This paper is a contribution to the establishment of a new capacity development (CD) 9 strategy, a process that the Consortium Office will facilitate, with external input, during 2013. The paper explores the lessons learned from CGIAR’s experience with CD and reflects the findings of a working group that was brought together in late 2012. The objective of the paper is to identify the roles that individual and institutional CD might play in CGIAR in order to increase CGIAR’s impact on the welfare of smallholder farmers and the sustainability of their farming systems.

This paper introduces Rapid Appraisal of Agricultural Innovation Systems (RAAIS). RAAIS is a diagnostic tool that can guide the analysis of complex agricultural problems and innovation capacity of the agricultural system in which the complex agricultural problem is embedded. RAAIS focuses on the integrated analysis of different dimensions of problems (e.g. biophysical, technological, socio-cultural, economic, institutional and political), interactions across different levels (e.g.

Parasitic weeds such as Striga spp and Rhamphicarpa fistulosa in smallholder rice production systems form an increasing problem for food and income security in sub-Saharan Africa. In this paper we implement the Rapid Appraisal of Agricultural Innovation Systems (RAAIS) as a diagnostic tool to identify specific and generic entry points for innovations to address parasitic weeds in rain-fed rice production in Tanzania. Data were gathered across three study sites in Tanzania where parasitic weeds are eminent (Kyela, Songea Rural and Morogoro Rural districts).

One of the most important things that innovation platforms do is to build the capacity of their members to innovate. Some key elements of innovation capacity include: self-organization, learning new skills, changing mindsets, valuing others’ roles in innovation, having a holistic view, being able to adapt to changing situations, creating new ideas, recognizing opportunities, being proactive, using indigenous ideas, and looking to the future. This brief uses the analogy of a traditional African cooking pot to explain how innovation capacity is developed within an innovation platform.

This is the first chapter of the book "Innovation platforms for agricultural development: Evaluating the mature innovation platforms landscape". It introduces the background, case study competition process, case study characterization and readers’ guide, and book outline. Characterization of the case studies includes their geographical spread, age and life stage of the platforms, and specific information on the multi-stakeholder processes, the content matter, platform support functions, and outcomes and impacts.

This is a chapter of the book Innovation platforms for agricultural development edited by Iddo Dror, Jean-Joseph Cadilhon, Marc Schut, Michael Misiko and Shreya Maheshwari.

The CGIAR Research Program on Integrated System for the Humid Tropics, or Humidtropics, works towards transforming the lives of the rural poor in several action sites in Asia, Africa and Tropical America. In doing so, different technologies and innovations were implemented and while at first the capacity development was going on almost intuitively, as an integrated part of the implementation process, it has soon become clear that such groundbreaking activities and ideas require a more organized and supervised approach.

Capacity development (CapDev) is increasingly acknowledged as a crucial part of agricultural development. In the CGIAR Strategic Results Framework (SRF), CapDev is included as a ‘cross-cutting issue’ and as a strategic enabler of Research for Development (R4D) impact for CGIAR and its partners. It goes far beyond the transfer of knowledge and skills through training, and cuts across multiple levels.

This brief is part of a series of ‘Legacy Products’ developed under the CGIAR Research Program on Integrated Systems for the Humid Tropics (Humidtropics – www.humidtropics.org ) to help CGIAR Research Programs integrate key ‘capacity development in systems’ concepts into their work. It introduces the rationale of capacity needs assessment, frameworks/steps and requirements. 

The poster briefs the introducing and utility of education materials and teaching notes on multi‐stakeholder innovation processes and how they work, results and outputs and who the legacy products are useful for.