CAPACITY NEEDS AND TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE FOR SUCCESSFUL IMPLEMENTATION OF THE IPMF

CAPACITY NEEDS AND TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE FOR SUCCESSFUL IMPLEMENTATION OF THE IPMF

178. 
     IPM is a knowledge intensive and interactive methodology. The need to accurately identify and diagnose pests and pest problems and understand ecosystem interactions could enable farmers with biological and ecological control opportunities and in making pragmatic pest control decisions. Thus the success of IPM depends largely on developing and sustaining institutional and human capacity to facilitate experiential learning for making informed decisions in integrating scientific and indigenous knowledge to solve district, ward and village specific problems. Poor communication between farmers, extension agents and researchers from research institutes and universities has often led to poorly-targeted research or to poor adoption of promising options generated by research. The full benefits of investment in agricultural research thereby remain untapped under these circumstances. Closer farmer-research investigator interaction and adaptive research and participatory learning approaches in capacity building efforts can help to bridge this gap and make research results more applicable by farmers. The farmers will learn biological and ecological processes underpinning IPM options, and use the newly acquired knowledge to choose compatible methods to reduce production and post-harvest losses through frequent field visits, meetings, demonstrations, adaptive research trails, etc.
     
     
179. 
     Capacity building will be achieved through farmer-based collaborative management mechanisms where all key stakeholders shall be regarded as equal partners. Beneficiary farmers shall be the principal actors facilitated by other actor such as from research institutes, academic institutions, sector ministries, NGOs, etc. as partners whose role will be to facilitate the process and provide technical direction and any other support necessary for the implementation of PMP. The pilot PMP should be designed to build on, and to some extent strengthen existing national capacities for the promotion and implementation of IPM.
     
     
180. 
     The major actors and partners will include the following:
     

1. 
   The programme beneficiary farmers: as the principal beneficiaries they will be organized into Farmer Groups for training and adoption of IPM practices. The farmers will be facilitated to set up Community IPM Action Committees to coordinate IPM activities in their areas.
   
2. 
   Agricultural sector ministries have the national mandates in implementation of crop protection and pest management research. The two projects will provide logistical and technical support to the Implementing Agencies, RSUs; CACs; and CCCs; Service Provider Consortia to be trained as IPM trainers and to exploit their experiences in the implementation of IPM and management of outbreak and migratory pest. RSUs, CACs and CCCs will undertake to build the capacities of researchers to train farmers and community leaders in promoting IPM activities. These in turn will facilitate information sharing with Farmers Field Schools (FFS). KAPAP will thus provide capacity and policy guidance and/or oversight for implementation of the two projects at regional/county level. The IPM commodity team will serve as resource persons at FFS, counties and districts or any other mechanism deemed suitable for conducting IPM Trainers and Farmer Group training secessions. The team will also be a major partner to farmer groups in the planning and execution of farmer participatory research activities related to IPM.
   
3. 
   The sector ministries within the pilot KAPAP/KACCAL districts should provide staff for training at FFSs and should play major role with NGOs/CBOs in the public awareness campaign, production of extension materials, radio and television programmes in the respective districts. They should also monitor the prevalence of inputs supply by the dealers.
   
4. 
   Ministry of Health (MoH): the district hospital or clinics in the KAPAP and KACCAL operational areas should set up databases on incidence of data on poisoning, effect of pesticides on human health and environmental contamination. This data will then be used to measure and validate the ameliorating effects of IPM adoption and pilot KAPAP/ KACCAL implementation that is expected to reduce risks to pesticides exposure.
   
5. 
   National Environmental Management Authority (NEMA): will collaborate with the district hospitals and natural resources management offices of the districts on training beneficiary Farmer Groups in environmental management.
   
   

178. 
     Partners will include the following:
     

1. 
   Research and training institutions: to formulate proposals for research and training programmes for the development of IPM protocols, and training modules for participating KAPAP- commodity IPM team and programme staff.
   
2. 
   WorldBank, FAO and Global IPM facility: to be a valuable sources of technical information and to provide technical support for training, planning and field implementation of IPM in Farmer Groups. The KAPAP/ KACCAL programmes will also build on the knowledge, structures, facilities, and lessons learnt in other related projects in Africa and elsewhere.
   
3. 
   Agriculture Service Providers and NGOs that are working on providing services to farmers and improving agricultural productivity, environmental management and rural health matters will be identified to provide services and technical support to the field implementation of IPM and other pilot PMP.
   

10. IPM RESEARCH AREAS IN KAPAP AND KACCAL

178. 
     There is need to develop strategies in the control of pests and diseases encompassing the following characteristics; economically feasible, socially acceptable, environmentally friendly and ensure safety. The following areas have been identified for more research in order to ensure the above characteristics are adhered to. These include: determining economic thresholds for major pests and diseases; undertaking risk analysis to provide information that assist in making a decision on the choice of management options; assessing impacts in terms of production (tonnage and monetary) which was unavailable. Others included development of IPM strategies for enterprises where they were missing or weak comprehensive determination of environmental impact of specific pesticides and further research for specific pests and control measures. These areas are fully described below: