Activities under this theme relate to research conducted by the OU-Côte d'Ivoire and to the planned collaboration between UNU-INRA and UNU-MERIT and UNU-WIDER, as well as with UN Agencies in Ghana. The overall objective of this theme is to identify socio-economic and policy constraints to the development and implementation of sustainable natural resource management systems, and to design ways of alleviating these constraints through studying the processes involved, developing innovations c.q. new technologies, developing and communicating policy recommendations, creating awareness, and other means to foster these goals.
Activities developed by the Operating Unit in Côte d'Ivoire include: (1) The cost of the Ivorian Conflict: Economic cost on Forestry Resources (OU-Côte d'Ivoire), and (2) The role of livestock and animal products in poverty alleviation, economic integration and natural resource conservation in Central West Africa (OU-Côte d'Ivoire). The core funding is meant to further develop these 2 proposals and to seek additional funding for their implementation. The livestock proposal will be submitted to the African Development Bank and other donors for funding.The forest resources project already received financial support from the Government of Côte d'Ivoire.
UNU-MERIT has placed a Postdoctoral Fellow at UNU-INRA for one year to conduct research on a joint project entitled "Towards an understanding of 'scaling-up' in relation to innovation in the natural resources sector in West Africa: The case of NERICA rice and the challenge of integrating technological and institutional innovations". The PDF has been supervised by Dr. Andy Hall (UNU-MERIT) and Dr. Karl Harmsen (UNU-INRA) and is now writing a publication on his research.
In parallel with the PDF project, UNU-INRA and UNU-MERIT have discussed two more project ideas: (1) Creating opportunities for innovation in Natural Resource Management in Africa, and (2) Policy Making and Natural Resource Management: A systems approach". The intention is to further develop these project ideas in fully-fledged projects. In this connection, a workshop will be organized by UNU-INRA and UNU-MERIT on the dynamics of policy making with regard to innovations and new technologies in natural resource management. The workshop will bring together potential partners in these projects and, hopefully, potential donors.
UNU-INRA continues to work as a member of a select team of UN agencies in Ghana tasked with the preparation of a system-wide project proposal to address the conflict and food insecurity problems in the three northern regions of Ghana. The UN Trust Fund for Human Security (UNTFHS) is expected to provide funding for the implementation of the project. The Project is now entitled "Enhancing Human Security through Developing Local Capacity for Holistic Community-Based Conflict Prevention in Northern Ghana" and the component on Human Security will be conducted by UNU-INRA in collaboration with the UNDP Human Security Unit in Accra and the Peace and Governance Programme at UNU Centre, Tokyo.
Future Projects
UNU-INRA is involved in 2 more (large) project proposals:
(1) A proposal for Joint Research Programme between UNU-WIDER and UNU-INRA to be submitted to DFID for funding.
(2) A proposal entitled "Enhancing Food and Human Security of Limited-Resource Farmers in the Savanna zone of West Africa" to be submitted to UNFIP for funding)
The proposed Joint Research Programme between UNU-WIDER and UNU-INRA aims at establishing and supporting a team of four African social scientists (two senior and two junior researchers) based in Accra, Ghana, who will undertake research on Africa that relates to the economic development focus of UNU-WIDER and the natural resource interests of UNU-INRA. In close collaboration with staff in Helsinki, the team will engage in projects in the WIDER Research Programme and organize seminars, lectures and conferences in Africa as a joint effort in capacity building. Members of the Accra research team will spend annual working visits at UNU-WIDER in Helsinki, and select UNU-WIDER researchers will spend shorter reciprocal periods at UNU-INRA. It is envisaged that the researchers would work on topics such as Food Security; Natural Resource Management; Land Tenure; Natural Resource Competition and Conflicts; and Factoring the possible effects of Climatic Change into Development Policies.
The proposal is entitled "Enhancing Food and Human Security of Limited-Resource Farmers in the Savanna zone of West Africa" aims at reducing poverty and improving food and human security, income and livelihoods of small-scale resource-poor farmers in the Savanna zone of West Africa.
The overall goal of this project is to reduce poverty and improve food and human security, income and livelihoods of small scale resource-poor farmers in selected communities in the savanna zone of Ghana, Burkina Faso, Togo and Cote d'Ivoire. It is anticipated that using a systems approach that integrates water use efficiency, soil and crop management, together with market opportunity identification and rural agro-enterprise development, anchored on approaches to sustainable human security, will result in significant benefits to the rural poor and the environment. The outcomes will be scaled out to wider geographic areas. In order to achieve this goal, UNU-INRA and its partners are seeking to address the following objectives and promote multi-sectoral and inter-agency integration based on their comparative advantages.
