03191naa a2200121 a 450000100080000000500110000800800410001910000160006024500440007626000090012052028590012977300810298816520142004-04-24       1998    bl uuuu     u00u1 u    #d1 aTHRO, A. M.  aIssues in farmer participation for CBN.  c1998  aAbstract: Cassava is a small-farmers' crop, and farmer participation would seem to come naturally to CBN. Initially, however, CBN's interest in integrating farmers into its work was held back by the unavailability, at that time (1992-93), of any well-articulated strategy for farmer participation in research, particularly strategic research. From 1994 to 1996, CBN experimented on this own with popular methods of learning farmers' perspectives for research priority setting. From 1996 to the present, the first participatory research projects in CBN were planned and funded; and interaction was strengthened with new sources of expertise in farmer participatory methodology, particularly throgh CIAT and other programs. In the future, CBN, throuch a new regional network in Latin America, has the opportunity to further articulate strategies for linking farmers to upstream research. CBN can serve as a unique forum for on-going dialoque between strategic research and research users, linked to well-designed participatory projects. A simple typology farmer participation in the areas of: priority setting; shared action and joint experimentation; shared decision making; and strengthening farmers' own experimentation. CBN includes projects of each type. Participatory research may be conducted to improve the functional value of research (better technology, better targeted, more likely to be useful and adopted; faster impact through smoother tech transfer links) (or for the pragmatic motive of access to resources for developing technology); or, it may be conducted primarily for capacity building (to enable farmers (and researchers?) to gain new confidence and new ability to act in alarger sphere than they did before, to become better informed actors and achieve their own goals) (empowerment). CBN, as a technology provider, focuses on the first, but the two are not exclusive, and existing CBN projects combine both in varying degrees. A number of issues in farmer participatory research that will be important for CBN in future will be presented, including: effective and informed farmer demand for research; the need for a storehouse of strategic research tools and results; aspects of implementation of participatory research(e.g location-specificity; famer vs. researcher time frames; division of labor; project evaluation); and regulatory issues. Some of these issues raise questions as yet unanswered. The presentation will aim to stimulate discussion in the CBN IV working group on famer participation, discussion which may help to suggest avenues of approach to some of these issues. It will draw on ideas of J. Ashby, W. Fukuda, L. Sperling, G. Henshaw, C. Spillane, M. Iwanaga, M. Bellon, the CGIAR: System-Wide Program on Participatory Research and Gender Analysis, and many others; however, any errors are the work of the author.  tRevista Brasileira de Mandioca, Salvadorgv.17, p.81, nov, 1998. Suplemento.