INTRODUCTORY WORKSHOP: PROLINNOVA SOUTH AFRICA, PARTICIPATORY INNOVATION DEVELOPMENT AND FARMER-LED DOCUMENTATION
MAFIKENG
4-5 AUGUST 2008
PROCEEDINGS OF THE WORKSHOP
Facilitated by:
Brigid Letty (Institute of Natural Resources),
Tebogo Serapelwane (Agricultural Research Council)
Michael Malinga (University of KwaZulu-Natal)
Norman Thebe (North West Department of Agriculture)
& Ineke Vorster (Agricultural Research Council)
4 SEPTEMBER 2008
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1 BACKGROUND 2
2 VENUE AND PARTICIPANTS 2
3 SUMMARY OF THE WORKSHOP ACTIVITIES 3
SUNDAY 3 AUGUST 2008 3
MONDAY 4 AUGUST 2008 3
TUESDAY 5 AUGUST 2008 8
4 Outcomes of the workshop 10
1 BACKGROUND
PROLINNOVA put out a call for proposals from the country partners (CPs) to undertake farmer-led documentation (FLD) activities. The FLD activities were to involve the documentation of participatory innovation development (farmer-led joint investigation). PROLINNOVA South Africa submitted a proposal to undertake an FLD pilot in North-West (NW) Province in collaboration with the Agricultural Research Council (ARC) and the NW Department of Agriculture. The pilot will involve the documentation of joint experimentation activities being undertaken as part of an ongoing food security project of the ARC. The first phase of the project involved the evaluation of a number of varieties / cultivars of tomatoes, amaranthus, cowpeas and sweet potatoes on station. During the next growing season the farmers will be establishing cultivars that they selected from the first phase at their own homes and in their community gardens. The farmers that have been involved to date are known as “farmer trainers” and they have the responsibility to train other farmers in their villages on topics that they learn through participating in the initiative. Farmers’ documentation of their activities will allow them to share their findings with the farmers in their groups, the farmer trainers from other villages, the ARC staff and staff from Department of Agriculture. The FLD pilot will run from August 2008 to May 2009, which covers the entire growing season, allowing for a reflection workshop after the final harvest in April.
In an attempt to initiative PROLINNOVA-related activities in NW Province, funds were made available to hold a PID sharing and learning workshop for staff from the Department of Agriculture and other stakeholders. Due to delays experienced in terms of mobilising stakeholders, especially the Department, a decision was taken to hold a one-day orientation workshop in conjunction with the FLD workshop. Department of Agriculture staff from the district where the FLD pilot is being held, were invited to participate in the first day of the workshop.
2 VENUE AND PARTICIPANTS
The workshop was held at the Department of Agriculture Training Centre, which is about 30km from Mafikeng. Participants travelled in and out daily from the villages where they live while the facilitators overnighted in Mafikeng.
It was attended by 18 farmers, three extension officers, three staff from ARC, five students on a learnership programme with the Department and two staff from NGOs (including the PROLINNOVA SA coordinator and Michael Malinga who had participated in the FLD pilot conducted in KwaZulu-Natal in 2007). The farmers came from 4 districts namely Tsetse (5), Miga (4), Magokgoane (3) and Ikopeleng (6). The ARC staff included the PROLINNOVA provincial task team coordinator for NW Province, Tebogo Serapelwane and Ineke Vorster, the project leader of the food security project. Ngwedi Chiloane, a technician at the ARC and currently completing her practical year for her National Diploma, attended to increase her knowledge in the extension part of her practical training in extension. The DoA staff included the local extension officer, Norman Thebe, who will be supporting the farmers on a day to day basis.
3 SUMMARY OF THE WORKSHOP ACTIVITIES
SUNDAY 3 AUGUST 2008
Brigid Letty, Michael Malinga and Tebogo Serapelwane met in the evening to finish planning the workshop. Aspects that need to be considered included the process for downloading and printing the pictures (including the number of prints to be paid for by PROLINNOVA), sharing the cameras, and the mechanism for making the payments for the printing of the photographs.
MONDAY 4 AUGUST 2008
Mr Mosetlhi, a manager from the Department of Agriculture welcomed the workshop participants. Tebogo Serapelwane (ARC / provincial task team coordinator for NW) gave a presentation on PROLINNOVA (an introduction to the structure of the network, both internationally and locally, as well as its aims and objectives). Brigid Letty (Institute of Natural Resources, PROLINNOVA programme Coordinator) then introduced the FLD initiative (background and objectives) and also discussed the concepts of local innovation and PID.
Introduction to PROLINNOVA· PROLINNOVA stands for Promoting Local Innovation in ecologically oriented agriculture and natural resource management
· PROLINNOVA is an international network that promotes participatory research and development methods and specifically an appreciation of farmers’ ability to innovate
· The idea is that through partnerships between farmers and other agents, local ideas that farmers have about overcoming a problem or making use of an opportunity can be tried out or further developed through a participatory process
· In South Africa we have a national steering committee with members from ARC, two universities, PELUM and an NGO as well as provincial task teams in KZN, Limpopo, Mpumalanga and North West
· The activities of the network are aimed at
o Creating awareness about farmers’ ability to innovate
o Promoting the use of participatory R&D approaches
o Encouraging partnerships between different organisations involved in R&D
Introduction to the farmer-led documentation initiative
· PROLINNOVA made funds available to pilot farmer-led documentation activities
· We wanted to submit a proposal to undertake a FLD pilot and decided that the ARC’s food security project at Mafikeng provided an ideal opportunity because of farmers taking experimentation home to their own gardens this year.
· FLD is a tool that will allow farmers to document and share their experiences with each other and with research and extension staff.
· We needed to have a workshop to initiate discussions with farmers and other stakeholders about FLD and to learn how to use cameras but we decided to widen the purpose to include a general introduction to PROLINNOVA and the development approaches it promotes
Introduction to the concepts of LI and PID
· What is local innovation?
o It is the process by which farmers, without support from R&D agents, discover or develop new and better ways of doing things – using the locally available resources
o Generally it is a process of building on the local knowledge of an area by using new ideas from various sources, including farmers’ own creativity
· Who is an innovator?
o Innovators are those people (in our case farmers and land users) who develop these new production methods or management approaches in order to improve their lives, their communities and/or their natural environment
o Research and extension programmes can benefit from working with innovative people who bring their own ideas about how to address a particular problem or capture an opportunity
· Innovations can be of a technical, social or cultural nature
· What is farmer experimentation?
o This refers to experiments that farmers design and control themselves, making their own observations and analysis. It allows them to change their current situation
· What words in your local language would you use for
o The process of innovating (developing new ideas)
o Experiments / Experimenting
o What is an innovation?
· What is participatory innovation development?
o It is a participatory process where R&D agents work with farmers to improve existing innovations or develop new ones, and where farmers actively participate in directing, planning, implementing and evaluating the process.
o This is where research and development programmes are based on things that rural people are already trying out or ideas that they might have about how to improve their livelihood systems - it builds on existing ideas and motivations
· PID could involve
o Experimentation (e.g. determining which fertilizer application rate produces the best results)
o Trying out a new system or way of organising things (e.g. for marketing produce or sharing information)
o Improving a piece of equipment so that it is easier to use or works better (e.g. trying different materials or making adjustments to a plough)
In order to ensure a common understanding of terms and concepts, time was spent translating terms into the local language of the area. According to the participants, the term / phrase for “the process of innovating” is tsela ya go batlisisa mekgwa e mesa. The translation of “doing experiments” is go dira diteko and the word for the outcomes of the innovation process (“the end results”) is diphitihelelo.
The participants, in groups representing the different municipalities, were asked to list examples of local innovations they were aware of.
Figure 1: Group work identifying cases of local innovation.
The examples identified were as follows:
· Mrs Dorah – uses plastic bags to make mats, plastic shoes and bags
· Calabashes (sego) used as light bulb covers
· Egg trays used to make a ceiling in a house
· Water harvesting – dig a big hole, line it with bricks and plaster, allow it to gather water when it rains
· Make necklaces from wild fig fruit that babies can chew on when teething
· Make tomato paste and dried tomatoes (value adding to allow for extended shelflife)
· Make flavoured oil by putting garlic into bottles of oil (used for cooking and for health purposes)
· Placing a stone in the furrow in front of the hose pipe so that the water does not cause erosion but rather it strikes the stone.
The next session was focused on the concept of farmer-led documentation and was facilitated by Michael Malinga (Farmer Support Group, University of KwaZulu-Natal)
Introduction to Farmer-led documentation· Kinds of Documentations - Books (writings), Video, Albums (Photos), Songs (events), Games, Audios
· Documentation is normally done by expects on pre-decided object or theme. It’s always top down/less or no consultation with the audience that is being documented or end users, and proceedings and user rights remain with the experts or are shared unequally.
· FLD is a multi-stakeholder process but led by the end users - farmers. The products are used by farmers (internal learning), can be shared with other communities (horizontal learning), used by external institutions and policy makers for development.
· The principles of FLD - It should be farmer-driven
o Decision about what to document
o Purpose of that documentation
o It should serve farmers goal - benefit them
o Be participatory and inclusive.
o NB: those giving the support to FLD should try to hand over the stick to the farmers.
· Why FLD?
o It enables the farmers to document on their own
o To speak freely about their issues and share their experiences
o Enables farmers to identify challenges to get help for
o Teaches farmers new skills – the use of cameras, pens etc.
o Taps on undocumented knowledge
· Experiences from the FLD pilot at Potshini – objectives of the farmers:
o To Keep Knowledge and practices for future generations
o Use pictures for learning and sharing between the stakeholders including farmers
o Farmers being able to take their own informed decisions derived from own documentations
· Processes at Potshini
o Awareness meeting
o Camera exposure
o Documentation
o Feedback meetings
o Dissemination workshop
· What has been documented?
o Yield, Good crop, Pest and Disease/failures, New practices, Processes, Ceremonies/events
· Highlights
o Digital camera donation By local seed shop
o Visit by Prolinnova SA
· Challenges
o Technology – Still cameras are going out off stock
o Digital Camera – No computer for storage or to support its use
o Picture developing far (to town) and expensive for farmers.
For the afternoon session, the participants split into two groups, one being officials and the other being farmers. Michael and Ineke spent the afternoon giving the farmers a practical session on the use of digital cameras. Brigid spent the afternoon with officials and students, discussing the process of planning a joint experiment.
Planning a joint experiment· With whom do you plan a farmer-led joint investigation?
o A group of farmers with a common interest (e.g. a group of farmers who keep goats and all experience problems with feeding in winter)
o First find out if any farmers in the group are trying out something different to address this problem. Are there any other farmers not present that are trying things out locally that could be a source of information?
o Are there any other organisations that might provide a source of information that we can contact?
o These sources of information can all inform the experiment that farmers want to plan and carry out.
· How could you plan with farmers – what questions would you ask (example provided)
o What do we want to investigate? Whether feeding dried leaves to lactating goats in winter will prevent them losing weight
o Why exactly do we want to investigate this? What is the underlying problem or opportunity? What would the benefit be if we were successful? In winter the lactating goats get very thin and then they become weak and susceptible to disease. Acacia leaves are available in summer and perhaps they could be harvested and then fed in winter. If this worked the goats would not lose so much weight and it would not cost much.
o What exactly do we want to find out? What questions should the investigation answer? We want to find out whether the goats will eat the dried leaves as well as how much we need to feed to make a difference
o If it is an experiment, how should you design it so that you can answer your questions? We want to compare the condition of goats that receive leaves with those that do not (will we compare with other people in the community? Will the farmer divide his own group into control and treatment, or will he evaluate it based on past experience?).
o What information will you need to collect to be able to tell if your experiment was successful or if you have made an improvement? What measurements should you take, what observations should you make, what things will you evaluate through discussion? What is the role of the farmer? What is the role of the extension officer or researcher? Measure how much is being fed (grams), weigh the goats weekly, observe their condition, what does this cost in terms of time? What does this cost in terms of equipment?
o How will you use the information – who will you share it with and how? For example, you might want to take photographs to show other farmers what you have done, how you have done it and the outcomes
TUESDAY 5 AUGUST 2008
The second day of the workshop was only for farmers and for the extension staff who will be directly involved with the food security project.