i-Bulletin 8

8/14/2019 i-Bulletin 8

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This is the final in the 8-bulletin series. The

aimed at promoting wider appreciation of information and knowledgemanagement for

agriculturaldevelopmentgenerally and specifically, support

for the IICA/CTA project on building amonitoring and evaluation informationsystem - MEAgrISys.

#8 of 2008

a collaborativeeffort of:

Naitram RamnananCaRAPN member

and:Diana Francis

Trade Policies andNegotiations Programme

IICA Caribbean Region

enabled by:Technical Centre

for Agricultural andRural Cooperation

(CTA ACP)

The Views expressedherein are not necessarilythose of the CTA and IICA

Agricultural I Agricultural I Agricultural I Agricultural In nn nformation formation formation formation Systems Systems Systems Systems proje projec projec projecCARICOM countries are no strangers to projects to developinformation systems in agriculture. We have had many national, sub-regional, regional projects; projects managed by Ministries of Agriculture, bydevelopment organisations, such as IICA and CARDI, by private sector agencies.There have been many! This current effort is just one of many recent initiatives.Its objective is not to solve all the information problems in agriculture inCARICOM. Rather, its objective is to stimulate a new thinking, outside the boxeven, of how we should approach the issue of building information systems inagriculture in CARICOM. This is especially given the new context for agricultureand the need to think and act in an integrated and systemic manner.

Are we making genuine Are we making genuine Are we making genuine Are we making genuine progress progress progress progress ? ? ? ?Consider this! In 2008, after many, many externally financed projects,needs assessments, and systems we are still listing lack of information systems as a major and binding constraint to competitiveand sustainable agriculture in CARICOM. Farmers complain that they are notgetting market information quick enough to make good decisions. Policy makerscomplain that they are not getting information from the private sector to feedthe policy process. Many the banks and financial institutions admit that they aregetting very little proposals for agricultural credits and loans, and they even if they did, they did not have the information base to effectively assess theviability of these proposals.

Is the process backed by strongIs the process backed by strongIs the process backed by strongIs the process backed by strong policy policy policy ?? ?Lack of national information policy, limited value placed oninformation and unwillingness to share information are often listedamong the major limitations to developing information systems in agriculture inCARICOM. This is aside from the usual constraint of limited technical (humanand information technology) capacity. Strong and enabling policy sends apowerful signal. It gives all a sense that the particular issue, target, industry or

sector is important. It mobilises individuals to action! It provides a framework fororganising institutions, securing resources and implementing projects. Weak,ambiguous or no policy at all, also sends a powerful signal! This matter is notsufficiently important to warrant attention. It can be left up to its own devices ormarket forces. Is this how we value information generally and specifically,information for agricultural development? Then what have the many successiveand often simultaneously implemented information projects hoped to achieve?Can progress still be made in such an environment?


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tying information ne tying information ne tying information ne tying information ne eds to development goals eds to development goals eds to development goals eds to development goals

What What What What is this information?Where Where Where Where is it?Who Who Who Who has it?

Why Why Why Why do we need it?How How How How do we get it?

What What What What do we do with it?

The IICAThe IICAThe IICAThe IICA----CCCCTA project focused onTA project focused onTA project focused onTA project focused on tying information needs to development goals.tying information needs to development goals.tying information needs to development goals.tying information needs to development goals.Such development goals are embodied the AgRuAgRuAgRuAgRu----matrix frameworkmatrix frameworkmatrix frameworkmatrix framework which forms the base for buildinga monitoring and evaluation information system tofollow-up on progress and to measure impact. It wasdeveloped mainly for the hemispheric AGRO Plan

2002-2015. But because of the convergence of development priorities of Caribbean countries, it canbe easily applied to track progress and measureimpact of national agricultural policies andprogrammes and regional ones as well. AgRu-matrixdefines three key groups of partners in thesustainable development of agriculture and ruralcommunities. These are rural stakeholders,agriculture value chain actors and policy makers.Each of these groups interacts and take actions

towards particular objectives. AgRu-matrix defines aset of seven strategic objectives for sustainable

development. These are competitiveness,environmental sustainability, equity, governance,rural prosperity, food and nutrition security andpositioning building a new type of informationsystem for sustainable agriculture. The first four of

these objectives relate directly to four keydimensions of development Economic, Ecological,Socio-cultural/Human and Political-Institutional -that define the priorities for guiding actions andinteractions of the partners. It is these interactionsof the 3 partners along the 4 dimensions of development that leads to the definition of 12Purposes for actions. It is on these 7 macro-levelstrategic objectives and the 12 micro-level purposesthat the MEAgrISys project is providing the

framework for building modern information systemsin agriculture.

Current national agricultural information systems are not sufficient to provide the information required forplanning, measuring progress and monitoring the impact of development actions. The project does not intendto solve all national problems, or address all concerns regarding the weaknesses of agricultural information inthe Caribbean. The issues for the project were on building: building: building: building: appreciation appreciation appreciation appreciation among information professionals, of the need to think outside the box, and see information

in a broader dimension; awareness awareness awareness awareness among agriculture stakeholders of the value of information and the importance of sharing that

information for the benefit of the agriculture system. sy sy sy synergies nergies nergies nergies among existing interests and capacities on the ground; not re-inventing the wheel. elements elements elements elements of an information system that are practical and mutually-reinforcing to cater to the needs of

sustainable development that links agriculture to quality of life. The system will provide a tool fordocumenting and monitoring actions, evaluating progress and reporting results and expectations.

At the end , the project hopes to provide: (a) a conceptual framework and methodologies for obtainingnational Experiences and Expectations, (b) a set of common Indicators for measuring progress, and (c) animproved method of reporting.


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Making Information Work for Agriculture: Making Information Work for Agriculture: Making Information Work for Agriculture: Making Information Work for Agriculture: IndicatorsIndicatorsIndicatorsIndicators We often hear about 'declining growth rates', or 'declining shares of agricultural GDP', or 'exportsincreased by 5%', etc. These conclusions are based on economic indicators that measure the status for aparticular point in time, or change between points in time.

An Indicator it is like a pointer or marker for a

something, at a point in time that has value andexpresses meanings. It is more than a statistic and isbased on accepted indicators to measure progress ormovement toward a stated goal or target. Indicatorsare quantitative and must be measurable. Indicatorscan help countries to track progress, measureperformance, identify trouble spots and show-upimportant trends. This information is part of what isneeded to enable policy makers, business anddevelopment organisations to redefine goals, realign

and monitor strategic actions and adopt furtherdecisions to improve agriculture and rural life at thenational, regional and hemispheric levels.

The MEAgrISys project has defined a set of Indicators

as the basis for measuring performance in each of the macro objectives (national and sectoral) and eachof the Cell Purposes (micro level). The importance of establishing credible and measurable PerformanceIndicators at the micro level cannot be understated.A sample of a list of variables (main topics) that canbe used to determine progress at the macro andmicro level, for which Indicators were defined toguide data collection, analysis and reporting isprovided for two of the development dimensions,

namely Economic (production and trade) andEcological.

EconomicEconomicEconomicEconomic - MacroCompetitiveness

Cell ICell ICell ICell I:::: promotecompetitive ruralenterprises

Cell II:Cell II:Cell II:Cell II: Integrate chains, fosterlinkages and enhanceproductivity

Cell III:Cell III:Cell III:Cell III: Promote enablingnational policies forcompetitive business

Position of Agriculturein National Economy;

AgriculturalProductivity;

Trade Dependenceand Performance;

Rural entrepreneursand InnovativeCapacity;

Institutional S SSSupport;

Entrepreneurial Activity andInnovative Capacity;

Chain organisation andintegration;

Private Sector Investment;

Macroeconomic PolicyEnvironment andInstitutional Support;

Trade Policy Regime andExtent of Openness;

EcologicalEcologicalEcologicalEcological - MacroEnvironmentalSustainability

Cell IVCell IVCell IVCell IV: promotecompetitive ruralenterprises

CellCellCellCell VVVV:::: Integrate chains, fosterlinkages and enhanceproductivity

CellCellCellCell VVVV:::: Promote enablingnational policies forcompetitive business

Status and quality of natural resources:water, land, forests,fisheries,

Resource Vulnerabilityand Degradation

Quality and use of natural resources in/close proximity to ruralareas;

Community-BasedDisaster ManagementCapacities;

Application of sustainableresource management (SRM)principles;

Utilisation of Agro-chemicals;

Capacity for Risk and DisasterManagement in the Chain;

Integration of SRM inPublic Policy andPlanning;

Natural Hazard and

Disaster Managementand Adaptation toClimate Change;

The MEAgrISys project has defined a set of Indicators as a base for measuring performance in eachof the seven macro objectives and each of the micro purposes as defined by the 12 Cells of the AgRu-matrix,and as illustrated above. Using these indicators, countries and institutions can make more informed decisionson where capacity already exists to collect them and prioritise those in which capacities should be developed.


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Making Information Work for Agriculture: Making Information Work for Agriculture: Making Information Work for Agriculture: Making Information Work for Agriculture: EEEExperiences:xperiences:xperiences:xperiences:All countries take actions necessary to alleviate the constraints to agricultural development. Whetherthese actions are undertaken by a Ministry of Agriculture (MoAs), non-governmental organisation (NGO), orproducer group, they seek to achieve a particular Purpose.

In spite of the numerous actions, by several players

in the agriculture-rural continuum, there is verylittle, in terms of documentation of actions by type,objectives and scope to enable comparative analysisand identification of best practices. Information onsuch Experiences is important since the challengesencountered in implementation and progress mademay hold the key to explaining the state of theIndicators. These ExperiencesExperiencesExperiencesExperiences hold the informationnecessary to explain the rate of progress asmeasured by the quantitative performance I IIIndicatorsndicatorsndicatorsndicators.

The MEAgrISys project promotes the need todocument national actions undertaken, not only byMoAs, but also and importantly, by all other majoractors, particularly NGOs and producer organisationsthemselves. It is the collective results of theseactions that determine if and how output increases ordecreases and the outcome of other objectivesmeasured by quantitative indicators. MEAgrISys alsopromotes the need to document and integrate this

qualitative information on Experiences, with thequantitative information provided by the Indicators.Why? Because documenting actions and challengesprovides a basis for comparing the types of actionsand approaches used by countries to address specificissues. Having such information in a database canidentify potential areas for horizontal cooperationbetween and among countries on common issues. Isalso provides the basis for establishing linkagesamong national, regional, hemispheric and

international actions and sharing of experiences tooptimise scare human, financial and institutionalresources. An analysis of national experiences canhelp to identify the pitfalls and define more effectiveinterventions and actions in the future. Particularly,

it can be used to show bias, if any, in the type of

actions taken in agricultural and rural development.

It has been observed, that traditionally, actions inagricultural and rural development tended to focuson production-trade issues, that is, in efforts toincrease output, enhance productivity andcompetitiveness and expand exports. However, evenwithin the production-trade dimension, very fewMoAs will have reported actions to promotecompetitive rural enterprises that are not linked to

farm production or small scale food processing.Rural development is wider than agriculture, a realitythat several Caribbean MoAs are not equipped orpositioned to deal with.

More recently, there has been a flurry of actions toaddress the environmental sustainability objectives.This largely due to the growing link between tradeand the environment in international tradenegotiations, and consequently, the proliferation of

environmental regulations, standards andconventions, of which most Caribbean countries aresignatory. Hence in more recent times, actions underenvironmental sustainability have become morecommon within MoAs. What has been relatively silentin terms of actions spearheaded by, or monitored byMoAs are those that relate to improving the socio-cultural-human aspect of development equity.More often that not, such actions are not associatedwith agriculture and hence the information is not

sought out and integrated into analyses onagriculture and rural development. Defining actionsand experiences to improve governance usuallycentres on developing policy frameworks and/orstrengthening farmers/producer organisations.

MEAgrISys promotes the need to collect, sort, store and analyse such national experiences , by each of AgRu-matrixs broad strategic objective and sub-purposes to lead to more holistic performance analyses,promotion of success stores and sharing of good practices.


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Making Informa Making Informa Making Informa Making Information Work for Agriculture: tion Work for Agriculture: tion Work for Agriculture: tion Work for Agriculture: ExpeExpeExpeExpectationsctationsctationsctationsThe recent regional debates on agriculture saw opinions such as agriculture is too risky , the future for agriculture lies in agri-tourism and we need agriculture for our food security . Whilethese opinions may be based on the particular stakeholders perception of past and current situation andviews of the future, they reflect an expectation. Expectations drive actions. And if they are largely negativetowards agriculture, then the majority of actions undertaken will be in non-agriculture activities.

A stark example of how ExpectationsExpectationsExpectationsExpectations impactdecision-making is in the financial sector.Agriculture is perceived as too risky, and hence thereis an expectation on the part of financial institutionsthat loans to agriculture will under-perform. Hencethe majority of commercial banks do not includeagricultural loans in their portfolio.

These views and perceptions of key actors/players

can be obtained through feedback mechanisms, suchas, surveys and questionnaire, designed to determineopinions and hints of what to expect on a particularissue. Expectations differ among the main categoriesof stakeholders in the agriculture-rural communitycontinuum. These differences in expectations arisefrom educational achievements, exposure to outsideinfluences, access to information and level of involvement in decision-making etc. Hence theexpectation of a policy maker with respect to small

business development projects among unemployedrural youth maybe substantially different from theexpectations of these same rural youth, who may notbe inclined towards the same type of small businessthat the Policy maker had in mind. It is sometimesthe discrepancy in expectations on a similar issueamong the different players in the system that makesor breaks a project towards a development objective.The only way such information can be obtained and

analyzed for use in policy and project decisionmaking is to obtain feedback from all participants.Often times, such feedback mechanisms come a partof a post-project evaluation to determine what went wrong .

As far as possible, such feedback mechanisms mustbe specific and clear in terms of the objective of thequestioning and simple to fill in. A sample of targetand issue specific survey is provided.

The MEAgrISys system advocates the need to institutionalize feedback mechanisms into informationsystems that seek to explain the situation and performance of agriculture.


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Moving forward with Information ProjectsMoving forward with Information ProjectsMoving forward with Information ProjectsMoving forward with Information Projects! !!!

AAAAgricultural Knowledge and Information Systems are as important and necessary to sustainablegricultural Knowledge and Information Systems are as important and necessary to sustainablegricultural Knowledge and Information Systems are as important and necessary to sustainablegricultural Knowledge and Information Systems are as important and necessary to sustainableagricultural developmentagricultural developmentagricultural developmentagricultural development ,,,, as is technology and finance. Any decision made in agriculture, at any and alllevels, use information and by using information, also generates information to be used.

The issue then becomes, do we have systems inplace to value, capture, store, integrate and analysethe information such that it becomes a valuable inputinto decision making?

Not yet, I believe!Are we getting there?Hard to tell!

Even with all the various information projects in theCaribbean, information systems development inagriculture is still trying find its way to the top of thepriority agenda.

We all appreciate that information is important. Weall spend time, money and efforts to developmentinformation systems in agriculture.

One thing that this project experience has illustrated,

and none too subtly, is the need for participation andGENUINE partnerships, at ALL levels.

Genuine Partnerships is es Genuine Partnerships is es Genuine Partnerships is es Genuine Partnerships is es in building a more ho in building a more ho in building a more ho in building a more ho

information system to m information system to m information system to m information system to m progress, measure perform progress, measure perform progress, measure perform progress, measure perform

evaluate the end pro evaluate the end pro evaluate the end pro evaluate the end pro

P PP Partnerships artnerships artnerships artnerships will seek to ensure that the: projects defined work towards a common goal,

are practical and useful to most, if not all, thestakeholders;

policy environment is in place to place a highvalue on information and hence enhancesustainability of efforts and results ininformation projects;

end products of projects will provide a base for

the continued development of the system; process must be built on shared roles and

responsibilities of all major actors, includingthe MoAs, development organizations and thestakeholders themselves. These roles willhowever differ based on the mandates andscope of decision-making and actions.

The expectation of having a perfect information system from the start as a precondition toThe expectation of having a perfect information system from the start as a precondition toThe expectation of having a perfect information system from the start as a precondition toThe expectation of having a perfect information system from the start as a precondition toinstitutionalize the M&E process in agriculture and rural life is neither practical nor prudentinstitutionalize the M&E process in agriculture and rural life is neither practical nor prudentinstitutionalize the M&E process in agriculture and rural life is neither practical nor prudentinstitutionalize the M&E process in agriculture and rural life is neither practical nor prudent ! Thiseffort so far, has and continues to be a learning process in how to build an information base andcapacity to enable comprehensive and continuous monitoring, evaluation and feedback on theimpact of policies, programmes and actions on agricultural and rural development goals in theCaribbean. There must be some minimum information system that establishes a base from which

progress can be measures against. TheTheTheThe MEAgrISys project offers some progressMEAgrISys project offers some progressMEAgrISys project offers some progressMEAgrISys project offers some progress towardstowardstowardstowardsunderstanding that baseunderstanding that baseunderstanding that baseunderstanding that base from whichfrom whichfrom whichfrom which we canwe canwe canwe can buildbuildbuildbuild and benefit,and benefit,and benefit,and benefit, through GENUINEthrough GENUINEthrough GENUINEthrough GENUINE PARTNERSHIPS!PARTNERSHIPSPARTNERSHIPSPARTNERSHIPS

Details on AgRu-matrix as the base for MEAgrISyscan be found on www.carapn.net, ,,, or by emailing

your request to [email protected]

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i-Bulletin 8