Humidtropics technicians and farmers work together on an experimental plot in the Nicanorte Action Site, Camoapa, Nicaragua.
In 2013, Humidtropics adopted the concept of Flagship Projects as the main vehicle through which the Program will carry out its research to achieve the Intermediate Development Outcomes. There are five Flagship Projects, of which one is mainstreamed to ensure coherence throughout the Program. The remaining four Flagship Projects are based on geographic location, including the Central America and the Caribbean Flagship, where the North Nicaragua (Nicanorte) Action Site is located.
Within the Action Site, the Program is taking on a series of challenges, such as degraded soils, the reduction of agro-biodiversity, and extreme climate variability which results in low agricultural productivity, translating into low farmer incomes and limited capacity to invest in their farms.
The Program also focuses on the institutional limitations present in the environmental, production and market sectors, which currently are not well-integrated to approach smallholder farmer sustainability, and turn instead to imposing increasing regulations. The lack of equity and opportunities for rural women and youth is a transversal topic which the Program considers as one of the enabling conditions for the region’s development.
The Learning Journey
The Situation Analysis in Nicanorte was conducted by CIAT and Bioversity, and data is now available related to human development, natural resource management, production, and market systems to generate outputs on the current state of affairs in the form of indicator maps. Brief parallel interviews were conducted with key organizations to generate an evaluation of the local innovation process dynamics.
The collective analysis of the processed information resulted in the identification of the convergence of interests of key organizations which share the Program’s goals and Impact Pathways. This convergence between over 20 organizations resulted in a national Research for Development (R4D) Platform. It is expected that this Platform will oversee the implementation of Humidtropics on a national level, and will be a key space for the scaling of results derived from the actions of the learning alliances in the territories facilitated by the Program.
Anchoring Learning Initiatives
The farmer of a small-scale banana-coffee mixed-crop farm carries bananas back to his house in the Nicanorte Action Site, Jinotega, Nicaragua.
Based on the results of the Situation Analysis, the Program decided to center its actions on three territories located in Northern Nicaragua, where the livelihoods of small farm families are based on diversified farming systems: maize-bean-cattle-tree (Esteli and Condega), coffee-banana-tree (Jinotega and El Cua), and cocoa-banana-tree (Rancho Grande and Waslala).
Leveraging the Learning Alliance’s successful experience in the region, it was decided that the implementation of Humidtropics in Nicanorte will be carried out through three territorial learning alliances in the region. These territorial learning alliances will become the platforms to facilitate collective learning processes, where international research centers and local organizations interact to develop a R4DÂ agenda and implement actions to generate, build and mobilize integrated knowledge that results in equal, sustainable development in the Action Site.
Current State of Affairs
In 2014, we continue working in Nicanorte through Territorial Analysis. Key partner organizations are using an integrated systems analysis framework which involves the realities of the farms, rural families, communities, markets, and policies.
A collective analysis based on local information is allowing us to identify strategic themes and entry points to start collective learning journeys. During this process, institutions which are actively participating in territorial alliances are becoming more efficient learning organizations, with the purpose of building and improving capacities in local innovation systems.
Achievements and Quick Wins in Nicanorte
Participants of the R4D Platform workshop, Nicanorte Action Site, Nicaragua.
The current state of human development, natural resource, production, and market indicators was compiled and presented as indicator maps for discussion and Field Site selection, while the state of innovation networks and the organizational outlook in Nicanorte was discussed with members of the R4D Platform to promote joint planning, public monitoring, and scaling of results.
Territorial analysis also began with the territorial learning alliances, which use an innovative integrated systems approach, and six themes for R4DÂ projects were identified for the elaboration of proposals.
Quick-wins include analyzing the source of increases in income; facilitating a National Bean Platform; building capacities for the value chain and efficient business models for bean, cocoa, coffee, and hortalizas; designing forage and agroforestry systems for the improvement of production and natural resource conservation; and researching, documenting and disseminating the effects of the Quesungual Agroforestry System regarding staple crop productivity, soil erosion, and water retention in the semi-humid tropics of Nicaragua and Honduras.
Blog and photos by Shadi Azadegan, Communication Specialist for Central America and the Caribbean, Centro Internacional de Agricultura Tropical (CIAT).Â