Research capacity building within NARI and training in agricultural chemistry

• National Agricultural Research Institute, Papua New Guinea

This project was initiated after requests to ACIAR from the Council and Director General of the National Agricultural Research Institute (NARI) in Papua New Guinea for assistance in fulfilling the institute's mandate 'to formulate national agricultural research priorities, define sectoral research priorities and recommend on the allocation of funds for agricultural research'.

The objectives of this project were to design a framework to assess strategic directions and priorities for PNG, design a framework to assess the NARI project portfolio, and provide input to the NARI resources allocation process consistent with strategic priorities. Apart from fulfilling this national function, NARI also needed guidance in how to set its own research agenda and determine priorities for its mandated research and development (R&D) areas, encompassing traditional and alternative crops and livestock.

The project began with a series of preparatory workshops and data collection activities. Then in September 2001 a national workshop was held that brought together organisations comprising the national agricultural research system in PNG. Together they developed the strategies for the implementation plan for PNG agricultural research, which would in turn provide a framework for individual research organisations to develop their own strategic directions and priorities.

In the preparatory workshops the participants sought to meet the project's five main objectives. The first objective was to prepare a framework that satisfied NARI senior management, then to establish areas of research opportunity (AROs). Project team members completed consultations with NARI regional stakeholders in major parts of PNG, compiled statistics and data, and drafted ARO statements and evaluations. A regional analysis was also completed, together with ARO statements and a workbook in readiness for national consultations.
The second objective was to design a process for assessing NARI's project portfolio within the national framework. The team members developed national R&D priorities that were responsive to needs of stakeholders, prioritised AROs and identified research issues within each ARO to establish strategic directions. They defined national research, development and extension resources for agriculture in PNG and fostered collaboration among R&D providers and with stakeholders.
To accomplish the third objective the team members developed ARO statements further in the context of NARI's mandate (a subset of national R&D needs), including statements of NARI's strategic intent. They analysed national priorities in terms of issues emerging from the regional consultations and assessed implications for NARI's R&D portfolio. They also initiated consideration of NARI's value propositions with respect to key stakeholder groups and examined NARI's organisational arrangements in terms of roles, responsibilities and accountabilities of its managers at all levels, from scientist to Director General.
In order to provide training to NARI in strategic planning and priority setting for R&D, which was the fourth objective of the project, the project team along with advisors from the ACNARS (Australia's Contribution to the National Agricultural Research System) project developed and presented workshops with a strong participatory component. NARI staff emerged confident that they could contribute to strategic planning and priority setting for R&D.
To ensure that strategic planning and priority setting for R&D continues beyond the life of the project NARI management took steps to institutionalise the process. This was carried forward with the preparation of a resource manual, adoption of the process at the regional level by NARI's four regional research stations, and application within NARI's appraisal and decision-making processes on its project portfolio.
In the national planning workshop held in September 2001 participants established a set of national and sectoral R&D priorities. Some fine tuning remained to reconcile national priorities with regional priorities, in recognition of the different agro-ecologies and state of development of the regions.
NARI now has the tools and competence to do this without further external inputs. Some further work is needed with the tree crop research institutes to apply a similar process for their mandated crops. All these institutes participated in the national planning workshop and contributed to the development of the ARO statements and definition of research issues. This process should proceed through ongoing consultation with NARI for those many farming systems in which tree crops are grown in concert with food crops.
NARI now needs to take the results of the project into the wider national policy arena where resource allocations are made. Officers from the Department of Agriculture and Livestock (DAL) and the Department of National Planning and Monitoring (DNPM) participated in the national planning workshop and were very supportive of the approach; the Minister for Agriculture attended the final session and made a very strong supporting statement.
NARI now has its own strategic directions within the national framework, along with the tools that will enable it to undertake further analysis of its programs at the regional level - reflecting the four agro-ecological zones in which its stations operate. This will flow naturally into analysis of its current project portfolio and how this might change to better reflect national and NARI priorities.
There are also implications for the organisation of NARI's research effort and for the management processes adopted to date. In this regard the project outputs link seamlessly to the ACNARS project, which has been in a good position to address these organisational issues. NARI management recognises the need to institutionalise the planning and priority-setting approach at both the national and NARI levels, and has decided to prepare a resource manual as one means to this end.