Dissemination of innovations in the Sahel zone - DISSEM-INN

The DISSEM-INN project aims to capitalise on experience relating to the innovation processes developed within nine DeSIRA projects in the Sahel. DeSIRA is a European initiative that promotes innovation for the transition of agriculture and food systems to more climate-resilient models.
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Issues

The Sahel, where the nine projects concerned are underway, is one of CIRAD’s geostrategic priorities. The different countries concerned all face similar challenges: very high population growth, extreme poverty, high climate risks and an increase in violent conflicts. All of the projects targeted attempt to address these challenges through innovation for sustainable agriculture and food security, with specific resources, methods and territories. CIRAD is involved in different ways in these projects, which are all financed through the DeSIRA initiative:

  • It is coordinator of the BIOSTAR, FAIR, IRRINN and Health & Territories projects;
  • It is a partner of the ABEE, ACCEPT and CASSECS projects;
  • It is not involved in the APSAN-Mali and INV-Niger projects.

Specifically, the DISSEM-INN project aims to produce cross-cutting knowledge based on experience sharing in the Sahel. To achieve this, two cross-cutting objectives are pursued:

  • Analysing the processes underway in the specific innovation situations within each of the projects, in order to draw lessons from the comparison of viewpoints and experience;
  • Producing resources that are of common interest to not only the projects concerned, but also to a broader audience including present and potential actors wishing to support or to engage in processes to implement innovations that address development challenges.

Description

The project comprises three types of activities, which will be conducted annually between 2022 and 2024:

2022: organisation of a regional exchange workshop. The goal is to share concepts, methods and results in order to build an information base aimed at capitalisation and the creation of a community of practice associated with information-sharing tools (website, platform).

2023: organisation of national workshops to support advocacy actions in Senegal, Burkina Faso and Niger. The goal of each workshop is to inform a national discussion on the support processes that could enable the roll-out of innovations based on the cross-cutting knowledge produced on the innovation processes developed by the DeSIRA projects.

2024: organisation of a regional review workshop. The goal is to disseminate all of the knowledge produced to a broader audience, in relation to the potential roll-out of innovations produced at the regional level in order to contribute to informing public policy and action, helping to mobilise resources and steering investment to support innovation processes.

Expected results

  • The participants in the DeSIRA projects concerned will have shared knowledge of the approaches, outcomes and lessons of the other DeSIRA projects, enabling them to reflect on their own approaches;
  • In each country where at least two DeSIRA projects are underway, a discussion will be launched on actionable innovation processes based on the outcomes of the DeSIRA projects concerned;
  • Beyond the participants in the DeSIRA projects concerned, a wider range of institutional actors from research, development and civil society in the Sahel region will have access to the knowledge produced by this regular dialogue on innovation in easily accessible and understandable formats.
Contract partners: Action pour la Promotion de l’Entreprenariat et des Systèmes d’Irrigation (APESI, Burkina Faso); Bureau d'Analyse Macro-Économique, Institut Sénégalais de la Recherche Agronomique (BAME/ISRA); West and Central African Council for Agricultural Research and Development (CORAF); Direction Générale de l’Agriculture du Ministère de l’Agriculture et de l’Élevage du Niger (DGA/MAG); GrupoTragsa; International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT/CGIAR); Institut de l'Environnement et de Recherches Agricoles du Burkina Faso (INERA); Development Innovations and Networks (IRED); Laboratoire National de l'Elevage et de Recherches Vétérinaires (LNERV/ISRA); Société Nationale d’Aménagement et d’Exploitation des Terres du Delta du Fleuve Sénégal et des Vallées du Fleuve Sénégal et de la Falémé (SAED); Gaston Berger University (UGB, Senegal).