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Research reports for Bolivia

Combating potato pests safely in Bolivia
Potato farmers in Bolivia, and their children, are learning about biological controls and integrated pest management. The potato is the staple food in Andean countries as well as the main cash crop. But pests and diseases cause huge losses each year. So, farmers use more and more pesticides, threatening human health and damaging the environment. Books for farmers, teachers and children introduce the ideas of integrated pest management. Children help in the potato fields, so raising their interest at an early age could pay off later. Farmers are also testing traps baited with natural extracts. These could help safely control the Andean potato weevil. Locally made traps intercept weevils heading for the potatoes. Other farm communities are keen to test the traps so demand could grow significantly. (Ref: CPP57)
Talking pictures: new tools to boost smallholders' milk production
New tools have been developed and tested in Bolivia, Tanzania, Kenya and India to help smallholder dairy farmers manage their animals better and greatly boost the amount of milk they produce. The improved breeds of cattle now available can produce up to 25 litres of milk per day, but many are producing similar amounts to local breeds simply because of poor management. To overcome this, researchers have produced software like the dairy rationing system for the tropics (DRASTIC), which trained users can use to predict what effect a particular mix of feeds will have on milk production. Another tool is Talking Pictures-Dairy (TP-D) which can be used to generate pictorial guides that local producers can easily understand and relate to. (Ref: LPP02)
Easy-to-use software provides the poor with access to information
Interactive learning software has been created to give users in Kenya and Bolivia access to information. The Daktari and Promotor programs are suitable for use even by the illiterate, and can give poor households who aren't reached by the extension services access to vital information. Poor users' access the software through kiosks placed in their community. And, despite the fact that only a small number of these kiosks are available, these programs have already been used by more than 6000 households. The programs are also complemented by digital forums. These can be accessed by policy makers and planners who want to gain better insights into the needs of the poor by finding out what information they are requesting. (Ref: LPP30)
Genetically-engineered resistance to potato nematodes
Potatoes that are genetically modified to resist nematodes are ready to use. Nematodes are parasites that cause huge crop losses - about US$125 billion a year - or enough to provide for 50 million people in Africa. Already accepted in Bolivia, Peru, India and China, nematode-resistant potatoes could boost potato harvests worldwide. People just need to be reassured that they are completely safe, both as food and for the environment. Breeding nematode resistance in potatoes by conventional methods takes ages - up to fifty years. Now, the gene technology makes it possible very quickly. So, the technology has a huge potential for crops that are important for reducing poverty but are neglected by profit-oriented plant breeders. (Ref: PSP21)
Improved livestock practices for highland communities
In Bolivia, work has been underway to find better ways of managing draught animals in the Andes. As part of this, the project has addressed the need to treat animals well and keep them healthy so that they can work for longer. But, importantly, it has also tackled the fact that inappropriate tillage practices are causing the delicate soils of the area to degrade, reducing productivity and forcing people to leave land on which they can no longer make a living. The project's outputs include the development of better ways of allocating feed, housing animals and caring for their health. It has also developed new equipment specifically for working the delicate soils found in hillside environments, and identified better ways to manage soil and conserve water. (Ref: LPP12)
Improving soil quality and fighting erosion in the Andes
Work has been ongoing in the Andean valleys of Bolivia to find ways of combating soil erosion and falling soil fertility levels - problems which affect similar semi-arid areas throughout South America. These problems hit poor subsistence farmers particularly hard and are forcing people to migrate from the country into cities. One of the main reasons that soil fertility is degrading is the fact that fields are not being left to lie fallow for sufficiently long. Options identified to combat this include the use of grasses and leguminous cover crops like woolly pod vetch. These act as barriers, protecting bare uncropped land from erosion and also boost the fertility of the land they are grown on. (Ref: LPP15)
Making it easier to keep small animals
In partnership with producers, studies have identified the problems that farmers living at the edges of forests in tropical Bolivia face when keeping small animals. The research addressed the needs of chickens, ducks, pigs, hair sheep and guinea pigs - all of which had been ignored by past studies. Once problems had been identified, it was possible to solve many of them using very simple measures. The number of chicks, piglets and lambs that died was reduced simply by applying up-to-date veterinary guidelines for vaccination and parasite control, for example. Improving housing and building nest-boxes and farrowing pens also increased the survival rate of piglets and chicks. Applying this approach elsewhere could greatly improve the livelihoods of poor families keeping different types of small animals. (Ref: LPP20)
New market chain approach gives fast results
The Participatory Market Chain Approach (PMCA) stimulates networking, links small farmers to markets and fosters productive partnerships based on trust and knowledge sharing. Active participation - or a lack of it - by the many actors along the food chain can make or break the system. PMCA systematically involves people in identifying and assessing market opportunities and identifying commercial, technical and institutional innovations. A poverty filter helps identify the greatest probabilities of pro-poor impact. In just three to six months, partners are typically able to get new market products and innovations into use. PMCA is currently being applied in Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru and Nicaragua, in Latin America, as well as in Laos, Syria and Uganda. Extensive testing has led to the publication of a PMCA User Guide. (Ref: CPH01)
Powerful planning tool for river basins and lakes
A new planning tool for river basins and lakes helps track trends and measure the likely results of changes to policies or regulations. Previous methods involved collecting large amounts of data and were expensive and time-consuming. Now, planners can quickly call up scenarios showing the impact of various options on rural development. The modelling tool is based on an extensive database of lake and river basin information from across the tropics. Proven in river and lake fisheries in Nepal, India, Bangladesh and Bolivia, FAO has now incorporated elements into the African Water Resources Database and the World Fisheries and Aquaculture Atlas. This tool also has great potential to be applied more widely, to water resources, human impact and climate change. (Ref: FMSP01)
Too many mouths to feed: a new tool to allocate feed efficiently
The OXFEED decision-support tool is now available to help farmers get the most from the feed they have available. The tool takes into account the fact that draft animals have to be given a minimum amount of food to allow them to do the work required of them as efficiently as possible. But, overfeeding them wastes resources that could be used to feed other livestock or for mulching and green manuring. OXFEED can base its �conclusions' for feed allocation on local data - which means that recommendations will be relevant to specific farmers in a specific area. And, it's simple to use. However, the tool is not widely known, and its current usage is mainly limited to Bolivia. (Ref: LPP10)
Capturing farmers' demands and involving them in research
A new menu of methods now helps farmers and researchers work together more productively. Farmers want and need change. So finding out what they want isn't a one-off process, it's continuous. And, like everyone else, there are things out there that farmers don't know about, so they don't know whether or not they might need them. Then, when suggestions are made to meet their needs, they like to be involved in testing them out. Development agencies, research organisations, foundations and non-government organisations already use the methods. Teamwork between researchers and farmers relies on social principles. These principles work as well with new equipment for draught animals as with integrated pest management, whether the topic is potato, rabbits or rice. (Ref: CPP58)
Weighing up the pros and cons of commercializing non-timber forest products
Three new tools are now available to help weigh up the pros and cons of commercializing non-timber forest products. A book looks at how harvesting and selling forest products could make a difference to the lives of the poor and what factors need to be considered. A manual, developed and tested in rural communities, maps out ways to scale-up, add value and overcome obstacles along the marketing chain. Then, a computer program helps compare options to reduce the risk of failure. National networks, researchers and development agencies already draw on these tools to help shape their programmes. Both producing and importing countries and regions use them - Mexico, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Vietnam, the Nile Basin, Sahelian West Africa, the Mekong Delta and the Philippines. (Ref: FRP42)
A new kind of extension worker: the Livestock Guru
Researchers working in India have developed Livestock Guru - a multi-media interactive learning program to teach farmers about animal health, welfare, and production. The program is available in two languages (Tamil and Oriya) and poor livestock keepers are being given access to it through kiosks with computing facilities. In Tamil Nadu and Pondicherry, these kiosks are permanently available in local village knowledge centres. In Orissa, on the other hand, they are being placed in NGO training centres and local government offices for two months before being moved on. Importantly, the program keeps a record of exactly what information users ask for. This information can then be used to make decision makers aware of the needs of the poor and to update the program. (Ref: LPP25)
How can we increase the impact and uptake of research?
A demand-driven framework for scaling-up research findings is making inroads into poverty and improving livelihoods. It identifies the key strategies that must be put in place - forging strong networks and partnerships, building institutional capacity and ear-marking appropriate funding - and points out that research must be genuinely demand-led, and that researchers must be made more accountable for research impacts. The framework was used in the development of the DFID-NRSP's strategy for communication and scaling-up, and adopted by the World Bank, CIAT, ILRI, FAO, and the Kenya Forestry Research Institute. It is used by USAID projects in the Andes, South-East Asia and West Africa, and by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) in Nepal. (Ref: NRSP05)
New decision tools to target restocking effortss
Decision-support tools are now available to help NGOs, donors and governments identify which households and communities would benefit most from restocking efforts. Restocking projects can greatly improve the food and livelihood security of vulnerable farmers and pastoralists. However, the impact they have on poverty is often low because they are badly targeted. By learning lessons from past projects, the new support tools could help to avoid this in the future. The tools are now being used by a wide range of practitioners, working with many different kinds of stakeholders around the world - ranging from pastoralists in Mongolia and refugees in Bosnia, to smallholders in South Asia suffering as a result of avian influenza. (Ref: LPP22)
Teaching smallholders to combat soil erosion
A systems framework forms the basis of a training tool for field professionals working with smallholder households on the impact of farming activities on soil erosion and conservation. Methods for the field assessment of both biophysical and economic aspects of erosion and conservation by developing country professionals and field staff are included. The methodology has been published and presented at meetings and training workshops. The publication was originally put on the Internet and is now available in print in English and Spanish, with an Arabic version in preparation. The technique has been widely adopted around the world. It is used in 26 countries with eight more about to take it up. This includes 12 countries of sub-Saharan Africa. (Ref: NRSP06)
Guides to better livelihoods
To help poor forest users make better use of the resources around them, researchers have worked with local people to produce field guides and create methods for identifying useful local plants. Outputs include policy briefings, a book to teach in-country partners how to produce usable easy-to-understand local field guides and a whole range of field guides suitable for use by local people. These are targeted at different countries, such as Bolivia, Brazil, Peru, Cameroon, Grenada, the West Indies and Ghana. This work has created a popular approach that local people can readily benefit from. Demand for the handbook on field guide preparation is high, and copies have been distributed to at least 15 countries. (Ref: FRP37)

RNRRS legacy: Rest of the World

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