Bio-Innovate’s next steps: Bio-Incubate, Bio-Communicate…

Posted on 4 Mar 2013 by Ewen Le Borgne • Leave a comment

The first Bio Innovate regional scientific conference (25-27 February 2013) ended last week with a focus on next steps and ‘big actions’ to come. On the last day, participants worked on three different strands: Crop productivity improvement and climate change adaptation Environmental management technologies Innovation incubation and value addition. The groups pondered bottlenecks in the enabling … Continue reading →

Africa / Animal Production / Asia / Drylands / DRYLANDSCRP / Event / Goats / ILRI / India / Innovation Systems / Knowledge and Information / Livestock / Mozambique / South Asia / Southern Africa

Innovation platforms: Documenting experiences from the imGoats project and beyond

Posted on 10 Jul 2012 by Ewen Le Borgne • 1 Comment

Innovation platforms are a complex and some would say a not-so-straightforward approach. Nevertheless, ILRI, other CGIAR centers and other partners are using this approach in various projects such as the Nile Basin Development Challenge, IMGoats and the recently-completed Fodder Adoption and Fodder Innovation projects. What are innovation platforms exactly? This poster gives some ideas. … Continue reading →

Africa / Agriculture / Books and chapters / Innovation Systems / Research

Agricultural innovation platforms – reaching out to more stakeholders

Posted on 20 Apr 2012 by Peter Ballantyne (ILRI) • Leave a comment

“By joining forces in innovation platforms, stakeholders can generate innovation by combining their indigenous knowledge, business interests and organisational skills” – Monty Jones of the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa introduces a new book by the Royal Tropical Institute ‘Putting heads together: Agricultural Innovation platforms in practice.’ “This book is based on the premise … Continue reading →

Africa / Agriculture / East Africa / Ethiopia / Film and video / ILRI / Innovation Systems / IPMS / Markets / Value Chains

An innovation story: Irrigated banana value chain development in Ethiopia

Posted on 17 Feb 2012 by Zerihun Sewunet • Leave a comment

This innovation story narrates the experience of the Improving Productivity and Market Success (IPMS) project on innovative banana value chain development in Ethiopia. The project introduced banana production systems in the district for the first time in 2005. IPMS together with the stakeholders provided support along the banana value chain on production, input supply and … Continue reading →

Africa / Agriculture / Animal Production / Animal Products / Botswana / Cattle / Dairying / East Africa / Innovation Systems / Kenya / Livestock / Report / Southern Africa / Uganda / Value Chains

Multi-stakeholder innovation in Africa: Dairy and beef cases feature in new report from FARA

Posted on 6 Feb 2012 by Peter Ballantyne (ILRI) • Leave a comment

The Forum on Agricultural Research in Africa just published a new report on agricultural innovation in sub-Saharan Africa: experiences from multiple-stakeholder approaches. The report draws together case experiences across Africa with an ‘integrated agriculture research for development (IAR4D) approach’ that brings together multiple actors along a commodity value chain to address challenges and identify opportunities … Continue reading →

Africa / Agriculture / Capacity Strengthening / East Africa / Ethiopia / ILRI / Innovation Systems / IPMS / Knowledge and Information / Markets

Increasing capacity for knowledge-based smallholder agriculture in Ethiopia

Posted on 26 Jan 2012 by Abenet Yabowork • Leave a comment

This working paper by Tesfaye Lemma Tefera, Azage Tegegne and Dirk Hoekstra of the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), on Capacity for knowledge-based smallholder agriculture in Ethiopia: Linking graduate programs to market-oriented agricultural development: Challenges, opportunities and IPMS experience was released by ILRI in January 2012. Graduate programs in agriculture and allied disciplines in Ethiopia are expected … Continue reading →

Agriculture / Innovation Systems / Research

Agriculture innovation systems: An investment sourcebook

Posted on 21 Nov 2011 by Peter Ballantyne (ILRI) • 2 Comments

The long-awaited agriculture innovation systems sourcebook has been published by the World Bank (view part 1 and part 2). According to some pre-materials, “the agricultural innovation system (AIS) approach has evolved from a concept into an entire subdiscipline, with principles of analysis and action, yet no detailed blueprint exists for making agricultural innovation happen at … Continue reading →

Animal Production / Consumption / Food Safety / Food Security / ILRI / Innovation Systems / Intensification / Livelihoods / Livestock / Markets / PIM / Policy / Report / Research / Trade / Value Chains

Livestock market opportunities for the poor: Smallholders can be competitive

Posted on 13 Nov 2011 by ILRI Communications • Leave a comment

For the November 2011 ‘liveSTOCK Exchange’ event at ILRI, Steve Staal, Derek Baker, Karl Rich, Ayele Gelan, Acho Okike, Delia Grace, Mohammad Jabbar, Mohamadou Fadiga, Ranjitha Puskur, Lucy Lapar, Berhanu Gebremedhin, Amos Omore and Francis Wanyoike prepared a series of issue briefs on smallholder livestock producers, consumers, and development … View a presentation to the … Continue reading →

Africa / Animal Feeding / Ethiopia / ILRI / Innovation Systems / Livestock / Livestock Systems / Project / Report / Research

Ten lessons on multi-stakeholder networks and innovation platforms

Posted on 1 Nov 2011 by ILRI Communications • 2 Comments

For the November 2011 ‘liveSTOCK Exchange’ event at ILRI, Keith Sones and Alan Duncan prepared an issue brief with lessons on ways to establish and facilitate multi-stakeholder networks on smallholder agriculture in developing countries. … Between 2007 and 2010, the Fodder Adoption Project (FAP) – funded by the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and … Continue reading →

Animal Feeding / Ethiopia / Fodder / Forages / ILRI / Innovation Systems / Livestock / Value Chains / Vietnam

Fodder adoption to enhance the livelihoods of poor livestock keepers: Lessons from a three-country study

Posted on 29 Sep 2011 by Peter Ballantyne (ILRI) • Leave a comment

Feed scarcity in smallholder systems is a key constraint to improved livestock production in developing countries. However, development efforts which have taken a narrow technology-focused approach to dealing with feed scarcity have had limited success. The IFAD-supported ‘Fodder Adoption Project’ ran between 2007 and 2010 and aimed to address issues around inadequate livestock fodder at … Continue reading →