing patterns of demand for their mandated commodities. In particular, in their work on germplasm enhancement, they will need to ensure that they can fully monitor utilisation characteristics, such as suitability for specific processing methods, quality characteristics and toxicity elements.
While working in collaboration with national organizations to identify areas for strategic research, the Centres could also draw attention to needs in adaptive and applied research. Organising workshops on these topics would be a useful function for Centres, help to foster the desired linkages and expose the needs to a wider audience, including NGOs, development agencies and representatives of trade and industry.
The Centres are in a good position to use their experience with production systems research to promote participatory research with a broader perspective. Likewise the principles evolving from the ecoregional approach might well find applications in a general move towards more comprehensive consideration of the production-consumption continuum. Centres could then determine the most cost-effective ways of generating the necessary critical mass, taking full advantage of opportunities for collaboration with national organizations, specialised institutes and industrial processing companies.
In this respect, the focal point approach adopted by IRRI, in the application of the stripper-harvester principle to the needs of small producers, merits consideration as a general model for collaborative work with the agro-industries. It illustrates one way in which a donor, an advanced research organization and an industrial company can be linked to tackle problems that lie beyond the competence of an individual Centre or national organization. The interest of commercial companies in helping to develop new processes and products would be dependent, however, on their assessment of the risks involved in obtaining a reasonable return from their investment.
The trend towards greater inter-centre collaboration, engendered by changes such as the ecoregional approach and the move towards programme funding, is one that would clearly find application in a more coherent approach to harvest and postharvest research. While some problems are specific to the mandate of a particular Centre, others are not. These wider problems call for collaboration among several Centres as, for example, in the various projects relating to post-production research on root and tuber crops, in which CIP, CIAT, IITA and IFPRI have been involved in various ways and in various combinations. Projects of this type are listed in the Report of the Inter-Centre Review of Root and Tuber Crops (1995) which draws attention to the greater efficiency derived from such collaboration.
Pursuing these ideas, the Report recommends the creation of an Inter-Centre Consultative Committee on Root and Tuber Crops that would sanction a postharvest and marketing group to explore wide collaboration on such problems as the characterisation of starch and flour, food processing technology and market research. This recommendation clearly has merit in the context of root and tuber crops, but it is also relevant to post-production research on other commodities and by other Centres. The question that arises is how to extrapolate from such ideas to create a workable strategy to cover all commodities and all Centres, and to make full use of the experience gained in one region in analyzing the problems of another.
From its beginnings as a loose federation of autonomous institutes, the CGIAR has moved gradually towards harmonising its activities and defining broad programmes to be funded on a Systemwide basis. Against this background, it is tempting to propose more and more co-ordinating committees and an increasing degree of central control. While there is an obvious need for collaborative activities, it has to be kept in mind that some of the most successful work of the CGIAR has been the result of individual Centre initiatives and that the System's reputation for efficiency has depended on a minimum of centralisation and bureaucratic control.
We favour a strategy that facilitates individual Centre initiatives within a broad CGIAR framework that gives greater recognition to the importance of the post production part of the production-consumption continuum. Centres should be encouraged to review their organizational structure and staffing patterns to ensure that, where relevant, there is a focal point for maintaining the broad perspective required, and for formulating and implementing appropriate collaborative research projects.
We see scope for the evolution of working groups, making full use of E-mail communication systems, and developing partnerships and networks. We do not see an urgent need for these activities to be centrally co-ordinated or controlled, but there has to be a mechanism for determining priorities among competing proposals.
In assessing the relative merits of various Centre proposals, TAC would need to build up a set of guidelines in relation to the criteria to be used. Among these, we consider that any proposal should indicate why the particular Centres was best placed to initiate the project; that the results were likely to be of wide applicability, consistent with the goals of the CGIAR; and that full account had been taken of potential contributions from other organizations, and the opportunities for collaboration with them.
Finally, we consider that there is a strong case for raising the profile of harvest and postharvest research through existing mechanisms of internal and external review. External review panels should be asked explicitly to give their views on whether the relevant Centre activities are set in the broad context of a production-consumption continuum and whether the total research effort is structured accordingly.
The CGIAR mission statement focuses on "productivity" as the key element, which is usually interpreted in the narrow sense of ending at harvest. Whether or not the CGIAR decides to invest more resources in solving post-production problems, the present mission statement now appears to have too narrow a connotation, even in the context of current Centre activities. It might be modified as follows (changes in italics):
"Through international research and related activities, and in partnership with national research systems and other organizations, to contribute to sustainable improvements in the exploitation of agriculture, forestry and fisheries in developing countries, from primary production to final utilisation, in ways that enhance nutrition and well-being, especially of low-income people".
Given a change of this type, consequential revisions would be necessary in other parts of the document, as well as to the "categories of activities" used as the basis for determining priorities. Category 1, "increasing productivity" would need to be changed to a more comprehensive term implying that full account is taken of the production-consumption continuum. We have used the term "utilisable production" in this context. Some restructuring within this category and within category 4 "Socioeconomic, Public Policy and Public management research" would also be necessary.
In the language that has evolved within the CGIAR, research activities related to crops, livestock, trees and fish are often lumped as "commodity research", and the Centres directly involved in it, as "the Commodity Centres". Within these terms, "crop research", for example, has been considered as part of "commodity research" even though this is clearly a misnomer in that crops, trees, livestock and fish are living organisms, whereas commodities are traded goods derived from them.
Recurring themes in this study have been that the CGIAR has been involved to a very limited extent in research on traded commodities; that its main contributions have related to the living organisms from which they are derived; and that what is needed in future is a broader perspective that encompasses the whole continuum from the living organism, through the traded commodity to the final product. Only from such a perspective can the deficiencies in research be fully assessed and appropriate steps be taken to ensure that the gaps are filled and opportunities for income generation more fully exploited.
We do not suggest that the CGIAR should immediately or fully accept the burden of responsibility for filling all the gaps, but we do consider that it should move selectively in that direction. It should build on Centre experience and encourage, where appropriate, a more comprehensive approach to commodity research, which takes into account the concept of "utilisable production", gives greater recognition to the need for products that are more closely tailored to changing consumer needs, and also takes into account the inter-relationships between different commodities contributing to similar end uses.
The strategy should ensure that appropriate mechanisms are in place for the Centres to identify harvest and postharvest problems, and to respond to opportunities for their solution through the various combinations of effort we have discussed. We see a need for a diversity of collaborative arrangements from which informal co-ordinating mechanisms could evolve as needed. Ultimately, it might be desirable for more formal mechanisms to be put in place for harmonising activities, especially where several Centres become involved in similar collaborative projects with the same national organizations. We also see a need for a Systemwide strategy for funding projects in harvest and postharvest research and a more explicit responsibility for monitoring and evaluating their efficacy through normal review processes.
Taking into account the need for international research on harvest and postharvest problems, as well as current CGIAR activities in these areas, we recommend that:
- the CGIAR should move towards an approach to the determination of priorities and strategies that gives greater weight to the harvest and postharvest parts of the production-consumption continuum;- the Centres should review, and strengthen where necessary, their internal capacities for identifying needs in harvest and postharvest research, and for assessing the most cost-effective ways of implementing projects;
- in any new approach to harvest and postharvest research, the Centres should take full advantage of opportunities for collaboration with others, such as national organizations, sister CGIAR Centres, advanced research organizations and industrial manufacturing and processing companies;
- a Systemwide programme should be developed from Centre proposals and resources allocated to achieve an appropriate distribution of effort on these problems across all the Centres;
- monitoring and evaluation of harvest and postharvest research should be strengthened through existing mechanisms of internal and external review.
