African Highlands Initiative

AHI Overview

AHI started in 1995 when the intensively cultivated highlands ecoregionwas chosen by its founders as an area where partnership could make adifference. AHI facilitates a consortium of research organizations thatprovide expertise to help address complex natural resource management(NRM) and agricultural productivity issues in the ecoregion. AHIstarted as a CGIAR ecoregional program, but early on national researchprograms (NARIs) joined in and AHI has since become a network of theAssociation to Strengthen Agricultural Research in East and CentralAfrica (ASARECA) until September 2007 when it was completely underICRAF following ASARECA’s reorganizations.

AHI is currently hosted by ICRAF and has operated at one timeor another in 5 countries of eastern Africa: Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania,Madagascar and Ethiopia. Benchmark sites were chosen as representativehighland areas having high population levels, small farm sizes andapparent natural resource degradation. The institutional context andR&D actors present in the area were also considered. Although thesites share some commonalities, they differ according to the enterprisemix, and the socio-economic, policy and NRM issues present.

AHI works where the people and landscapes in the denselypopulated highlands of Eastern Africa are under pressure. Populationgrowth, fragile landscapes, limited economic opportunities and therapid pace of climatic, political-economic and cultural change haveoutpaced people's coping strategies, causing water shortages,deforestation, soil erosion, unreliable rainfall, increased incidenceof pests and diseases and increased poverty. The target eco-regionfaces the following major challenges at local and institutional levels:

• Under-utilized potential of local people to manage their resources sustainably and to articulate their demands
• A breakdown in natural resource governance
• Conventional research approaches that are not addressing the complexity of modernization processes, livelihood-NRM links and farmer demand
• Limited capacity of researchers and their organizations and policy makers to respond to challenges of working in an integrated, participatory manner.

AHI'score role as an innovator is to develop innovative methods andapproaches for participatory "integrated natural resource management"(INRM) through their development and testing in pilot sites, cross-sitesynthesis and regional dissemination and institutionalization. AHI'stargeted beneficiaries and partners in this work include national andinternational research organizations and networks, developmentorganizations, local government, civil society organizations, serviceproviders, policy makers, community-based organizations, and male andfemale farmers.

Since 1995 AHI has evolved considerably, althoughits purpose has remained consistent. Evolution occurred as fieldexperience was gained, as a wider set of actors became involved (policymakers and development agents), and as the research cadre made theirown conceptual and practical leaps. The evolution of AHI over timereflects the changes that have been underway at global, regional andlocal levels in biophysical, socio-economic, socio-cultural andinstitutional grounds.

PHASE 1

In Phase 1 (1995-97), AHI was organized around regionally determinedthematic technical agendas, i.e. characterization and diagnosis,integrated pest management, and improvement of soil productivity. Anearly evaluation of AHI (1996) indicated that the top-down thematicapproach was not achieving the necessary integration, systems approach,or partnerships. In response, the regional "Task Force" recommended theappointment of National and Site Coordinators and the adoption of abenchmark "integrated research team" approach.

PHASE 2

In Phase 2 (1998-2001), AHI changed from its initial top-downthematic approach towards using a bottom-up approach, promotingparticipatory research (PR) methods, an integrated systems perspective,and multi-institutional and multi-disciplinary teamwork. Theparticipatory research methods used by NARI research teams entailbottom-up problem identification, priority setting, planning andresource allocation, and monitoring and evaluation—a process called"PAM" (participatory agro-ecosystem management). Research teams startedworking through farmer groups, and focused on "entry points" andadaptive research where useful "on-the-shelf" technology options thatcould be quickly taken up by farmers were introduced in direct responseto local priorities.

PHASE 3

The emphasis for Phase 3 (2002-2005) was to linkfarm-level improvements from Phase 2 to other landscape issuesinvolving water, forest and communal resource management. Phase 3retained AHI's emphasis on addressing natural resource degradationissues while increasing productivity and improving livelihoods by:

• Intensifying the INRM work in watershed sites;
• Scaling up INRM approaches to district level and beyond;
• Pursuing institutional change in favour of INRM; and
• Enhancing networking among INRM practitioners.

AHI's focus has been on methodological dimensions ofachieving the necessary integration, partnerships and workingarrangements, collective action and farmer innovation to solve priorityNRM and productivity issues. Working models to illustrate what strongerlinkages between research and development can accomplish in thehighlands were envisioned, with NGO-research andresearch-extension-community linkages successfully piloted. Thesemodels helped to generate and test new approaches to "integration" and"participation" at watershed and landscape level, and are available asexamples for scaling up to other watersheds, institutions, districtsand countries.

AHI and partner organizations have supported andenhanced researcher and research institutions' capacity to promote anduse INRM so as to achieve better integration of technical, economic,policy, institutional and social processes. Finally AHI made a strongercommitment to influence wider INRM policy and practice throughnetworking, information exchange and compiling and synthesizinginformation. The ultimate objective has been to mainstreamenvironmental, sustainability and equity concerns into the traditionalproduction-oriented focus.

PHASE 4

Phase 4, (2006-2008) is envisionedas a period in which development and institutionalization of the INRMapproach would be consolidated. While AHI's mode of working "locally"and synthesizing and influencing "regionally" is sound and there wasconsiderable progress in developing the integrated watershed approachin Phase 3, three years was insufficient to bring the approach "fullcircle" in benchmark sites. Even more time is needed toinstitutionalize the approach, given the need for "mind-set" change andthe need to work with a wider group of scientists, managers andinstitutions. The envisioned Phase 4 emphases can be summarized asfollows:

1. To further develop the watershed approach, focusing on enabling collective action and integrating biophysical, social and economic dimensions of farm and landscape management. The outcome of this work would be livelihood, equity and environmental impacts in benchmark sites, while the output was the synthesis of methods and tools that enabled these integrated outcomes to be realized.
2. To use experiences and methods from AHI benchmark sites combined with information from more extensive surveys and syntheses to derive good practices and methods for development agencies.
3. To conduct research to understand links and dynamics between vulnerability, poverty, livelihood strategies, economic growth and NRM. This include methods to better articulate tradeoffs from the vantage points of different stakeholders and land use scenarios so as to provide information for improved dialogue across levels of decision-making;
4. To provide relevant and timely information to district and national development actors and decision-makers by aiming research at: critical evaluation of R&D partnerships and linkages to enable better management; developing and testing analytical frameworks and performance monitoring schemes to improve quality and contributions of various actors to development processes; and learning from various scaling up and communication strategies.
5. To impart "how to" information, provide "real life" examples, and follow with mentoring for institutional change in some key research institutions that eventually serve as "models" and provide lessons to others in the region and beyond.

Targeted beneficiaries and participants in Phase 4 include national andinternational research organizations and networks, civil societyorganizations, service providers, policy makers, local authorities,community-based organizations and male and female farmers.

PHASE 5

Inthe next phase (2009-2011), AHI’s emphasis will be on integration oflesson learnt into going to scales from farm → Watershed → Landscapelevel. The aim is to enhance social-ecological resilience of thehighland agro-ecosystems in the eastern Africa. Major focus will be oncollective action, governance and institutional change, with assumptionthat social ecological resilience is a mainly driven by the threeparameters and once addressed will enhance resilience to most highlandsagro-ecosystems. In this phase various methods will be used but mainlysocial learning- by forming polycentric, multilayered platforms,adaptive management of highland agro-ecosystems and landcare approach.This is still under preparation but will at least look into the abovementioned areas.On the other hand much of AHI’s experience could be found in ourwebsite http://worldagroforestry.org/projects/african-highlands