Transforming Institutions to Achieve Innovation in Research and Development1

Agricultural researchers around the globe are taking on complex, multi-faceted environmental and livelihood challenges. In doing so, they are searching for, testing and proposing a number of methods and approaches that depart from those normally used in traditional agricultural research. There are several driving forces behind this evolution: a growing dissatisfaction of governments and donors in the limited impact from substantial investment that has been made in agricultural research; a heightened pressure to deliver and to show that farmers are using the technologies that have been “on the shelf”; and an awareness that technologies and other research products need supportive conditions, coupled with local innovation and incentives, to enhance adoption. There is also a growing realization by researchers and NRM practitioners that technologies in themselves are not a panacea to address NRM issues, but need to go hand-in-hand with supportive social, institutional, economic and policy arrangements. It is hoped that Participatory Research and Gender Analysis (PRGA) approaches promoted by the CGIAR will help to address these sorts of concerns. Following a brief introduction, the paper summarizes key elements and conditions to consider when fostering institutional change. The paper concludes with a discussion of progress and future challenges to sustaining institutional change in eastern African agricultural research institutes.