Over the course of its history, CIMMYT can look back at outstanding achievements and tremendous impact, and since the period of the last EPMR the Centre has continued this successful record. Nevertheless, this is no time for complacency. Over the next 30 years, the population of developing countries will continue to grow at a rate of 1.6% per year and the expected income growth will further increase the demand for maize and wheat. Overall, the demand for wheat and maize is expected to grow at an annual rate of 2.2% over the next 30 years. By the year 2020, 67% of the world's wheat consumption and 55% of the world's maize consumption will occur in developing countries. Projections indicate that they will need to import about 122 million metric tonnes of wheat and 41 million metric tonnes of maize annually. Moreover, nearly all the necessary increases in maize and wheat production in the developing world will have to emanate from increased yields since, with the exception of very few countries, the opportunities to increase the area under cultivation are limited. Agricultural research must continue to play a critical role in developing new technology to further increase the productivity of maize and wheat cropping. CIMMYT will have to maintain its pivotal part in this process.
CIMMYT is to be congratulated on the significant shift it has made from the strongly entrenched organization of its work by programmes towards a matrix management of multidisciplinary projects. Its dominant challenge for the future is in deciding how to proceed beyond the interim stage of development that the present formative structure of projects represents. The Panel was unable to assess CIMMYT's vision of the end-point of this process because it has not yet been articulated. The challenge identified will require further major adjustments in CIMMYT's culture and ethos, and in the way that CIMMYT projects its image to the outside world. These adjustments will require further evolution of CIMMYT's management of people, finance and information.
A major external factor affecting this consideration is the fundamental change in the nature of donor funding within the CGIAR System. There appears to be an inescapable trend towards a reduction in the relative proportion of unrestricted core funds (which have traditionally provided CIMMYT and other IARCs with flexibility in the management of their budget) and a corresponding increase in restricted and special project funding. Considerable skill will be required to sustain financial security without distorting the mission and the work programmes designed to achieve it. In the Panel's opinion, a move towards full project costing of all projects is overdue.
The image which CIMMYT has traditionally presented to the outside world and especially to its major stakeholders, the NARS, is that of a centre based on the improvement, in the broad sense, of two important commodities, wheat and maize. The challenge for CIMMYT is to reassure its partners that the internal changes in its management culture should in no way detract from its capability to deliver the same impact as in the past. CIMMYT's partners will continue to need recognizable points of contact at the Centre.
It may be anticipated that CIMMYT will move further upstream in the nature of the scientific research that it conducts and in providing more specialized training. CIMMYT will therefore need to consider how to do this without jeopardizing the situation of the "weaker" NARS. CIMMYT will need to decide how to assist the flow of technology from the stronger to the weaker NARS through networking or other means.
CIMMYT has already moved substantially into research in biotechnology and will increasingly, in seeking to exploit the fruits of this research, find itself confronted by problems of IPR, confidentiality and exclusivity, formerly considered anathema in the CGIAR System. The clock will not be turned back and CIMMYT will need to press on with vigour to formulate its own policy to deal with this situation while at the same time conforming to broad CGIAR guidelines. CIMMYT will also need to review how the adoption of new technology would internally affect the conduct of its traditional operations in the commodity programmes, in terms of efficiency and cost-effectiveness.
Finally, CIMMYT will need to devise a means of fostering its emerging programmes, such as NRG, within relatively flat budget projections for the foreseeable future. Above all, CIMMYT faces the challenge of maintaining the vigour, quality and relevance of its research in a changing world. The Panel believes that CIMMYT will rise to this challenge.
