 Our new Capacity Strengthening Department (CSD) replaces the former Training Department of CIP.
In response to requests and subject to available resources the CSD will still provide administrative, technical, and professional support services for various educational or training activities to strengthen developing countries’ research capacities and to improve potato and sweetpotato livelihoods and food security. It will continue cooperating with other CIP Departments or Divisions, Research Programs and scientists, CIP regional offices or field stations, and National Agricultural Research System (NARS) partners. It will build on past work with other Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) centers, including various CGIAR System-wide and Eco-regional Programs (SWEPs).
Training will remain a priority for CIP. However, the new CSD also recognizes that training is often just one component of a wider and more complex process of facilitated learning in a diversified capacity strengthening approach which could have potentially much broader and deeper impacts.
The CSD will help refocus CIP’s work especially in response to challenges posed by the CGIAR Science Council (SC) study (July 2006): Evaluation and Impact of Training in the CGIAR. Key observations noted there were:
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a decline in unrestricted resources available for training with more unstable, short-term project funding; |
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uncertainty about the present quality, effectiveness or impacts of training; |
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future training demands expected from NARS in order to increase and improve their research capacities; and |
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the need for better coordination and sharing of training work while enhancing the pedagogical expertise of the CGIAR system |
 To more systematically study and effectively respond to such challenges the CSD will prepare a CIP Discussion Paper on CS, learning and training issues. At the same time it will begin conducting related research to better assess CIP’s existing capacities as well as capacity strengthening, learning and training needs in cooperation with partners. The CSD will consult with CIP Staff and others to clarify the scope and objectives of this study while designing the necessary research to incorporate participatory evaluation methodologies and strategic planning approaches.
The results of the CSD’s Capacity Assessment and Needs Assessment will contribute to developing a CIP Capacity Strengthening Strategy. That strategy will complement The Strategic Plan for Research of the International Potato Center 2006-2016 (version March 2007 to revised in 2009). It is also intended to: serve the CIP Vision: Preserving the Core, Stimulating Progress; help achieve the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to eliminate global poverty and hunger while protecting the environment through agricultural research; and support CGIAR-wide cooperation on Science Council (SC) System Priorities for CGIAR Research, 2005-2015. The strategy also aims to help facilitate better identification, targeting and assessment of capacity development or strengthening objectives, outputs and impacts in the goals, projects and programs reported in CIP’s Medium Term Plan (MTP) which is revised and updated each year. The new strategy will further aim to strengthen CIP/CGIAR capacities for better understanding/enhancing potato’s role in market chains and facilitating sustainable livelihoods, while adapting to urgent, emerging, global challenges such as biodiversity conservation, climate change, conflict and other threats to health and food security.
 CIP’s CS Strategy will also incorporate new insights from education theory and research. It will include better/wider use of open/distance learning tools to make our work more accessible and effective. It will aim to build on or expand partnerships among universities, farmer-researchers, NGOs, the private sector, donors, international organizations and other CGIAR centers to help study or enhance institutional learning and change, and further policy coherence to improve aid effectiveness and scale-up potato and sweetpotato sector development impacts.
As a part of CIP’s ongoing research Capacity Strengthening activities, the CSD hosts Learning and Knowledge Seminars for visiting scholars, officials, CIP scientists and students. These seminars, with accompanying learning resources, provide an opportunity for open dialogue on science’s contribution to agriculture and development. They also a forum for sharing and debating new discoveries while supporting the development and use of new knowledge products as an international public good consistent with CIP’s mission as well as broader CGIAR system-wide objectives.
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