Getting the Picture
"In the highlands of South America, Africa, and Asia, diversity is the single most notable feature of the landscape."
After years of growth, CIP's natural resource management (NRM) research has entered a flowering phase.
Using a variety of powerful data-gathering and analytical tools, CIP scientists and their collaborators have dramatically expanded their understanding of complex highland ecosystems. In many places, the thrust is now in translating that understanding into action.
In the complex mountain environment of the Andes, farming may be practiced on steep mountain slopes or interspersed with dairying on irrigated valley floors and in high mountain pastures.
In Cajamarca, Peru, years of data collection have resulted in a comprehensive "digital atlas" of the area. This atlas, completed in 1998, combines agronomic information (cropping areas, soil types, water supply, slope, climate, etc.) with social and economic data. Government agencies and NGOs will use the digital maps to plan and implement development activities and infrastructure improvements to combat poverty and decrease land degradation. Similar atlases are now under construction for other key sites in the Andes.
In Carchi, Ecuador, CIP scientists are linking models of soil processes, pasture quality, dairy productivity, and crop growth with an economic "tradeoffs" model quantifying the costs and benefits of different scenarios in terms of health, productivity, profitability, and environmental impact. This effort should result in specific recommendations for land use and management in an important agricultural production zone, as well as in methods that will help scientists and policy makers make sound decisions in other areas.
On the altiplano of Bolivia and Peru, CIP scientists, in collaboration with researchers from a variety of national and international institutions, have used satellite images and data from ground surveys to create large-area maps for frost risk and biomass production. These maps will be indispensable in efforts to increase crop and dairy production in one of the western hemisphere’s most depressed areas.
In the mountains of central and eastern Africa, CIP researchers are working with other institutions as part of the African Highlands Initiative, which seeks to extend research findings and methods to poorly-studied areas, and to promote the idea of integrated rural development in complex mountain environments. CIP scientists are now linking integrated pest management techniques with efforts to improve soil fertility on small potato farms, with the goal of increasing productivity, reducing nutrient loss, and helping control the spread of crop diseases.
A Six-Year Push
Since its founding, CIP has been concerned with the interaction between agriculture and the environment. Center scientists have worked to reduce the use of toxic chemicals, promote the conservation and use of agricultural biodiversity, and improve land-use practices associated with potato and sweetpotato production systems.
However, CIP’s commitment to NRM per se began in 1992, around the time that the Technical Advisory Committee of the CGIAR responded to the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development with a set of guidelines to assist members in promoting sustainable agriculture. Environmental sustainability quickly became a cornerstone of the Center’s research agenda, not because of its "trendiness," but because of the very nature of root and tuber production in the developing world.
Unlike most cereal-producing areas, the environments in which potatoes and sweetpotatoes are grown are generally characterized by geographical complexity. In the highlands of South America, Africa, and Asia, diversity is the single most notable feature of the landscape. Soils, slopes, water availability, and even climate can vary dramatically within a small area.
At the same time, no activity in a highland environment occurs in a vacuum. Poor water management leads to soil erosion; soil erosion leads to poor soil fertility; poor soil fertility leads to low productivity; low productivity leads to low family incomes; low family incomes lead to environmentally inappropriate land-use decisions. In the mountains, everything is connected.
For both these reasons—complexity and interconnectedness—solutions to production and environmental challenges must be based less on broad principles than on detailed knowledge and a subtle understanding of the many forces at play in any given place.
Working in Partnerships
Natural resource management is by nature a collaborative endeavor. No single institution can fully decipher the complex human and physical reality of a locale or region, prescribe solutions to its problems, and follow through with the implementation of those solutions. Thus, CIP has worked to create a number of strategic partnerships, not only with other research institutions, but also with policy makers and development organizations.
A large part of CIP’s NRM work has been carried out through the Center’s affiliation with the Consortium for the Sustainable Development of the Andean Ecoregion (CONDESAN), which CIP helped found in 1992 (see box). CIP scientists coordinate closely with the CONDESAN directorate, and participate in a number of collaborative research activities.
CIP is also a founding member of the Global Mountain Program, which unites the Center with the African Highlands Initiative, the International Centre for Research in Agroforestry (ICRAF), the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), and the International Center for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD). Founded in 1997, the Global Mountain Program works to link research and development initiatives in the Andes, eastern and central Africa, and the Himalayan Kush.
Because natural resource management depends so much on local knowledge, capacity-building is a vital part of CIP’s NRM mandate. Center scientists have conducted workshops in the use of natural resource management tools for national research programs in Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Colombia. In 1998, the Center helped create MOSAndes, a multi-institutional soil fertility research network for the South American highlands.
