TAC is grateful to John McIntire and his colleagues for a thought-provoking review and a well written, analytical report. The Committee is very pleased with the Panel's conclusion that the current organization of the CGIAR's work is reasonably cost effective and that there is no need for major restructuring of the way the CGIAR is operating in West Africa. The Panel's report has many useful suggestions and observations for some of the centres' research programmes on which the Committee will follow up on, through the external reviews of the centres concerned. It is to be noted that the reviews of IITA and ICRISAT are scheduled to occur during 1995 and 1996 respectively.
At the request of TAC, the Panel addressed a range of issues which were beyond its original terms of reference. By so widening the scope, TAC has given the Panel an opportunity to make additional important contributions. This has stimulated discussion and identified a range of issues for consideration by the CGIAR. Such issues include the interaction between small NARS and the CGIAR Centres, particularly the ideal and realistic division of labour and complementarities among them in a dynamic context; the comparative advantages of individual Centres and IFPRI in policy research; and the impact of CGIAR Centres.
TAC's reaction to the major themes identified in the report is provided below. Two distinct observations and lessons emerge from the West Africa Study on process issues. First, because the Panel's report covered issues other than the original terms of reference and reached controversial conclusions on several of them, it prompted stronger reaction as can be seen from the attached CDC's comments. Second, the draft report presented to TAC in October 1994 was discussed in an open session, leading to its premature circulation to donors prior to the Panel having an opportunity to fully respond to the comments of affected CGIAR Centres. The Committee of Centre Directors has expressed a concern at this procedure and TAC concurs, that circulation of the earlier draft might have given a less favourable picture of the Centres' work and impact than is warranted, particularly in view of the revisions made by the Panel in the report in response to Centre Directors' comments, and the fact that several centre programmes were in any case changing in line with what the Panel is now recommending. There is an important lesson to be learned regarding the sequence of the process of consultations and subsequent revisions given the synergetic review process.
TAC's commentary below focuses on only a few important issues covered by the Panel.
Policy Research
The Panel recommends that IFPRI should be named as a strong convening centre for socioeconomics, policy and management research in West Africa with a greater focus of IFPRI's work in Nigeria than hithertofore. This is in order to integrate the micro-economics focus of the commodity Centres with its own policy focus, and to provide leadership to the policy work.
Both IFPRI and concerned Centre Directors have objected to this recommendation on grounds of logistics, replicability of likely impact of CGIAR's policy research in Nigeria to other countries, and impact vis-a-vis that of other actors, for example, the World Bank. TAC recognized that while IFPRI may have a strong track record in policy research, this does not provide it with the natural leadership in other areas of social science and management research. Furthermore, TAC's forthcoming stripe study on policy research will address this issue in a more generic way, for example, the relationship of IFPRI with commodity centres in policy research and may reconsider this recommendation in the light of the findings of the stripe study.
Production Systems versus Germplasm Development Research
The Panel recommends that Activity Category 3 (Production Systems and Management Research) be devolved by IITA and ICRISAT to the NARS in order to augment upstream work by Centres in Categories 1 (Conservation and Management of Natural Resources) and 2 (Germplasm Enhancement and Breeding). The report also emphasizes strategic and process-oriented research in the IARCs in Category 3, and devolution of site-specific production systems to strong NARS through long-term joint programmes. It argues that the work of the IARCs should be more strategic, for example, on the development of computer models of multiple cropping and soil-water interactions, etc.
ICRISAT, ILRI and IITA are already devolving a substantial share of their applied research work to national research systems which is congruent with the Panel's recommendation. However, other recommendations, particularly with regard to the extent to which even strong NARS can take over most of the production systems and management research, remain contentious in view of the generally poor funding of the NARS in West Africa. For example, TAC does not believe that outright devolution will be appropriate under existing circumstances. Strengthening of partnerships between the Centres and NARS in the subregion will inevitably result in a shift towards the more strategic spectrum of production research by centres. TAC also notes that in recent years major efforts have been made to strengthen the organization of national research to a regional perspective e.g. through SPAAR and CORAF. These efforts merit full support and may lead to further opportunities to devolve current CGIAR activities to national agencies.
Research in Semi-Arid Areas
The Panel has recommended: (a) a high-level review of ICRISAT's crop improvement programme in West Africa, including that of CIRAD's programme for sorghum; (b) shift of ICRISAT's research effort in millet improvement from the Niamey site to a less arid area where such management issues as inter-cropping, mechanization, complex cropping patterns, and rotations can be incorporated into millet improvement.
TAC considers that, to the extent such changes are not already in process, these issues should be explored further both in the forthcoming review of ICRISAT, the cereals study, and the ecoregional initiative on the desert margins.
A Common IITA and WARDA Board
The Panel proposes a common Board of Trustees for WARDA and IITA with ex-officio representation of ICRISAT, ICRAF, and IRRI as means of harmonizing research between the two institutions.
Harmonization of boards by ensuring a few common board members is a direction in which CGIAR Centres are moving to increase inter-centre coordination of research, for example, between CIFOR and ICRAF. Yet there is no consensus in TAC that a fully common board will be either feasible or effective in harmonizing the research programmes. Cross-representation at programme committee level is a possibility which should be examined by the IITA review. It is therefore an issue which will be addressed by TAC again in the near future.
Irrigation and Water Management
The Panel expresses caution with respect to future work on irrigation and water management in West Africa. Many of what seem to be technical or social research questions are in fact problems of public policy for irrigation and water management.
TAC notes that West African governments have tended to opt for large-scale surface irrigation projects. While there is also considerable scope for the transfer of simpler, small-scale technologies, to Africa, from the viewpoint of employment, income generation, rates of return, etc, TAC believes that future policy work by others, and perhaps the CGIAR, for example on investment policies with regard to irrigation in West Africa, is needed.
