Developing Technologies for the Rural Poor (Occasional Papers) - Softcover

Biggs, Stephen; Alsop, Ruth

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1853393657 ISBN 13: 9781853393655

Verlag: Practical Action Publishing, 1984

Inhaltsangabe

This selective review looks at case studies where NGOs have been involved in rural/agricultural technology programmes directed at the rural poor, and attempts to identify those common features which characterize the agencies that have met with success. (Published in the ITDG Occasional Paper series).

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Stephen Biggs retired from DEV in 2004 but has continued researching fair trade, rural poverty reduction, rural mechanization, employment and energy policy, and science and technology policy. Most of his research and professional interests have been concerned with rural poverty reduction in Nepal, Bangladesh and India. Currently, he is working with colleagues on rural poverty, mechanization, employment and energy policy in South Asia.

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Developing Technologies for the Rural Poor

By Stephen Biggs, Ruth Grosvenor-Alsop

Practical Action Publishing Ltd

Copyright © 1984 Intermediate Technology Publications
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-85339-365-5

Contents

I. INTRODUCTION, 1, 
II. CROPS, 4, 
III. IRRIGATION, 49, 
IV. POST-HARVEST TECHNOLOGIES, 66, 
V. DRAUGHT ANIMAL TECHNOLOGIES, 91, 
VI. LIVESTOCK, 97, 
VII. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS, 106, 
NOTES, 110, 
BIBLIOGRAPHY, 113, 

CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

This paper is a selective review of case studies of where government and non-government organisations (NGOs) have been involved in rural/agricultural technology programmes specifically directed at benefiting the rural poor. The purpose of the review is to try to identify speciftc institutional features which characterise organisations and agencies which appear to have benefited poor client groups in the short and long run. It is not a 'state-of-the-art' review and does not claim to give a representative coverage of relevant literature. Rather, it is a presentation of case study material aimed at illustrating and supporting what are felt to be the important institutional issues concerning the generation and diffusion of rural/agricultural technology.

The report is structured into five main technology areas, namely: crops, irrigation, post-harvest, draught animal technologies and livestock. Within each of these, case studies are divided into different types of institution, namely: universities and research organisations, government agricultural departments, non-governmental organisations, international development agencies, and the 'informal' sector. In the last category, situations are described where individual local artisans and farmers have, through purposive selection, trial and error, developed useful technologies without the major involvement of a formal agency.

As one might expect, the distinction between types of agencies becomes blurred at the edges. In addition, there is a very real problem of how to characterise and draw lessons from situations where two types of agencies interact. For example, it is open to subjective judgement as to whether the recent development of 'successful' types of on-farm research methods is seen as primarily a result of the inputs of international agricultural research institutes, or mainly as the result of the help and other inputs given to international scientists by local scientists in developing countries. The implications of this type of analysis are important as they can affect where and how funds might be best allocated in the future.

In each case study, the focus is on lessons which relate to important issues. This could not have been done universally across the board because, quite frequently, the required information was not available.

Further, some of the information must be treated with caution, as, understandably, agencies often publish information which portrays themselves in a favourable light. The issues looked at include: the identification of intended poor client groups; the dynamic process by which agencies went about designing, implementing, monitoring and changing activities over time; the short term effects of agency programmes on the intended client groups and on other poor people; and the long term effects on strengthening local poverty focused research and extension capabilities.

The paper is concerned with looking at those programmes where the agency has defined its clients as some group of poor people. These may be poor small farmers, poor rural women, malnourished children, landless labourers, etc. Some agencies call these programmes 'target' group programmes. However, it is preferable to think of 'client' groups rather than 'target' groups. The term 'client' is a more neutral professional term which does not carry with it some of the top-down, elitist connotations sometimes associated with the 'target' approach. For example, when an agency is targeting resources at the poor there is often an implicit assertion that 'we' know what your problems are, and now we are delivering the solution.

As so many poverty programmes have missed their 'target' it is clear that agencies should be less confident that they are able to correctly diagnose the problems of the poor and effectively deliver the goods and services needed.

This is more than just a matter of semantics. It reflects a whole way of thinking about technology generation and diffusion. The conclusions that project staff drew at the end of the first year of the Caqueza Project illustrate a change from a target approach to a more humble client approach:

... field work and the increased contact with farmers allowed the project staff to identify several unforeseen areas of activity that, if neglected, appeared likely to substantially limit the project's progress. Given these circumstances, they requested a substantial increase in staff for 1972. The old extension approach that considered the communication of the new technology to farmers as the only activity required was being forgotten and being replaced by the idea that more had to be known about the farmers' present production system before anything could be done about changing it. But agronomic knowledge alone was not enough; socio-economic knowledge was required as well. This was a year of observing the requirements for rural development to occur. The project staff began to comprehend that no surefire methodology existed, and that a long process of trial and error lay ahead of them.

Sections II to VI of the paper contain the case studies by major technology area. Each case study ends with a summary of the major issues raised. General conclusions derived from the review are presented in Section VII.

CHAPTER 2

CROPS

A. UNIVERSITIES AND RESEARCH ORGANISATIONS

1. CIMMYT (International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre), Mexico and Kenya.

Kenya's 4th Five-Year Development Plan contains the observation that:

Research must be of increasing relevance to the farmer's situation. This includes not only the physical environment that confronts him, but also the socio-economic setting of his farm activities.

This statement reflects the concern that CIMMYT had expressed three years earlier when they made their commitment with the Kenyan Agricultural Research Services to Farming Systems Research (FSR). Although not restricted to poor small farmer situations, applications of FSR had been applied primarily to the problems of small farmers. Briefly, the FSR perspective is one that embodies the following characteristics:

(1) Farming systems research views the farm or production unit and the rural household or consumption unit – which in the case of small farmers are often synonymous – in a comprehensive manner. FSR also recognises the interdependencies and inter-relationships between the natural and human environments. The research process devotes explicit attention to the goals of the whole farm/rural household and the constraints on the achievement of these goals.

(2) Priorities for research reflect the holistic perspective of the whole farm/rural household and the natural and human environments.

(3) Research on a sub-system can be considered part of the FSR process if the connections with other sub-systems arc recognised and accounted for.

(4) Farming systems research is evaluated in terms of individual sub-systems and the farming system as a whole.

CIMMYT is thus concerned with the development of a technology (a combination of all management practices for producing or...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Practical Action Publishing
• Erscheinungsdatum: 1984
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 1853393657
• ISBN 13: 9781853393655
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 128
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: preigu; mail@preigu.de; ; Lengericher Landstr. 19; Osnabrück; 49078; Deutschland