N2+Innovation+platforms+discussion+11+May+2011


 * Innovation Platforms**

Alan, Kees, Josie; 11 May 2011

Early on explore NRM issues farmers want to address and market aspects

Initial meeting for Diga and Fogera needs to be organized soon. First strategy could be for Alemayehu to do some initial awareness raising with letters.

Invites to major actors (e.g. those listed in Fogera presentation) plus kebele administrator from each of 5 target woredas. First meeting might be half a day and would focus on setting the scene and assessing enthusiasm. Zelalem and Alemayehu could make initial visit to visit the actors and distribute invitations. Resource-wise we could set up a "Challenge Fund" of 10 k USD per site which action sub-groups could bid for. Would need to have evaluation group - could draw on experience from Prolinnova. Kees to ask Anton Krone and Alan to ask Ann Waters-Bayer. Could apply for funds from Boru's Innovation Fund. Alan to find out about procedure for applying. Could wait until we have discussed at Fogera before applying. Could also think about CRS as funding sources. Could invite SLM people in Fogera to IP meeting.

Need to work out how we connect platform with communities. Could be through FREGs. If they do not exist in target woredas we could ask ARARI to establish them.

Need to think about research questions about the process. Also need to plan simple M&E strategy. Kees is developing something more related to value chains and will share a draft. Could do some social network analysis.

Agenda for initial meetings
Introduction of participants

Introduction to NBDC

Introduction to the platform
 * envisage a dual focus on markets and NRM
 * example of what happened in other platforms e.g. FAP.

Ask for feedback on expectations - why have they come? What do they hope to get out of it?

Some presentation of key issues emerging from baseline.

Joint development of ToR - mandate, role of different actors. Facilitation may start with us but eventually be passed on. What are the big issues that the platform could tackle?

Set date for next meeting.

Follow up meeting with Alemayehu Belay and Zelalem Lema - 17/5/11
Alan met with Alemayehu and Zelalem to plan next steps in getting innovation platforms up and running. Zelalem and Alemayehu will plan to make a visit to sites week beginning June 6 to informally meet with potential platform members, discuss what we are thinking and invite them to a "road-paving" meeting during week of June 21st. Alan might be able to join for this visit (and maybe Eva?). We discussed on how best to ensure community representation and agreed that during the visit, elders from each of our focal kebeles (5 per woreda) would be identified and invited. Alan agreed to produce a one-page glossy outlining what IP's are about (along lines of Ripple one on LPA's). The following next steps were agreed:


 * Alan to produce one-pager on IP's for Alemayehu and Zelalem to take with them
 * Alemayehu to draft invitation letter
 * Alemayehu and Zelalem to agree on logistics and decide on initial actor list including some Zonal representation e.g. our existing research partners.

Extract from e-mail from Ann Waters-Bayer about "innovation funds"
About innovation funds, there are plenty of initiatives underway. The Local Innovation Support Funds (LISFs) that we are piloting are managed primarily - in some cases, exclusively - by farmer groups. You can find more under [] An early piece outlining the concept is under [] We did a lit review of experiences before starting the pilot; that came out as a Working Paper in 2005 and is on the Prolinnova website under "Piloting LISFs"and under "Resources / Prolinnova publications".

You can also find a presentation at ISDA last year about LISFs under [] The paper is under []

Esbern Friis-Hansen from Denmark did a review of innovation funds in early days of ours (2007); that can be found under []

We are just now compiling the latest experiences after holding a writeshop on LISFs in late March of this year in Morogro. I am also currently involved in a project with Wageningen University (on behalf of AusAid and DFID) to assess experiences with innovation funds of various types. Some of the farmer-based funds are more for farm investment, some more for farmer-led research (the LISF is primarily for the latter). I have the impression that you are referring to the former (resourcing small pilot interventions). These can also become the latter if they are deliberately regarded as experiments, as sources of wider learning in the farming community and beyond; i.e. the outputs in terms of knowledge are public goods. In some of our LISFs, the farmer groups - looking to issues of sustainability of the fund - have differentiated between "experiments" or "investigations", from which the farmers "pay back" in terms of new knowledge (about what works and what doesn't work or what they found out in the investigation, e.g. about marketing channels) and "investment", in which case they regard the fund as a loan, and the farmers pay back in cash, as the benefit is private.

In Ethiopia, the RCBP has been playing around with farmer innovation funds for years; Prolinnova-Ethiopia has been trying to convince them to use the LISF approach but I don't actually know how successful they were. Amanuel Assefa from ASE (whom you know) and Yohannes GebreMichael from Addis Ababa University (do you also know him?) are both "livestock people" who have experience with the LISFs, so you could also tap their knowledge. If you need contact details, let me know.

We would be very interested to hear how your local innovation platforms and innovation funds develop. A particularly tricky issue is: who decides on the use of the funds? who has the greater power? Thus far, decisions over use of research / innovation funding have usually been made by bodies in which farmers are in the minority, if they are there at all.