REVIEW OF THE CGIAR SYSTEM-WIDE PROGRAMME ON INTEGRATED PEST MANAGEMENT (SP-IPM): A JOINT RESPONSE FROM IITA AND THE SP-IPM STEERING COMMITTEE

GENERAL COMMENTS

We have read and circulated the SP-IPM review report and consulted with members of the Inter Centre Working Group (ICWG/Steering Committee) of the SP-IPM to prepare this response. The response represents the common view of the convening Centre, IITA and the ICWG. We express our appreciation to the reviewers for highlighting the good progress made by the programme, providing advisory comments on IPM science and its application and suggesting an operational and governance mechanism of the programme. The SP-IPM will build upon the encouraging words by the reviewers to address the key issues raised in the report. Many of the details of the report are clearly reflective of the scientific backgrounds, interests and particular experiences of the two reviewers, the future growth of the SP-IPM will certainly benefit from their experiences. The operational shortcomings noted in the report are probably best viewed in framework of the proven ability of the SP-IPM to reorganize itself. The recommendations are stimulating and challenging, albeit with some factual errors and will guide the discussions on the best way to up-grade the programme and sustain a quality and cost-effective delivery system.

Certainly, many of the reviewers' suggestions on the future of SP-IPM go well beyond SP-IPM alone and, we look forward to feed back from the iSC on some of these issues. For example, we view the proposed concept of an “IPM virtual Centre” as alternative to the Challenge Programme approach, for which SP-IPM partners had recently submitted a concept note and pre-proposal for consideration. It is also important to stress that the body of the report acknowledges that the SP-IPM was established by the CGIAR as a mechanism to coordinate its own IPM research and outreach activities in partnership with other IARCs, ARIs, specialized global IPM implementation agencies and sub-regional/national agricultural development programmes. The CGIAR provides the resources, has the institutional and technical capacity, proven ability and appropriate linkages to coordinate collaborative partnerships required to meet the challenges in a far more effective, comprehensive and committed manner than would a “virtual Centre”. It also makes excellent and cost saving sense to work within the institutional settings offered by memoranda of understanding between the Centres and governments/inter-governmental bodies than to initiate a “virtual Centre” at extra time and budgetary costs.

The reviewers wrongly believe that IITA profiteered through research gains on the SP-IPM and cite examples to partly justify their conviction that IITA has compromised its neutrality as a convening Centre of the programme. This conclusion is partly based on factual errors in the report. IITA remains an active partner in SP-IPM and has profited mainly by openly sharing information and technical resources to improve the quality of the programme and timely delivery of products and services. Similarly, other partners have profited by working together to achieve the SP-IPM goal through better collaboration.

In terms of upgrading the programme, we agree with the reviewers that the coordinator's position be paid by CGIAR funds and not from the special donor contributions as is presently the case.

We also advocate a professional reward system that fully recognizes valuable contribution of task force leaders/members/scientists.

SPECIFIC COMMENTS

Annexes 1 - 4 accompany the following responses to specific recommendations in order to correct some factual errors in the report about the structure of the SP-IPM task forces, projects and pilot site initiatives.

Recommendation 1

The Panel recommends that in view of the global challenges from pests and pest management issues there exists a strong need and a high relevance for SP-IPM in the future. In view of the changes that the CGIAR is currently undergoing, the Panel views advancements in the internal coherence of the CGIAR research portfolio as an important pre-condition for SP-IPM to perform its role effectively. The Panel recommends that in order to be successful in the future SP-IPM should go beyond its present focus of improving co-operation among Centres and should widen its scope and take a more outward-looking approach in seeking international assistance and co-operation.

Response

We fully agree with the panel that the overriding challenge for the SP-IPM partners is to continue to develop pest control strategies/tactics and to undertake consultative activities to influence the policy environment that favours IPM adoption. The SP-IPM would, however, not want to globalise the challenges at the expense of marginalizing the location-specific nature of IPM, especially as experienced by resource-limited farming communities and national organizations.

The SP-IPM, at its inception in 1996, realized that the CGIAR Centres couldn't do the job in isolation. At the time of the review, the programme already had a relatively impressive spread of partners. The ICWG list (Annex 1), for example, includes 10 CGIAR Centres, 3 other IARCs, the FAO Global IPM Facility, the Pesticide Action Network (PAN, representing NGOs), the Global Crop Protection Federation (a private crop protection industry) and the re-emerging IPM Forum (for information dissemination). Many of these groups are also key partners to plan and execute joint activities in collaboration with at least 30 national programmes (research, extension services and NGOs) and associated farming communities in the developing world. The need to broaden partnership is further met by the programme's de-facto membership on the Governing Board of the International Association for the Plant Protection Sciences (IAPPS), the independent umbrella organization established at the 14th International Plant Protection Congress (IPPC, in Jerusalem, July 1999) to address important work on international plant protection problems/questions and plan the IPPCs. Based on need, special projects of the SP-IPM attract a wide range of ARIs, e.g., the primary partners on the whitefly project include 10 ARIs from Australia, Denmark, Germany, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States. The mechanism to attract and collaborate with other key players exists.

The SP-IPM will build on these kinds of collaborative linkages and networking to further increase its visibility outside CGIAR research circles and encourage activities to gradually break down “exclusivity” walls that may surround some individual partners.

Recommendation 2

The Panel recommends that SP-IPM should more thoroughly analyse its taskforces with regards to scope and extended problem definition in order to expand their potential global relevance. In order to carry out this task the Panel sees a strong need for an independent and strong global research network on IPM and recommends that the CGIAR make the SP-IPM a more visible part of its strategy for achieving its stated objectives.

Response

We are in full agreement with the panel on the need to re-organize our task forces (Annex 2), especially to move the task forces away from fund seeking for special projects (as their major activities) to more proactive assistance to decision-making processes by national and inter-governmental on plant protection issues of common/growing concern. Some of the SP-IPM shortcomings cited by the reviewers can be traced to the failure to attract funds for crucial task forces covering cornerstone IPM topics, not linked with direct requests by our clients for solving specific pest problems. In an atmosphere of very weak core SP-IPM funding level, these task forces easily “disappear”. The long-term value of the programme would probably lie in the capacity of re-structured task forces to provide credible and objectively verifiable information on candidate problems/issues such as crop loss and IPM impact assessment methods, insecticidal transgenic crops, beneficial micro organisms, alien invasive species, novel IPM research and extension methodologies, PQ protocol and national institutional environments to integrate IPM in mainstream agriculture. Additionally, the task forces would encourage sub-regional collaborative research for technology development and minimize “more of the same” research to reduce farmers' dependence on unsustainable plant protection options.

The SP-IPM will re-organize the multi-institutional task forces to include national programmes, universities and international specialist organizations and other similar key stakeholders with keen interest in IPM. The SP-IPM is obviously well placed to play the role of a “...strong global research network on IPM...” and we fully endorse the reviewers recommendation for the CGIAR to “...make the SP-IPM a more visible part of its strategy for achieving its stated objectives” and thereby further strengthen the foundation for leaving a legacy of ideas, processes and results.

Recommendation 3

The Panel recommends that in order to make full use of relevant disciplinary expertise, SP-IPM should more seriously explore the complementarities among programmes including different systemwide programmes and relevant Centres not included in the systemwide programme as well as outside research institutes be they advanced NARS or ARIs. To fully utilise recent advances in computer modelling and GIS that offer new potentials for the transfer of site-specific research results SP-IPM should adopt these concepts as unifying part of its major research strategies.

Response

We agree that the combination of simulation modelling and GIS techniques offers hitherto little explored opportunities to integrate local results, thus allowing researchers to see the big picture and to communicate this to a wider audience. Partnerships between CGIAR Centres and ARIs already exist and should be strengthened to tackle specific problems that escape a solution through traditional, agronomy-type studies. We would, however, like to express caution on over expectations from modelling in IPM, as it can be difficult to attribute a practical success due to modelling. While we consider GIS techniques extremely useful, their exploitation would need more investment in extension and farmer training to guarantee monitoring and assessment of pest incidence and severity. This would generate the 'ground truthing' information, without which maps generated from satellite images are of limited use for other communities. This will also be in line with the Agenda 21 objective to “put IPM practices within the reach of farmers”. The task force on farmer participatory research can explore communication media and systems, additional to existing models on participatory learning in IPM, to promote the efforts to reach a large number of farmers simultaneously.

Recommendation 4

The Panel recommends that socio-economic and policy research be added as a major component of SP-IPM. There are at least three broad themes that deserve to be given more attention if the SP-IPM wants to make relevant and significant contributions to international agricultural developments, namely (1) economically defined crop loss assessment, (2) policy research in response to national crop protection policies and international trade issues, i.e. IPM and globalisation and (3) impact assessment that incorporates natural resource management aspects into social science research.

Response

We agree with the panel's recommendation to engage in IPM policy and social research. The SP-IPM is exploring collaborative linkages with the IAPPS to undertake consultative dialogue with national governments and multi-stakeholder groups to develop/revise national plant protection plans with appropriate strategies and legislative policies to secure high and stable yields and increase user compliance of the protocols. The SP-IPM expects that the activities will emphasize the “do good” aspects of IPM and not simply re-focus attention on the “do no harm/pesticide control” aspects. The programme also expects to conduct the activities within the framework of agricultural development policies (where these exist) to create excellent opportunities for a holistic research approach on social and policy issues in food security demands. Some concerns to address would include a regulatory framework for the production, marketing, distribution and use of inorganic pesticides, biopesticides and insecticidal transgenic crops, institutional capacity and sustainability for research and education to evaluate pest problems, generate alternatives to unsustainable products/practices and enhance farm-level decision making. The World Bank Operational Policy 4.09 (cited by the reviewers; an internal bank document for project appraisal, monitoring and evaluation; under review) forms a background to build upon. In this regard the key collaborative partners in Sub-Sahara Africa, for example, will include the Inter-African Phytosanitary Council (Yaoundé, Cameroon), the FAO Regional Plant Protection Office (Accra, Ghana) and international IPM development organizations).

Recommendation 5

The SP-IPM Review Panel recommends that the status of IPM be greatly elevated within the CGIAR and to be upgraded beyond the focus of the current systemwide programme. That SP-IPM in the future should be organized as a “virtual Centre” with minimal infrastructure but maximum linkages. The Panel views this as the best way to develop a global structure that has a fair chance to overcome the problem of rising crop losses from pests and the growing level of pesticide use world-wide. The co-ordinator position should serve as a liaison and “honest broker” between the Centres and other IARCs, donors, development organizations and the GIPMF on IPM issues. The co-ordinator position should be at the level of a Centre Director. Funding for the SP-IPM programme co-ordinator position should come from CGIAR core funds. The Panel recommends to establish the virtual IPM Centre either directly under TAC/SC or alternatively with any other research organization of international status in IPM to be determined through an open bidding process and to be coupled contractually to the CGIAR.

Response

We agree that the status of the SP-IPM needs to be elevated within the CGIAR, but not with the rest of recommendation #5 for a number of reasons:

a) The SP-IPM currently has impressive membership and professional linkages; the CGIAR/IARCs and other international partners have memoranda of understanding with national governments and inter-governmental bodies. It makes far better sense to work within these institutional settings, at no cost to the SP-IPM, than to initiate a “virtual Centre” that may have to rediscover this wheel and at extra time and budgetary costs.

b) The SP-IPM was established by the CGIAR as a mechanism to coordinate its own IPM research and outreach activities within the framework of its mission. The body of the reviewers report does not dispute the fact that the CGIAR provides the resources, has the institutional and technical capacity, proven ability and appropriate linkages to coordinate collaborative partnerships required to meet these kinds of challenges. It is doubtful that an independent/“virtual Centre”, removed from the centres and from the daily challenge by local, rural and political problems, would be able to contribute effectively to the CGIAR mission to alleviate poverty. What the SP-IPM does is to harness plurality of IPM interests to serve its clients.

c) The reviewers believe that IITA profiteered through research gains on the Africa cassava mosaic disease (ACMD), Striga (parasitic weed) and stem borers and cite these examples to partly justify the conviction that IITA has compromised its neutrality as a convening Centre of the programme and is now unsuitable to host the programme. However, the facts are very much to the contrary. The prior and on-going ACMD work by IITA in Africa added significant value to the SP-IPM global project on whiteflies and whitefly transmitted viruses (Annex 3) in many ways, e.g., existing NARS networks, IITA core research activities in East/Central Africa, funded special projects with trained national field staff. On Striga, the parasitic plant task force never got funded, but IITA went ahead and did much of the work with its own core scientist, in the spirit of the task force. Presently, the SP-IPM lead Centre for Striga/parasitic flowering plants is ICRISAT and not IITA. The only ongoing work on Striga/parasitic flowering plants is limited to the SP-IPM pilot sites initiatives with ICIPE (Western Kenya), IITA, (Northern Nigeria) and ICRISAT (Mali and Burkina Faso) and ICARDA (Egypt and Morocco). The SP-IPM Coordinator plays a facilitation role in this initiative (which is not a task force). Furthermore, the only SP-IPM stem borer work is at the ICIPE pilot site. The reviewers erroneously equate the pilot sites initiative with the task force on parasitic flowering plants. The pilot sites were funded under a different mechanism specifically to promote the adoption of 'best bet IPM options' in cereal/legume intercrops with entry points Striga and/or stem borers, in Africa (Annex 4). The evolving pilot site initiative tries to pick up some good ideas from several sources to achieve stronger organizational partnerships, a more inter-disciplinary approach, including social sciences input, participatory methods and impact analysis. In fact, we believe that this pilot site initiative could be a better way forward for the SP-IPM than the existing task forces. We hope to expand/duplicate this concept around other pest problems and with other centres, collaborators and countries (see also response to recommendation 2). In fact, the stimulating interplay between core activities of the centres and their SP-IPM contributions and collaborative activities is the basis of SP-IPM.

d) The ICWG of the SP-IPM had recently had two opportunities to discuss management structure, but on both occasions the members did not express any strong desire to move the convening Centre from the CGIAR and for that matter from IITA. ICIPE had raised the need to rotate the Secretariat and offered to host the Secretariat, but the issue has received no echo from the general membership. A recent suggestion concerns the need to discuss programme management structure. This is more important in the event that the SP-IPM evolve into a Challenge programme. The ICWG will certainly re-visit the broader issue of SP-IPM management structure at its next annual general meeting in April 2002.

e) The key management issue relates largely to how closely the Programme Leader and Coordinating Secretary interact with each other and with the ICWG to promote activities by task forces, projects and special initiatives. The report indicates that the task of organizing and developing SP-IPM had been unevenly shared between the then Programme Leader and Coordinator/Secretary, with the latter taking on much of the duties. Our current description of a Coordinator is “a facilitator, advocate, consensus builder and day-to-day organizer”, these elements of coordination focus mainly on people (building partnerships), things (provision of technical and material resources), processes (facilitation, programmatic issues) and money (budgeting and disbursement). The Programme Leader takes on the other roles of technical linkage with task forces to advise on scientific content, fund raising/donor relations and CGIAR relations. This is practically the “small team” advocated by the reviewers for the management of the virtual IPM Centre. In short, we think that the presently practised consultative interactions and sharing of roles between the Programme Leader and Coordinator and amongst partners is a better way forward for SP-IPM implementation than new structures, new locations etc.

f) The administrative position of the coordinator of the SP-IPM is the highest position possible in the organigram of the convening Centre, IITA, namely 'Project Coordinator'. The position is not 'deep within the hierarchy', this phrase, as stated in the report, gives an erroneous impression that the coordinator lacks the freedom to act. In terms of upgrading the programme, we agree with the reviewers that the coordinator's position be paid by CGIAR funds and not from the special donor contributions as obtains presently. We also advocate a professional reward system that fully recognizes valuable contribution of task force leaders/members/scientists. Involving Centre DGs to formerly endorse institutional representatives on the SP-IPM could pave the way for appropriate reward systems (centre-specific) to the scientists.

Annex 1: Members of the Inter-Centre Working Group on IPM (^* CGIAR Centre)

Annex 2: The SP-IPM projects, task forces and special initiatives

Annex 3: Sub-projects of the global project on whiteflies

Annex 4: The SP-IPM pilot sites initiative

Dr. Emil Q. Javier
Chair, Technical Advisory Committee
Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research
Institute of Plant Breeding
University of the Philippines at Los Banos
College, Laguna, 4031, Philippines

6 January 2002

Dear Dr. Javier,

On behalf of Professor Waibel and myself, I am pleased to submit to you the Report of System-wide Programme on Integrated Pest management (SP-IPM). The Panel reviewed, as requested, the research programme and management aspects of the programme making every effort to present an accurate account of the outputs, achievements and what is known about the impact of the programme.

IPM globally faces new challenge as it enters the biotechnology era in pest control, this without ever fully understanding fully the challenges of past technologies. The challenges for the CGIAR system are especially great if IPM is to flourish and take its proper role in the crop production research for developing countries and on the larger global scale. We have noted in this report the many strengths of the SP-IPM and its critical role in conducting research aimed at poverty alleviation, enhancing food security and sustaining the environment in developing areas around the world. The report also focuses on several areas that need strengthening, especially in the area of modern techniques of analysis, policy environment and the social science. Professor Waibel and I were of a common view that there are exciting opportunities for SP-IPM to exert leadership globally in IPM research and implementation - a role that it must vigorously pursue for the common good.

This review was, by all accounts, the most challenging assignment I have ever undertaken, but one that Professor Waibel and I feel is of utmost importance. I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for the opportunity to be of service in this arduous task and for providing the opportunity to work with Hermann Waibel - we worked exceedingly well together, with incredible energy and commitment and cemented a strong friendship. On behalf of Professor Waibel, I would like to express our sincere appreciation to the many CGIAR scientists whose enthusiasm lightened our burden and made us push through the many revisions - we sincerely hope this review strengthens their ability to do even more creative work. We apologise for going beyond our TORs, but it proved necessary to do justice to the future of IPM in the CGIAR.

We sincerely hope our report will be a useful instrument to CGIAR members, TAC and to the Centres.

Yours sincerely,

Andrew Paul Gutierrez, Chair
Herman Waibel