2.1. The Socioeconomic and Ecological Environment
2.2 The Scientific Environment
2.3. The Institutional Environment
This Chapter reviews some global developments of special importance to the orientation of work within the CGIAR. The first section looks at broad issues in past trends of production, consumption, demography, and forecasts of production and demand, and concerns in natural resources management; the second section considers specific changes in the scientific environment; and the third reviews briefly changes ensuing from GATT, UNCED, public sector investment in Agricultural research, and new emphasis on the global research environment. These concerns, issues and themes will influence the CGIAR's decisions on its priorities.
2.1.1. Past Production and Consumption Trends
2.1.2. Future Demographic Changes and Expected Responses
2.1.3. The Changing Patterns of Demand
2.1.4. Growing Pressure on Natural Resources
2.1.5. Agriculture and the Environment
2.1.6. Perspectives in the Productive Management of Natural Resources
This section briefly reviews past trends in production and consumption, expected future growth in population and incomes, and their implications for patterns of demand. These are then related to a perspective on evolving research strategies, and the argument for new research paradigms, arising out of the increasing pressures on natural resources, is considered.
1 This section draws heavily on Alexandratos, N., (ed.) 1995. World Agriculture: Towards 2010. An FAO Study. FAO and John Wiley and Sons, 1995.
The growth in global Agricultural production has been slowing down. Annual growth declined from 3% in the 1960s to 2.3% in the 1970s to 2% in the 1980s. This decline largely reflects adjustments in developed countries, where populations are growing at low rates and consumption per capita is already at high levels. However, in developing countries recent per capita growth rates have also declined with respect to those in the early 1980s, and, in sub-Saharan Africa, per capita production actually declined.
Upon examination, the crop and livestock sectors of developing countries reveal different trends for different commodities. Therefore, although the annual growth rate for cereals decreased from 4.1% in the 1960s to 2.8% in the 1980s, and that of other basic food crops decreased from 2.5% to 1.6% over the same period, the annual growth rate for livestock products rose from 3.9% in the 1960s to 4.6% in the 1980s and that of non-food crops increased from 2.7% to 3.1%.
Trends towards lower growth rates are expected to continue for cereals. On a regional basis growth rates were analysed for periods covering the last three decades (1961-1990), the last two (1970-1990) and the last one (1980-1990). Over these time spans production rates have declined in East Asia from 4% over the last three decades to 3.1% over the 1980-1990 decade, in Latin America from 2.9% to 0.8%, in South Asia they remained the same at 3% while they increased in the Near East/North Africa from 2.4% to 2.9% and in sub-Saharan Africa from 1.8% to 3.4%. TAC was struck by the implications of these data and checked carefully with FAO, their source, to confirm them.
Per capita food supplies in developing countries have increased from 1950 calories in the early 1960s to 2520 in 1990-92, even though their population grew from 2.1 billion to nearly 4 billion, therefore, it is clear that significant progress has been made. On a percentage basis, estimates of chronic under-nutrition in developing countries have declined significantly in all regions but sub-Saharan Africa, where they rose slightly to 37% in the 1980s.
A full discussion of the possible reasons for these successes and failures can be found in Chapter II of the FAO Study. It is worth mentioning, however, that the most common characteristics of the many countries that failed to make progress in their nutritional status were declines in both per capita incomes and - almost certainly related - per capita agricultural production.
In the coming 25 years the world's population is expected to increase by 2.3 billion people, 93% of whom will live in the developing world. Absolute population increases will be highest in Asia (1.6 billion) and lowest in Latin America and the Caribbean (240 million).2 Projections indicate no further significant progress in reducing the number of the poor, 3 after two decades of progress, unless the goals of the FAO World Food Summit are realized. However, while absolute numbers will change little, regional estimates indicate large changes (see Table 1).
2 Pinstrup-Andersen, P. and R. Pandya-Lorch, 1994. Alleviating Poverty, Intensifying Agriculture, and Effectively Managing Natural Resources. IFPRI - Food, Agriculture and the Environment, Discussion Paper 1. Washington, D.C.3 Source: World Bank, World Development Report 1992 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992). Note: The poverty line is US$ 370 annual income per capita in 1985 purchasing power parity dollars.
Table 1. Number of People Below the Poverty Line, 1990 and 2000
|
REGIONS |
1990 (millions) |
2000 (millions) |
|
Latin America and the Caribbean |
108 |
126 |
|
Middle East and North Africa |
73 |
89 |
|
Sub-Saharan Africa |
216 |
304 |
|
East Asia |
169 |
73 |
|
South Asia |
562 |
511 |
|
TOTAL |
1128 |
1103 |
Currently, the highest incidence of poverty is encountered in South Asia, where close to 50% of the population is below the poverty line, followed by 19% in sub-Saharan Africa, 15% in East Asia, and 10% in Latin America and the Caribbean. However, poverty is projected to increase by 40% in Africa, which will then account for 27% of the developing world's poor. Rural inhabitants make up more than 75% of the poor in many sub-Saharan and South Asian countries. Although the urban poor are a slight majority in Latin America, it is thought that the poorest of the poor are found in rural areas. Studies on rural poverty identify small farmers, the landless, women, nomadic pastoralists, artisanal fishermen, indigenous ethnic groups and displaced people as the most vulnerable groups in the rural sector.
While there is a general consensus that population growth and higher incomes will increase the global demand for food by 2025 to more than double current production levels, 4 there are diverging views on the capacity to mobilize resources to meet such demands. Conventional estimates give reasonable hope that they can be met at the global level without price increases, while other estimates purport to show that this can result only from the mining of natural capital, i.e., at the cost of future production. Moreover, it seems clear that some regions - especially sub-Saharan Africa - will have difficulty in meeting food needs, whether of crops, fish, livestock or forest products. Such forecasts imply upward pressure on regional food prices, thwarting, to some degree, prospects for income growth.
4 McCalla, A.F., 1994. Agriculture and Food Needs to 2025: Why We Should Be Concerned. CGIAR - Sir John Crawford Memorial Lecture, October 27 - Washington, D.C.
Although there is considerable congruence among the various estimates for demand, those pertaining to food supply vary significantly. All food supply estimates are based on the hypothesis that that there will be continuing improvements in technology and support for research in order to increase food production.
Given population and income growth, market demand for cereals and livestock products is expected to grow much faster in developing than in developed countries. 5 It is estimated that average per capita demand for foodgrains in developing countries will grow by 0.4% per year between 1990 and 2020, and demand for livestock products by 1.5%, implying a similar increase in the demand for feedgrains.
5 IFPRI, 1995. A 2020 Vision for Food, Agriculture, and the Environment: The Vision, Challenge, and Recommended Action. Washington, D.C.
Urban population in developing countries is projected to increase by 4.6% per year, rising to 43% of the population by 2025;6 a trend which will increase problems of food supply and distribution. The incomes of certain segments of urban populations are rising rapidly, leading to increasing demands for more expensive and diversified sources of carbohydrates, including high-quality cereals, as well as for livestock, fish, vegetables and forest (spices) products. The majority of urban dwellers in most developing countries, however, will continue to have limited purchasing power, thereby requiring the supply of low-cost food which stores well and is reasonably convenient to prepare.
6 UN Economic and Social Council, 1995. Concise Report on the Monitoring of World Population Trends and Policies - Report of the Secretary General, January.
At present rates of population growth, developing countries will depend on dwindling areas of cropland per person and declining access to forests, rangeland and fisheries. In Asia, for example, the current 0.15 hectares of available cropland per capita is forecast to fall to a mere 0.09 hectares by 2025.7 While many are concerned about the degradation of that shrinking land base, there are few quantitative studies on the impact of degradation on production, especially in developing countries, and those available offer widely differing predictions.
7 Renewal of the CGIAR: An Overview, 1995. In Background Documents on Major Issues. Ministerial-Level Meeting, Lucerne, 9-10 February. CGIAR
Water, too, is coming under increasing pressure. It has been noted that Agriculture in the developing world utilizes some 70% of the fresh water available and apparently accounts for a significant part of what is perceived as waste and contamination of water. IIMI will publish a report in 19978 that takes into account the increased water requirements for Agriculture, due to projected population growth, through to 2025, as well as decreases caused by expected gains in productivity from work on agricultural inputs other than water. However, the report does not take into account the possibility of substituting agricultural imports for irrigated land.
8 Seckler, D., R. De Silva, and U. Amerasinghe. Forthcoming. The IIMI Indicator of International Water Scarcity. Research Report. Colombo: IIMI
According to IIMI's research, the countries with the highest rate of water scarcity are in West Asia and North Africa. A second group facing serious future water scarcity is heavily concentrated in sub-Saharan Africa. The report assumes a higher level of irrigation efficiency than currently exists in most cases. The search for greater efficiency is assisted by the promotion of concepts that look at the performance of whole river basins, in addition to the traditional measures of irrigation efficiency.
The loss of biodiversity is another concern. Issues include ex situ and in situ conservation, and the interaction between the two, as well as themes dealing with intellectual property rights. While research on conservation is proceeding in many quarters, issues pertaining to property rights remain largely at the discussion stage.
Ex situ conservation has served agriculture well. It has provided the standard approach to conservation of biodiversity for the world's major food crops. Of the 320,000 known species of vascular plants, only 3000 are regularly exploited for food. Just two - rice and wheat-supply about half the world's food energy intake, while nine supply three quarters of the energy obtained from food.
In situ conservation on farms, and particularly in forests, is subject to varying degrees of disturbance. Grazing land, parks and reserves provide the main refuge for the remaining plant species. Of an estimated 50,000 terrestrial vertebrates 30 species of animals have been domesticated and are mainly conserved on farms. Both in situ and ex situ conservation present major challenges to science and to policy-makers, which were well documented, in the case of plant genetic resources, in the Global Plan of Action.9
9 1996, Global Plan of Action, FAO
The chief reasons for loss of plant biodiversity from ex situ genebanks are inadequate storage facilities and regeneration practices. Genetic erosion has resulted principally from the spread of modern commercial agriculture, 10 and through the unrestricted expansion of cultivation into forests and marginal lands, combined with overgrazing. Urban and industrial growth also contribute to the loss of plant genetic resources. 11
10 1996, State of the Worlds Plant Genetic Resources, FAO11 World Bank Technical Paper No. 321
Agriculture impinges on the external environment in many ways, but four areas are of special concern to the CGIAR. These are the effects of pesticides, off-site effects of soil erosion, contamination with fertilizer nutrients and disposal of effluents from intensive animal production.
The major environmental issues concerning pesticides are the negative effects some have on the health of farmers and fanning communities, and the damage that their residues cause or are suspected of causing off-site, particularly in streams and groundwater, and in food crops. This is in addition to the direct costs from the development of resistance in target pests and the loss of natural biocontrols. The environmental problems caused by pesticides have been most acute in controlling insect pests and diseases on high value cash crops such as cotton, fruits and vegetables, but they also occur with subsistence food crops such as rice.
Given the nature of pest and disease problems chemical pesticides will continue to be used and the chemical industry will continue to develop new ones, but they will be used increasingly in integrated pest management (IPM) systems. Such systems require the input of intensive research, which has important implications for the work of the CGIAR. The focus of research on integrated protection systems is tending to move from insecticides to herbicides, which have a very important role to play in developing country agriculture as part of soil-conservation cropping systems that retain plant residues on the surface. Unfortunately, chemical herbicides also have resistance and residue problems.
Erosion not only degrades soil on-site, it can cause even more costly damage off-site. The deposit of sediment in lakes and streams, dams and coastal waters can have drastic effects on water supplies for irrigation and non-agricultural purposes, as well as on the ecological health of the bodies of water and wetlands. The degradation of aquatic environments will affect fisheries of all kinds, with those dependent on estuaries at particular risk.
The environmental damage to water caused by soil erosion is compounded when associated with residues from fertilizer, and can result in affected waters becoming over rich in organic and mineral nutrients, so that algae grow rapidly and deplete the oxygen supply. However, fertilizer use is required for replenishment of essential mineral elements which agriculture tends to remove from the soil in the form of plant and animal products, with limited possibility for their subsequent return. As with IPM, the key is to develop integrated systems for management of plant nutrients and soil organic matter to achieve maximum efficiency and reduce off-site damage. 12 Another increasingly important form of nutrient contamination is nitrate in groundwater used for household supplies. The leached nitrate may have come from fertilizer, notably in those developing countries which have adopted a high-input system of cropping, or from the breakdown of soil organic matter.
12 1996 Technical Background Document 11, World Food Summit, FAO
Finally, an increasingly serious form of environmental pollution is caused by animal excreta and other wastes, even in developing countries. Pig and poultry production are forecast to increase rapidly in the growing economies of Asia, where poultry raising is already conducted in intensive units. The deleterious effects of aquaculture and culture-based fisheries arise chiefly from intensive systems, which often cause excessive nutrient and organic enrichment of water bodies and degradation of wetlands. Peri-urban dairies, which use cut-and-carry systems of feeding, could also encounter problems with manure. While there will generally be greater scope for applying animal waste products beneficially to cropland in developing rather than in industrialized countries that use high rates of mineral fertilizers, the threat of environmental pollution from the use of fertilizers and pesticides should not be overlooked in the CGIAR's research planning.
The goal of the renewed CGIAR is to conduct research that will help liberate the deprived and disadvantaged from the grip of extreme poverty and hunger. The central themes of the CGIAR vision are: less poverty; healthier, better nourished families; reduced pressure on fragile natural resources; and people-centred policies for sustainable development. 13 This is a more explicit statement of the concerns of the Group, with a more central role for poor people, than that of the past, and reflects a new appreciation for the role of agriculture and research in alleviating poverty. Earlier paradigms saw poverty and poor people as being distant from research and more the province of development. The current, more holistic view, sees agriculture as an important factor in stimulating growth and hence sees research as an important instrument for reaching the poor. This has led to a clearer sense of the impact of poverty on natural resources and the environment, as manifested in the idea of sustainable development.
13 Serageldin, I., 1995. Foreword. In Background Documents on Major Issues. Ministerial-Level Meeting, Lucerne - 9-10 February. CGIAR.
In the context of the earlier round of priority setting, this effort reflects a modest rebalancing of emphasis emerging from a heightened concern for poverty. As in the past, the guidelines orienting CGIAR activities continue to evolve as a result of new experience and knowledge.
International agricultural research has evolved over the years. Initially, the emphasis was on production aspects, focusing on crop improvement through "seed-embodied" technologies that resulted in larger "piles" of rice and wheat, albeit with uneven adoption rates. This triggered the poor-farmer-centred socioeconomic stage focused on "constraints research" in small-scale systems, and broadened analysis to include the human-ecological environment, in which technology had to fit. This wider analytical context, and the impact on society of increasing environmental degradation, expanded the emphasis towards natural resources, with special focus on their conservation. As this occurred, the CGIAR, which had been aware for some time of the need to husband natural resources, started to give these concerns more emphasis by adding new centres and increasing the allocation of research resources to the older centres.
In recognition that the sustainability of natural resources cannot be pursued independently of the interests of the poor, emphasis is now focusing on the links between poverty, productivity and natural resources, with poverty alleviation as the guiding impulse.
Science will provide increased opportunities for CGIAR research. As germplasm improvement and natural resources management are the main foci of CGIAR research to develop improved technologies, this brief overview of recent advances in science and technology concentrates on these fields. The overview will also look at advances in the field of information technology, vis-à-vis the catalytic role the renewed CGIAR could play in the development of global and regional research agendas.
Genome mapping, using tools from molecular biology and methods from biometry to synthesize concepts from classical genetics, is recognized as a valuable approach to the improvement of germplasm. Studies on cereal genetics and physical mapping are now underway in many places. One of the startling recent discoveries is that the orders of DNA sequences in the genomes of rice, maize, wheat, barley, rye, sorghum and foxtail millet are very similar. Although these species have been isolated by many thousands of years of separate evolution, their genomes have retained similar gene structures and sequences. The practical consequence of this is that knowledge of rice can be used to breed wheat, for example. Rice has a very small genome - that of any one of the component genomes of wheat is 15 times larger - so it is easier to find genes on the rice map than the wheat map. Therefore, the rice map can be searched for commercially important genes and, if found, the equivalent gene can be sought in the corresponding section of the wheat map. The same approach can be used for breeding other species in the cereals group. These new insights will strongly enhance the applications of molecular biology to cereals.
Results are already to hand which suggest similar collinearity in the genomes of pulses. Therefore, principles such as those used for cereals may soon be deployed, for example, in Phaseolus (beans), Vigna (cowpeas) or Lens (lentils). There is collinearity also between tomato and potato genomes as the two crops belong to the same genus. Since tomato is diploid and very well studied, gene probes created for tomato can be used to locate genes for breeding work in potato, which is a polyploid and thus more difficult to map. In addition, even without collinearity, the mapping of the human genome is of help in locating genes on the maps of domestic animals.
Other opportunities are also arising from detailed mapping, especially for genes which affect quantitative characters or disease resistance. Quantitative trait loci (QTLs) are genes that contribute to the expression of continuously variable characters, such as yield or height. QTLs are being located on maps and the positive (increasing) and negative (diminishing) alleles of the gene identified. The accumulation in a single plant or animal breeding line of the positive QTLs for yield will increase the yield potential of the line. Results from this process are beginning to appear for some staple crops.
When two or more genes give resistance to the same race of a disease, it is not normally possible to recognise whether one or more resistance genes is present. But, by gene tagging with markers, genotypes can be selected into which several genes have been pyramided. The presence of more than one resistance gene will prevent resistance being broken down by a single genetic change to virulence in the pathogen. Therefore, the durability of resistance will be enhanced.
Nucleic acid technology will improve research on soil microbiology and can be used to determine the composition of the population of the micro-organisms in any soil. This will enable more precise predictions of how soils should be managed to improve current productivity without hazarding the sustainability of such natural resources.
For the past decade, expectations have been high that transgenic crops, with introduced alien genes, would significantly benefit farmers in developing countries. Transgenics are expected to contribute to two components of the Group's mission; they should add to productivity by providing increased resistance to disease and insects, which would lead to a second environmental benefit, that of reducing the use of pesticides. However, attempts to exploit genetically manipulated organisms (GMOs) have been constrained, principally by the justified caution of governments in framing regulations governing the conditions under which GMOs may be released. Nonetheless, it is expected that in the immediate future more countries will permit releases to agriculture. Inevitably, the CGIAR centres will become involved with risk assessment and risk management for GMOs. Equally, they will have to be able to deal effectively with intellectual property rights over genes, gene constructs, vectors and promoters etc.
The outcome for agriculture of GMOs cannot be predicted with certainty, but caution would be wise as knowledge of the phenomenon known as "gene silencing" is inadequate. When an introduced gene is silenced, even though still present in the genome of the recipient organism, it is not expressed. Silencing often occurs when the introduced gene has a product similar to that of a gene of the recipient. The information now becoming available on production and use of transgenics will need to take into account gene silencing.
Gene cloning and protoplast fusion are being perfected using computerized micromanipulators. It is now possible to create transformation vectors that accept very large pieces of DNA, not only single genes. Transformants for multiple genes are thus obtainable. These two advances create new opportunities for genetics and for plant and animal breeding that were not possible even two years ago.
In the field of natural resources management, choices about land use 14 result from complex decision-making processes involving information on soils, climates, vegetation, location, infrastructure, potential uses, markets and available economic resources. Advances in the generation and application of geographical information systems techniques (GIS) will influence future developments in the understanding and management of processes related to the use of land resources for agriculture, forestry and fisheries. GIS is a software application designed to provide the tools to manipulate and display spatial data. In addition to computerized maps, GIS accepts, organizes, statistically analyses and displays diverse types of spatial data that are digitally referenced to a common coordinated system. As each set of data is grouped together in an overlay, new data sets can be produced by combining them, allowing the researcher to look at interactions.
14 The term "land" includes all the natural resources contained on the earth's surface: soil, terrain, water, climate and weather.
GIS techniques would facilitate the development of an interdisciplinary production/ecological approach to research on sustainability issues, as recommended by the Task Force on Sustainable Agriculture in its report to the MTM in 1995. Such information tools are gradually moving from the data storage and processing phase to the development of decision-support systems. While the underlying concepts are valid on any scale, the specific methods and techniques of implementation differ, according to the complexity of decision-making at national, district, farm and even plot level. This makes them a valuable tool for centres' research at the ecosystem level, where they could be applied to develop, inter alia, i) georeferenced temporal models to assess the incidence and rates of change in resource degradation and agricultural productivity; ii) statistical and simulation models to identify homologous natural/socioeconomic environments, thereby improving site selection and extrapolability of results; iii) georeferenced multiple stakeholder decision models to enhance collective decision-making on land-use practices and policies; and iv) models to analyse georeferenced data for conserving the biodiversity of agricultural species, by identifying criteria for selecting candidate sites for in situ conservation of genetic resources.
One of the most important opportunities may arise from combining the possibilities of remote sensing of natural resources with the power of GIS techniques to handle large data sets. This combination, together with the ability of the geological sciences to deal with problems such as the erosion of landscapes and watersheds (basins, catchments), may allow the CGIAR to overcome the location specificity of traditional, process-oriented soil science that previously limited its contribution to the System's work.
The renewed emphasis on natural resources management requires a further expansion of the conceptual framework that integrates data, information and knowledge on land-use research for agriculture, forestry and fisheries. Conventionally, scientists have used production systems as the foci for such integration, sharing information with their peers. But cooperation among institutions involved in developing a common research agenda could further benefit from linkages among their information management processes, which should then become an explicit part of the research process.
In this context, the building of ad hoc "electronic institutions" 15 around specific research programmes, could facilitate the development of regional and global partnerships as envisaged in the CGIAR renewal process. Such virtual institutions would operate as brokers, actively using available electronic information resources (e.g., databases connected by client/server relationships) and supporting services (e.g., E-mail, list servers, electronic conferences) to bring real institutions together. Their role is to increase partnership potential, by helping institutions to find each other, and then selecting the correct electronic services and appropriate "hosts" connected to the right networks.
15 Hart, R.B., 1994. Global Electronic Partnerships. Outlook on Agriculture, 23 (4):237-241.
However, certain anomalies have recently emerged in the information pertaining to natural resources management (NRM). Of special concern are: the lack of standardized methodologies and the frequent absence of appropriate statistical techniques; the frequent absence of distinction between levels of degradation easily corrected and those notably difficult to correct; and, the inconsistencies sometimes found between expert opinion and production data. Each of these adds to the difficulty of assessing the relative importance of such work. (All are discussed in more detail in Chapter 5.)
Social-science research also offers new possibilities, insights into the development and role of institutions offer promise for work in such fields as common property. Concepts dealing with the evaluation of resources will reinforce work in natural resources management as will new work in support of participatory research.
From the above it can be determined that while changes in the research environment need to be analysed to allow the CGIAR to position itself more effectively, the expansion of scientific opportunities undoubtedly raises expectations on the potential of future research by the CGIAR centres and their partners in the global agenda.
2.3.1. The Surrounding Environment
2.3.2. The Global Research System
The last years have seen the consolidation of changes leading to an increasingly interdependent world, as reflected in the enforcement of global trade agreements, the conceptual move from "food self sufficiency" to "food security", and the agreements reached at the Earth Summit and in negotiating the GATT. Few developing countries or development agencies have recognized the potential effects of such changes on agriculture, forestry and fisheries.
At the Uruguay Round of trade negotiations countries undertook commitments to reduce internal subsidies to crops, livestock, forestry and fisheries. These changes are predicted to lead to price increases of some 5% and to boost world agricultural trade significantly. Although low-income, food-importing countries will be adversely affected by higher food prices, if favourably located they may gain access to developed-country markets. Moreover, such price increases can be expected to stimulate domestic agriculture.
At the Earth Summit in 1992, it was made clear that the world could no longer think of the environment, and economic and social development, as being isolated concerns as the interactions among them were of great significance. It is worth noting that the discussions on agricultural issues in Agenda 21 focus mainly on their environmental impact, with less emphasis on poverty alleviation than in the CGIAR Agenda. UNCED brought into play several global initiatives; two of which are of special importance to the CGIAR. The Biodiversity Convention has provided guidelines to the System for the management of the biodiversity of which it is a custodian and has shaped its extension into new areas, and the Desertification Convention has encouraged the CGIAR's activities in the Sahelian region, in accordance with the importance the Convention gives to this area.
The Biodiversity Convention has a direct bearing on the work of international institutions. One of its articles assures the sovereign rights of countries over their biodiversity and allows them to seek compensation, in kind or in access to technology, for the use of their biotechnology by others. As a result, germplasm, once regarded as a common heritage, is now beginning to be seen as a tradable good. The Convention also states the rights of developing nations to have access to the new technologies that would allow them to benefit from their biodiversity, and recognizes the rights of farmers and farmer communities to preserve and use landraces for commercial purposes.
With regard to the actions of individual countries over the past decade, public sector support for Agriculture and Agricultural research has declined in real terms virtually everywhere. 16 Developed countries have reduced the proportion of public funds directed to such activities and nominal increases in some budgets have been more than offset by inflation. At the same time, development assistance agencies have also reduced their support to Agriculture in developing countries. Similar trends are evident in all but a handful of developing countries.
16 Pinstrup-Andersen, P., 1995. The Challenge for a 2020 Vision: Extent of Today's Human Suffering and a View Toward 2020. Speech made at an International Conference on "A 2020 Vision for Food, Agriculture, and the Environment". July 13-15, Washington, D.C.
Partially offsetting these effects are increases in some research fields by the private sector. Even so, investment in research on public goods has declined notably on a global basis. On the other hand, perhaps the strongest source of optimism is the emergence of regional groupings of national research capacities which promise to strengthen research agencies in developing countries and will facilitate the channelling of resources from international centres. Within regional groups, there is a growing recognition of the role of NGOs in diffusing information, in bringing a user-perspective approach to adaptive research, and in strengthening the community action which is important in natural resources management. Equally important is the possibility that regional grouping can promote effective and cost-efficient research by dividing the workload, encouraging specialization, and stimulating the sharing of results.
A major change in the conception of the CGIAR's role has been the explicit recognition that the System constitutes but a small portion of the research activity relevant to developing country Agriculture. Certainly most members had been aware of this, but its explicit expression has encouraged more precise consideration of the CGIAR's future role in the global system.
In the opinion of TAC, collaboration in a global system is a primary means of achieving greater efficiency in reaching the CGIAR's people-centred goals of poverty alleviation and the protection of natural resources. Emerging from this point of view is an enhanced sense of the possibilities available through such collaboration and centres are encouraged to work closely with others, as contractors, partners and catalysts. The discussion of these options has led to more awareness of, and sensitivity to, their latent advantages, as well as to evidence that such options are being pursued.
As part of this process, TAC has identified alternative sources of supply for the products of the CGIAR from other centres, NARS and advanced research institutes. This was an important element in TAC's review of the centres 1998-2000 MTPs. TAC believes that the external reviews should include explicit consideration of collaboration as it has an important role in ensuring efficient operations. As the development-assistance community has, through its active support, encouraged research managers to move in these directions, the concept has already had operational consequences for the System.
In view of this interest, the System intends to encourage periodic meetings of the global actors concerned, in order that global priorities can be clarified and assessed, roles identified and progress described. TAC will foster broader awareness of the advantages to be had from interdependent activities and will encourage broader participation within and outside the CGIAR.
One desirable long-term outcome of developing a global research network is the possibility of making decisions, based on the comparative advantage of each partner, as to which partner should be involved in specific actions, and to what extent, based on the comparative advantage of each partner.. Should this occur, the global community can expect even greater productivity from the research system. At present, progress in this direction is impeded by the absence of a structure to guide the effort. Moreover, few self-enforcing mechanisms are in place to support the rationalization of tasks and the delivery of products. It can be said that few agencies are better placed than the CGIAR to catalyze the evolution of the required rules-of-play.
