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News

Development of a national capacity for rural innovation in Burkina Faso

Context and objectives

Partnership with IFDC 1000+

This project aims at building capacity of community organizations and extending partnerships to less "conventional" ones more involved upstream and downstream market chains. It also helped the implementation of "committees" within the three commodities and established dialogue with the donors and input providers.

The Agrinovia programme

ICRA participated in a design workshop for a pilot learning programme at the UO and will play a leading role in a block of modules on innovation partnerships. The course is meant to lead to a full fledged regional Master’s course hosted by a University in Francophone West Africa, presumably Ouagadougou. The pilot learning programme took off on 5 October 2009 in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, and was completed in June 2012, with the graduation of 18 students from 4 countries.

The second course started in October 2012. Together with contributing to the design of the course, ICRA has been mandated to design and lead 2 modules (Partnership building and Value Chain Analysis, which Nour Sellamna facilitated in December 2011) and to coach students.

ICRA is involved in the implementation of the second Agrinovia course in 2012 - 2013 as well. This course has 16 students, from Burkina Faso, Togo, Benin, Cameroon and Ivory Coast. The Universities of Züric and Louvain, and SupAgro left the prject because of lack of funds. The University of Roma 3 is still participating. Southern partners still involved in teaching are the Universiteis of Lomé, Cotonou, Niamey and Korogho.

The 3rd master course will start end of 2013.

Achievements in Partnership with IFDC 1000+

• A National Innovation Platform (NIP) started in 2007 including Farmers' Organisations, and other trade, finance, agriculture, R&D, and food processing organizations, as well as NGOs, trade unions and State agencies.
• In October 2007, a National Capacity Strengthening Team (NCST) of six professionals was selected to participate in the 2008 Montpellier based ICRA Francophone Programme. The professionals were mid-level management staff members of a National Farmer Federation (FEPAB), an Association of Agricultural Input Providers (AGRODIA), a network of Credit Services (RCPB), and the University of Koudougou.
• The NCST members participated in the 2008 ICRA Francophone programme, together with an additional team from Mali. The programme was spread out over the year and included four learning blocks composed of knowledge acquisition workshops, field work, and reflexion sessions, alternated with periods during which the participants returned to their organisations. More details, see Francophone 2008 Programme.
• The first learning block took place in Montpellier, France, the second and third ones in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, and the final one in Sikasso, Mali. Field work was related to the support and further development of the sesame cluster in Sissili Province (BF), within the framework of IFDC's 1000s+ project. Participants actively facilitated self-appraisals of the stakeholders involved in the production and marketing of sesame and linkages between these stakeholders. In the reflection sessions, participants reviewed and analysed their experiences and lessons learned, and identified options for extending their experiences within their own institutional settings.
• ICRA staff participated in a workshop in May 2009 at UO to develop a module for Agrinovia on partnership and strategic planning and facilitated a 1 day session on partnership development in October, during the first programme of AGRINOVIA that took place from October to December 2009.
  The NCST has been involved in a capitalisation workshop in this programme in December, preparing the ground for the follow-up of this pilot programme.
• Three NCST members participated in the sub-regional workshop organised in May in Cotonou in preparation of the new Capacity Building programme for ARD Facilitators (Design & Management of ARD Learning). The same persons also participated in that new programmee in Montpellier in September/October.
• Selected members of the NCST were actively involved in steering the 1000s+ project, through support to the Sterring Committee in the evaluation of potential Cluster action plans.
• ICRA supported the NCST in the set-up and implementation of a Capacity Strengthening needs assessment that was organised by the Cluster Advisor of the 1000s+project for the Business Support Services involved in the development and support of agri-business Clusters.

3rd Master professionnel international (pdf, 257K)

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