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International Workshop Assesses Innovative Measures for Agricultural Modernization
Agricultural transformation is not a matter of quick fixes but requires visionary planning and long-term political commitment. This was one of the key messages of a workshop entitled Transforming Tropical Agriculture: An Assessment of Major Technological, Institutional and Policy Innovations, which took place on 17-19 July, at Brasilia, Brazil.
Including a full and ambitious program of presentations and discussions, the event was organized by the Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (Embrapa) in collaboration with the CGIAR and with the co-sponsorship of the World Bank.
| the background: Over the past several decades, tropical agriculture has undergone a remarkable transformation in some parts of the developing world, particularly those where rainfall, soils and other conditions are favorable. The productivity of key staple crops has increased dramatically, reducing their costs for consumers, while generating significant economic benefits within the agricultural sector and beyond. The regions that have made the most progress are those in which four conditions have coincided: 1) innovations in crop and livestock production, based on multidisciplinary research, 2) effective measures to improve management of natural resources affected by more intensive agricultural production, 3) institutional advances, such as public-private partnerships, that have fostered the development and spread of new technology and 4) government policies, such as those offering better market access, that have favored rural development.
For a variety of reasons, many tropical regions have yet to find a formula for agricultural transformation, so progress has been highly uneven. Moreover, in some areas growth in agricultural productivity has proved unsustainable, because it was achieved at the expense of natural resources, especially soils, water and forests. The challenge is to put in place the combination of scientific, technological, institutional and policy innovations that should permit sustainable agricultural growth where it has so far been limited.
Progress in some tropical areas, where marked improvement was considered unlikely, may signal the way forward. A case in point is the development of highly productive and sustainable agriculture in Brazil’s tropical savannas, or Cerrados. Another is the spread of conservation tillage for grain production in South Asia’s Indo-Gangetic Plains. |
One unusual aspect of the workshop was the active participation of current and former Brazilian government ministers, including Luís Carlos Guedes Pinto, Minister of Agriculture, Livestock and Food Supply; Sergio Machado Rezende, Minister of Science and Technology; João Paulo dos Reis Velloso, former Minister of Planning and current Director of the National Institute of Superior Studies; and Alysson Paolinelli, former Minister of Agriculture. Their contributions gave a clear signal of the strong political commitment behind research for tropical agricultural development in Brazil.
Velloso outlined key elements of planning that had led to the remarkable development of agriculture in Brazil’s central Cerrados, or savannas, and he called for a new revolution in agribusiness that would keep Brazil in the vanguard of agricultural development. Successful implementation of such plans, noted Guedes, requires a large investment in developing human resources for high-quality research. It also depends, said Rezende, on creative approaches for mobilizing resources for research, such as Brazil’s new “sectoral funds.” All four ministers stressed the value of international collaboration through, for example, Embrapa’s strong relationship with the CGIAR.
On the workshop’s second day, a session focusing on support for sustainable agricultural development provided a sketch of how that relationship can work in the policy realm.
In that session, Mark Rosegrant, director of IFPRI’s Environment and Production Technology, gave an overview of policies that helped translate Brazil’s large investment in technology and institutional development into dynamic agricultural development. He also pointed to policy measures needed to meet challenges that remain, particularly in terms of poverty reduction and environmental protection, and he explored the possible consequences for Brazil of different scenarios involving reduced agricultural subsidies in countries of the North. Next, Allyson Paolinelli offered an emotional account of how Brazil’s policies were actually implemented to achieve sustainable intensive agriculture in the Cerrados, an achievement for which he is being awarded the 2006 World Food Prize.
That and other advances in Brazil have generated significant economic impact, according to Yale economist Robert Evenson and Embrapa economist Flávio Avila, who is also a member of the CGIAR’s Standing Panel on Impact Assessment. They spoke of an ongoing Green Revolution in Brazil, which is by no means complete but has proved remarkably comprehensive, cutting across various crops and environments.
For the CGIAR staff attending the event, it represented an opportunity to put the workshop’s themes in a global perspective and to underline the powerful contribution of international public goods to agricultural transformation in Brazil and elsewhere. Presentations by the leadership of CGIAR-supported Centers provided a sampling of the wide range of approaches, technologies and knowledge emerging from their research.
Three directors general (Emile Frison of IPGRI, Frank Rijsberman of IWMI and Joachim Voss of CIAT) spoke, respectively, on biodiversity for improved livelihoods, improving the productivity of water in agriculture and improved tropical forages and bean varieties. In addition, Kevin Pixley, a program director at CIMMYT, gave an overview of achievements and challenges in maize improvement; Raj Gupta, who coordinates the CGIAR’s Rice Wheat Consortium, explained advances with conservation tillage in the Indo-Gangetic Plains; while Andrew Jarvis, an agricultural geographer with CIAT and IPGRI, outlined the implications of global climate change for agriculture and pointed to some innovative approaches for dealing with these.
For Embrapa scientists, the workshop offered an opportunity to highlight and document important achievements, such as the establishment of globally competitive and sustainable production of soybean and other crops in the Cerrados. But it also allowed them to identify the many challenges that remain, including the restoration of environmentally degraded areas of the Amazon.
The Embrapa and CGIAR presentations together, said Francisco Reifschneider, director of the CGIAR, “showed a compelling picture of the complementarities and synergies between national and international research.”
Major support for research covering a wide range of challenges in Brazil’s agriculture will be provided under a new initiative called Agrofuturo. On the afternoon prior to the workshop, Embrapa and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) signed a US$60 million contract for this initiative. The World Bank is also committed to supporting major agricultural projects with Embrapa, according to John Briscoe, the Bank’s country director for Brazil, in comments during the workshop’s closing session.
While assuming many new challenges in Brazil, Embrapa is strongly committed to international sharing of knowledge and expertise. For this purpose the organization embarked several years ago on the establishment of external research laboratories in other countries, where Brazilian researchers can work in close collaboration with foreign colleagues. There are currently two such labs (referred to as Labex) – one in the USA and another in France, which collaborates with this and other European countries -- and a third is planned for Asia. An entire workshop session, including a presentation by Yves Savidan, who chairs CIAT’s Board of Trustees, was devoted to discussing the importance of such arrangements for accelerating innovation in agriculture.
Embrapa also has a longstanding history of interaction in agricultural research with developing countries, including Africa. To further strengthen this collaboration, the organization announced recently that it is establishing an office in Accra, Ghana, which will begin work in September 2006. Embrapa’s growing commitment to international outreach represents a new opportunity for collaborative efforts with the CGIAR toward our common goal of agricultural transformation in Africa and other tropical regions.
Biofuels are one likely focal point for agricultural innovation in Brazil and for its collaboration with both developing and developed countries. The country is already a world leader in the production of ethanol from sugarcane for large-scale domestic use and export. To catalyze technical advances in this field, Embrapa has established a new research center, called Embrapa Agrienergy, which is headquartered at Brasilia and has operational units in different parts of the country.
In the workshop’s closing session, Alan MacDiarmid, who received the Nobel Prize for chemistry in 2000, outlined an ambitious scheme whereby Brazil could not only maintain but expand its leading role in biofuel development, in partnership with other developing countries, including China and India. Other concluding speakers also touched on this theme, while summing up the workshop’s main contributions. These will be documented in a scientific book to be published by Embrapa in collaboration with the CGIAR.
Agricultural transformation is not a matter of quick fixes but requires visionary planning and long-term political commitment. This was one of the key messages of a workshop entitled Transforming Tropical Agriculture: An Assessment of Major Technological, Institutional and Policy Innovations, which took place on 17-19 July, at Brasilia, Brazil.
Including a full and ambitious program of presentations and discussions, the event was organized by the Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (Embrapa) in collaboration with the CGIAR and with the co-sponsorship of the World Bank.
Click here to view the Agenda
International Workshop on Tropical Agriculture Opening Session on July 18 - Left to Right: John Briscoe, Country Director, The World Bank, Brazil, Luis Carlos Guedes Pinto, Minister of Agriculture, Livestock and Food Supply, Brazil, Silvio Crestana, Director-President, Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (Embrapa), Brazil, Francisco Reifschneider , Director, Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) |
Left to Right: Frank Rijsberman, Director General of IWMI, Sri Lanka; Joachim Voss, Director General of CIAT, Colombia; Sergio Machado Rezende, Brazil's Minister of Science and Technology; Silvio Crestana, Director President of Embrapa; and Francisco Reifschneider, Director of the CGIAR. |
Left to Right: Sergio Machado Rezende, Brazil's Minister of Science and Technology, with Silvio Crestano Director President of Embrapa, and Francisco Reifschneider, Director of the CGIAR
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Left to Right: Joao Paulo dos Reis Velloso, Director of Brazil's National Institute of Superior Studies and former Minister of Planning; Silvio Crestana, Director President of Embrapa and Rolf Kuntz, Economics Journalist, O Estado de Sao Paulo. |
 Interviews
Papers on Tropical Agriculture
- Mobilizing Resources in Agricultural Innovation - Public and Private Partnerships, presentation by Francisco Reifschneider, Director, CGIAR (check against delivery)
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Is Forest Management Improving in the Tropics?- Moctar Toure
- Agriculture, Risk and Climate Change- Andy Jarvis, Myles Fisher, Peter Jones, Simon Cook, Luigi Guarino
- Past and Future Innovations in Tropical Maize Improvement- K. Pixley, M. Banziger, H. Cordova, J. Crossa, J. Dixon, F. Kanampiu, A. Srivastava, S. Waddington and M. Warburton
- Innovative Partnerships for Better Integration and Impact- Yves Savidan
- Successes and Challenges in Improving Common Bean Productivity- S. Beebe
- Agricultural Biodiversity and Human Well-Being- Emile Frison
- Conservation Agriculture in South Asia- R.K. Gupta, K. Sayre and J.K. Ladha
- Strategies and Opportunities for Intensifying and Diversifying Livestock-based Systems in the Neotropical Savannas of Colombia- J. Voss, I. Rao, C. Lascano, E. Amezquita and L. Rivas
Complete Papers- Papers forthcoming
Related Links
Page last updated, July 27, 2006
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