For further information contact: Peter Okoth

TSBF-CIAT's strategy for building NARS capacity must deal with the fact that national funding for agricultural research and extension programmes has decreased significantly during the past 5 years in most countries of Africa and Latin America. A reversal of this trend is not likely to occur in the foreseeable future. TSBF-CIAT recognizes this situation and proposes to work with a broader range of stakeholders, in addition to the NARS, to implement its programmes. In the past 10 years, TSBF-CIAT has moved effectively in this direction to work with NARES, NGOs, farmer groups, and the private sector and this work will be continued into the future.

On the other hand, the largest constraint to increased NARSs research capacity is the lack of operating funds rather than the need for more scientific staff. The scientific staff found in many NARSs are competent and can significantly contribute to TSBF-CIAT's mission, but the lack of operating resources limits the ability of NARSs staff to stay abreast of scientific developments. In particular, training, leveraging of networks, and information dissemination are essential ingredients for NARSs' effectiveness, but most NARSs budgets fail to allocated resources for these activities. Given TSBF-CIAT's limited human and financial resources, it is crucial for the Institute to develop explicit strategies for both training and information dissemination that take full advantage of the rapid advances in information and communication technologies. There is also a critical need to encourage the participation of women in its training activities and the strengthening of electronic publishing capabilities.

We expect the role of networks to increase in importance in TSBF-CIAT's programme.
TSBF-CIAT collaborates with three regional networks in Africa, Latin America and Asia. Such networks will play an ever more important role as national and international research institutions operating in a given subregion integrate their efforts around common interests. Their function today already goes well beyond regional testing of ISFM technologies, extending into the domains of priority setting, sharing of tasks and extrapolation of technologies to sites where they can be most effectively used. TSBF-CIAT is making full use of this approach, particularly in the areas of ISFM and participatory approach.