Transcript Document

ILRI
International Livestock Research Institute
Livestock Farmer Field Schools (FFS)
Integrated Livestock Management
Bruno Minjauw, Gertrude Buyu & Dannie Romney
[email protected]
A different research
approach
Livestock FFS project
Farmer Field Schools
Information dissemination
Knowledge generation
Participatory data collection
The farmers, the extension
officers and researchers are
all stakeholders, participating
from the initiation of the
research
The FFS approach was developed
by FAO in South East Asia in
the late 80’s for small-scale rice
farmers to investigate and learn
for themselves the skills
required for, and the benefits to
be obtained from, adopting
integrated pest management
(IPM) practices in their paddy
fields.
• 3 year project funded by
DFID-AHP and FAO
During the 1990’s an estimated
2 million farmers were trained in
South and South East Asia
(Pontius et al., 2000).
• Twenty-four livestock FFS
with similar characteristics and
interests in dairy production
were established in five
different agro-ecological zones
in Central, Rift Valley and
Coastal Provinces of Kenya
• Under the umbrella of the
Smallholder Dairy Project
(MoA/KARI/ILRI).
• Objective: Test and adapt the
FFS methodology for livestock
purposes taking the smallholder
dairy production system as an
example.
In Africa, FAO is currently
working in over a dozen
countries from Senegal to South
Africa (Simpson & Owens, 2002).
(Lovell et al., 2002)
FFS Objectives
FFS Methodology
FFS Techniques
Participatory Epidemiology
FFS Principles
To enhance farmer’s capacity to
analyse their production systems
and to identify their main
constraints
FFS are based on an innovative,
participatory and interactive
learning approach in which
farmers are empowered to
direct the learning process
Focus groups of 25-35 farmers
with common interests
Weekly meetings of 3-4 hours
A grant or loan of 600 USD to
finance their activities and the
facilitation costs
Agro-ecological analysis (AESA)
Systematic observation
Problem identification
Introduction of recording
systems & analyses of change
Participatory epidemiology is based
on participatory techniques for the
harvesting of qualitative
epidemiological data contained
within community observations,
existing veterinary knowledge and
traditional oral history
What is relevant and meaningful is
decided by the learner and must
be discovered by the learner
Participatory epidemiology techniques
integrated in the training of
trainer course
Learning is an evolutionary process
with open communication,
confrontation, acceptance, respect
and the right to makes mistakes
To test possible solutions suitable
to their farming systems using
comparative experiments
Build on existing knowledge enabling
farmers to adapt and/or adopt
existing or new technologies, so
that they become more
responsive to changing conditions
and take advantage of emerging
opportunities
Participatory Technology Development (PTD)
Design comparative studies to
test possible solutions or available
technologies
Special topics
Ensure demand led information
dissemination
Opportunities for non-livestock related
issues
Increase awareness of disease
prevalence
Better understanding of the
farmer’s perception of disease risk
Learning is a consequence of
experience
Cooperative approaches are enabling
Each person’s experience of reality is
unique
Lessons learned and outcomes
New Scientific collaborations
Next research questions
• Better understanding of the modalities of the
FFS methodology and livestock extension policies
• Hands on experience in creating an environment
where the poor are able to test and adapt
technologies, with opportunities to feed back to
researchers
• Recognition of ILRI as an actor in developing
extension methodologies
• International Trypanotolerant Centre,
The Gambia
• Institut Sénégalais de recherches agricoles
(ISRA), Sénégal
• Ministère de l’Agriculture et de L’ élevage, Benin
• Dept. Vet. Parasit., Makerere University, Uganda
• Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Dept. of
Animal Health and Welfare, Denmark
Adoption of the livestock methodology
Recognition as a relevant partner
• What are the pros and cons of the FFS
methodology in comparison with other extension
approaches?
•What are the policy and institutional parameters
needed for successful implementation of FFS?
•What are the minimum monitoring and evaluation
techniques needed to improve the FFS?
•How can we improve the sustainability of the FFS
by testing alternative funding approaches?
•Are FFS suitable network for epidemiosurveillance or market information dissemination?
•What are the impacts of FFS on livelihoods in the
short, medium and long term?
• Kenyan Development Dairy Project: Land O’
Lakes funded by USAID
• Special programme for Food Security (FAO) in
Lesotho and Swaziland
• Farming In Tsetse Control Area (FITCA)
projects (Uganda ,Kenya and Tanzania)
• CABI (Swiss grant project): Community Based
Sustainable Resource Management Project in
Pakistan
• Network for Smallholder Poultry Development,
DANIDA
• VETAID:'Mitigating the Effects of HIV/AIDS
on Food Security and Agriculture in Eastern and
Southern Africa‘, November 2003, Mozambique
Additional roles of ILRI
• Agricultural Support Programme (ASP) Kenya,
DANIDA. “Working participatory – not a change of
methods but of attitude”, January 2004, Kenya
Building capacity, research support and technical
backstopping to enable partners to test and adapt
the FFS methodology to their environment
Acknowledgements: All colleagues from the Ministry of Agriculture, ILRI, DFID-AHP and FAO and Dr Nancy McCarthy from IFPRI.