Farmer-to-Farmer for Agriculture Education and Training
Country F2F Project Description:
Guinea Informal Agriculture Education and Training
Implemented by Winrock International
Submitted to USAID
December 19, 2013
Farmer-to-Farmer for Agriculture Education and Training (FY14-FY18)
1. Objective
The objective of the Guinea Informal AET Country F2F Project is to strengthen AET delivery by informal AET institutions by building the capacity of cooperatives, NGOs, and private sector entities to recognize the importance of, and mobilize resources for, AET to clients, members, and employees.
2. General description of sub-sector targeted for assistance and rationale
Winrock International proposes a demand-driven Country F2F Project to strengthen AET delivery by informal AET institution (cooperatives, NGOs, and private sector entities) to improve the skills, knowledge, and productivity of at least 770 (35% of which will be youth) AET delivery professionals in Guinea, who in turn have the anticipated spread effect of reaching up to 1,600 farmers and entrepreneurs during the life of the project, with countless indirect beneficiaries (farmers and entrepreneurs) that are key agents for adopting new technologies disseminated by informal AET institutions.
Fifty years of repressive governance has made Guinea one of the poorest countries in the world in a region facing chronic and severe malnutrition. Guinea has also been called a “geological scandal” as it has vast mineral wealth and the most productive agriculture potential in West Africa (next to Nigeria), supported by substantial water and forest resources - seven major rivers in West Africa have their source in Guinea and 15% of Guinea is under forest cover. At Independence, Guinea was a food exporter. Today, it imports approximately 300,000 MT (estimated at a third of consumption) of rice, the major staple crop, each year. With a newly elected government, the first democratically elected president in Guinea’s history, and strong civil society engagement and enthusiasm for reform and development, Guinea has an unprecedented opportunity to seize transformative development opportunities.
The latest Poverty Assessment estimates that 35% of Guineans regularly have a problem feeding themselves, and that the typical poor household spends 19% of its income on rice alone. Agricultural growth is a priority strategy of the Government of Guinea (GOG) for reducing poverty and food insecurity. To transform the stagnant and fragmented agricultural sector into a poverty reduction driver, Guinea must address fundamental constraints: the insufficient distribution of existing technologies, improved seeds, fertilizer, and animal health supplies; significant environmental degradation in the absence of modern land management methods; and lack of market linkages and private sector investment in value chain upgrades. Furthermore, the limited investment in agriculture education, training, and research (AET) has left Guinea ill prepared to respond effectively to evolving market demands of the agricultural economy and an ageing population of AET professionals.
However, with up to 400 billion m3 of rainfall a year, 6.2 million ha of arable land, 364,000 ha of irrigable land, levels of sunshine that allows the production of several crops throughout the year, 300 km of Atlantic coastline, an abundance of fishery resources, as well as a climate suited to the production of livestock, Guinea is well-positioned to be the breadbasket of West Africa.
Guinea’s National Investment Plan for Agriculture and Food Security 2012-12016 (PNIASA) serves as Guinea’s Comprehensive African Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) Country Investment Plan to focus limited public sector resources to increased agriculture sector growth. The PNIASA targets value chains for rice, cotton, coffee, mango, palm oil, cashews, rubber, pineapple, horticulture, fishing, animal husbandry, meat and eggs and provides modest discussion and goals for strengthening farmer and entrepreneur-level technology transfer and training. F2F for AET will help Guinea’s informal AET institutions to contribute to the national vision for agricultural growth, with focused attention on strengthening the linkages between technology developers, technology disseminators, and technology adopters in order to realize a comprehensive and inclusive Agriculture Innovation System (AIS) that effectively creates circular linkages that allow for technology development based on feedback and input from technology adopters.
The Informal AET Country Project targets improvements in training for the base of the Technical Education Pyramid[1] (farmers and entrepreneurs that adopt technologies). With the complementarity by the Formal AET Country Project (technicians who disseminate technologies) and the USAID/Winrock AEMIP (university graduates who develop technologies) the AET system in Guinea can correct the historical investment imbalances within the pyramid, and realize the vision of cooperation within pyramid levels to reinforce the upward and downward linkages for market-driven, gender-responsive, and climate-smart agriculture technology uptake as an AIS. Furthermore, the Informal AET Country Project will upgrade the qualifications and interest of a new generation of agriculture professionals to overcome current entrance requirement barriers to accessing formal AET, thus improving the pipeline of future formal AET enrollees.
At the policy and institutional level, the role of informal AET is nominally recognized in Guinea, and structural linkages to formal AET institutions are theoretically mandated (though not yet realized). In terms of quality of skills transfer, engagement of multiple stakeholders, and dissemination and adoption of technologies, in many respects informal AET institutions are organizationally and developmentally ahead of the formal AET institutions. F2F for AET will build on the competitive advantages of informal institutions to deliver AET and support the adoption of new technologies at the farm level, while facilitating the emergence of functional and productive relationships with formal AET institutions.
3. Description of the key problems/constraints to be addressed or opportunities to be exploited
During the development of the F2F for AET full proposal and rapid assessment subsequent to award, Winrock staff contacted several organizations affiliated with AET across Guinea, from federations to cooperatives, to identify the biggest constraints, unmet needs, and how the system functions and who does what. We also met with other key stakeholders to identify areas to complement and leverage each other’s work to multiply impacts. Some key problems were identified during these discussions. These included the following:
Member relations. Challenges: The cascading structure of federations/unions/farmer groups/farmers has resulted in federations not offering comprehensive or most appropriate services to their union members, and the services offered are not well-articulated and not delivered at the appropriate times in agriculture calendars. In return (and perhaps because of this weak service delivery), organizational members (and their individual farmer members) do not pay their dues regularly.
Opportunities: The federation of unions’ structure of agricultural organizations in Guinea offers significant potential to impact farmers and entrepreneurs at scale by strengthening training and technology dissemination. Federations surveyed claim membership of hundreds of unions, who in turn reach tens of thousands of farmers. F2F for AET will support federations to improve their services to union members and take full advantage of the cascading model.
Institutional governance. Challenges: While statutes and bylaws generally exist, they are not universally understood by members or enforced. While governance structures (boards and executive committees) are in place, they are not effectively engaged in key issues, such as advocacy and external relations, and in some cases are not active (rarely meet or have unclear governance mandates).
Opportunities: F2F for AET will first strengthen the execution of existing statutes, bylaws, governance structures and mandates in place to minimize the disruptions caused by organizational restructuring. Volunteers will provide support in organizational governance system execution that will help federations to build the evidence base for the effectiveness of existing governance systems, and provide indications for longer-term governance reforms needed to maximize federations’ impact on farmers and entrepreneurs.
Service delivery. Challenges: A framework and system for cascading service delivery (including training and technology transfer, input supply and access, credit, etc.) is lacking. As mentioned above, key services in advocacy and external relationships are weak or non-existent. Generally, service packages are not strategically comprehensive or bundled, or delivered at appropriate times, to have the desired and possible effect on farmers. The organizations surveyed also indicated that they are currently unequipped to deliver training and services that relate to climate change adaptation.
Opportunities: Theoretically, actors understand the services needed by member organizations and farmers, and are delivering them with constrained resources and in the absence of efficient delivery mechanisms. F2F for AET volunteers can support informal AET institutions to leverage resources for increased and improved service delivery through public private partnership (PPP) development and strengthened linkages to formal AET institutions. PPP development will focus particularly on the weakest aspects of services currently – credit mechanisms and business development services. Volunteers will also support organizations to establish service delivery protocols, mechanisms, monitoring procedures, and comprehensive yet customizable service, input and training packages for both organizational members (unions) as well as farmers themselves.
Training facilities and human resource capacities. Challenges: Current training programs of informal AET institutions are not appropriately segmented, in terms of the roles and technical capacities, between organizations that are federations of other organizations and those organizations that provide direct services to farmers. Training infrastructure and facilities are not systemic, with wide disparities among organizations in terms of venues, training materials, equipment, transport, and demonstration facilities.
Opportunities: By segmenting training roles along the cascading structure, training capacities can be deepened and strengthened for each level organizationally as well as allow for trainer specialization. F2F for AET volunteers will support informal AET hosts to review training needs of each level of the institutional pyramid structure, and develop capacities that match those needs. For example, at the federation level, volunteer TOT will focus on developing a cadre of trainers specializing in organizational development and governance, membership management, advocacy and external relations, and public private partnership development for training that will be delivered to organizational members. At the member organization level, TOT will focus on technical service delivery, training management and monitoring, and technical content training in key value chains, climate smart agriculture, enterprise development, and gender. F2F for AET linkages to formal AET institutions through the formal AET country project as well as AEMIP and its support of the AET Stakeholder Group will provide significant opportunities to leverage training facilities and equipment, as well as utilize the expertise of formal AET students and faculty as content specialists (and in turn, those students and faculty get more practical and experiential learning experiences by placement in informal institutions through internships and consulting opportunities.) Volunteers will also support informal AET institutions to collaborate with government and formal AET institutions to legitimize and codify the training they deliver, as credential-building achievements of farmer trainees that will improve their ability to access entry into formal AET institutions.
4. Proposed F2F activities
a. How will volunteers be used?
During the five-year program, 35 volunteers will strengthen informal AET institutions to improve their service delivery to members. Winrock will focus on those areas best served by volunteer technical assistance: technical training and technology transfer, organizational development, business/enterprise development, financial model development for farmers and financial institutions, and the capacity to identify, negotiate, implement, and monitor public-private partnerships (PPPs).
F2F volunteers will:
· Conduct a labor market survey for AET graduates, and build AET institutional capacity for conducting such surveys in the future.
· Conduct an assessment of PPP opportunities for AET, and build AET institutional capacity for conducting such assessments in the future.
· Support hosts in training package content development and TOT (particularly on climate smart agriculture, enterprise development, gender, organizational development and governance), in the key value chains informal AET institutions are focusing on (including poultry, small ruminants, agroforestry, aquaculture, agriculture processing, and horticulture).
· Support hosts to develop complementary service packages and delivery mechanisms that will facilitate farmers to adopt technologies and apply new skills acquired through training (including credit, business development services, development of farm- and enterprise-level production cost and profit models).
· Strengthen linkages and support the emergence of beneficial partnerships with external stakeholders (ISAVF and IRAG, the public extension system, peer institutions, secondary education institutions, sub-national, national and regional private and civil society sectors) for the purpose of improved effectiveness in technology dissemination, increased relevance of curriculum, and human, financial and material resources for AET.
· Strengthen hosts human resource management, financial management, and governance capacities to improve member service delivery and member responsiveness.
· Help design training programs that target illiterate farmers, women and youth.
· Support the development of training delivery protocols, mechanisms, monitoring procedures, as well as mobilizing stakeholder support for formalizing the credentials and skills gained by farmers through training programs to increase qualifications for formal sector employment and formal AET access.
(See F2F for AET Year 1 Work Plan, for specific volunteer activities proposed for the first year. Priorities for volunteer assignments in subsequent years will be based on ongoing analyses, consultation with stakeholders, and the annual work planning process).
b. What are the key country partners (if any) and their roles
Country partners—including donors and their implementing partners, public education institutions, public technical agencies, and private agribusinesses—will support assessment and planning, in-country volunteer support, and replication/spread effect of F2F assignments. Partners will also provide complementary support, such as linking hosts with broader AET networks and PPP development. Anticipated partners include the Network of Agricultural Actors and Rural Formations in Guinea (RUFARGUI), UNDP, World Bank, UNICEF, ISAVF, IRAG, MEETFP and the Ministries of Agriculture, Livestock, and Aquaculture.
The AET Stakeholder Group, currently being established by AEMIP, will serve as a coordinating body for F2F for AET efforts.
c. What are likely to be target hosts
Over the five-year program, F2F will work with fourteen informal AET institutions in Guinea.
Winrock has identified two hosts for whom to launch support in Year 1, based on their broad membership of unions and community-level farmer organizations and articulated desire to engage in climate change adaptation activities, to take strategic advantage presented by the AEMIP project’s implementation of its Global Climate Change (GCC) Integration Pilot activity in 2014-2015. AEMIP’s GCC Integration Pilot is focused on strengthening the role of ISAVF in developing farmer-level climate smart technologies and solutions. The Pilot will support formal AET faculty and students to work directly with farmer organizations through a grants program, to implement pilot field-level activities testing climate smart technologies and solutions. This presents an excellent opportunity to demonstrate and model the benefits of stronger collaboration between formal and informal AET institutions. The two hosts identified for this support are the Confederation of National Farmer Organizations in Guinea (CNOP/G), and the Federation of Farmers’ Organizations of Lower Guinea.