Determining advisory service investments and capacities

1. Determining advisory service investments and capacities Presented by Magdalena L. BLUM FAO Research and Extension Branch Stakeholder workshop on tracking investments in Agricultural Research for Development Berlin, 20. January 2012

2. Existing initiatives • Extension studies and assessments • IFPRI-FAO-IICA: Worldwide extension study • USAID-MAES – country in-depth studies in up to 30 countries • FAO investment assessments • FAO in-depth studies as part of technical assistance projects • studies from other development partners • Farmer organizations • IFAP data base • membership lists of sub-regional organizations and national federations

3. Worldwide extension study Purpose: • Identify what extension systems are now existing in the countries, what changes have occurred? Characteristics: • Worldwide, Questionnaire for advisory service providers (en, fr, sp) Output: • Low return of filled questionnaires due to several problems, not representative

4. Major problems • Identification of who are the advisory providers • What is included in advisory services? • Missing M&E systems in the countries • Lack of aggregated data • no or little records on extension providers/FOs • particularly contribution of private sector not recorded • also for the decentralized public structures, no or little data is aggregated • how far is existing data representative? • In most countries national extension platforms are not yet or not well established

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8. Investment Assessment Study Purpose: • Identify Investment requirements in 9 sectors in the Zero Hunger Objective by 2025 Characteristics: • 94 countries, questionnaires (en, fr, sp) for 9 sectors, one consultant per country Outcome: • partly filled in questionnaires most countries • analysis of the country investment situation, country briefs, most of them validated in workshops • projections of future investment needs (2010-2025)

9. Major problems • Identification of who are the advisory providers (less of a problem with research) • Missing M&E systems, hence missing data, particularly investment data, but also missing qualitative data/info • Lack of aggregated data • no or little records on extension providers/FOs • contribution of private sector not recorded • little breakdown of subsectors (agric., fisheries, forestry, rural dev) • how far is existing data representative?

10. Investment targets for EXTENSION Earlier target estimates 2% of AgGDP (Worldbank, 1981) 1% of AgGDP (Roseboom/FAO, 2004) 1000 agricultural labor per extension agent (Roseboom, 2004) A country specific formula developed Basic equation Extension investments = No of Extension agents * average cost per agent (country specific) (country specific)

11. Number of extension advisors Definition of Active rural population per extension advisor (ratio): interval [500-2000] A country specific definition of based on socio-economic macro indicators (= baseline scenario) rural population density (WB) poverty and malnutrition (FAO, WB) - poverty headcount ratio at $2 a day (% of population, WB) - prevalence of undernourishment (% of population, WB) - GNP/capita (PPP) (WB) access to information - radio, mobile, internet (World Resources Institute, WB) Agent Ratio * active rural population = country specific no of extension agents

12. Number of active rural population per extension agent ratio [500-2000] Countries The bubble size depends on the required number of extension agents in the country.

13. Country specific cost per extension agent * Roseboom (2004) ** Lower interval larger than 20% to ensure continuity.

14. Selected Country Results

15. TOP 10 (2011) Burundi 6,43 Lesotho 4,37 Chad 4,09 Eritrea 3,89 Zimbabwe 3,17 Ethiopia 2,98 Malawi 2,92 Congo, DR 2,64 Madagascar 2,64 Niger 2,55 FAO target, Roseboom (2004) 1% of AgGDP

16. Annual required investment in extension (in % of AgGDP) The bubble size depends on the monetary value of the investment in the country.

17. Scenario including Climate Change Baseline scenario with same weighting of indicators Uneven distribution in the scale [1-94] [1-94] ranking converted in a reduced predefined AGENT ratio (Bx) interval of [500-1500] Increase of cost per extension agent based on Climate Change Vulnerability Index

18. Climate Change Vulnerability Index BASED ON EVI INDEX, SOPAC/UNEP (2005)

20. Target Investments – Regional averages (2009) in percentage of AgGDP

21. Potential saving in annual extension expenditure Improved information access: Ethiopia (7 million USD) Increased mobile subscription from 37 to 160; Internet access from 4 to 10; Radios from 185 to 200 per 1000 Bangladesh (48 million USD) Increased mobile subscription to 400, Internet access to 60 and radios up to 200 per 1000 people Reducing poverty and hunger: Bangladesh (25 million USD) Reducing poverty headcount ratio by about half to 40% Angola (3 million USD) Reducing undernourishment by half to 20%

22. Use of results Model provides an overall investment target (public and private sector) on extension Long term savings possible depending on how investments are done Results can be used as an ex-ante assessment tool for targeting international development funds For the poorest countries where the required annual extension exceeds substantially 1% of the AgGDP: 1 to 2 international aid dollar could be contributed to every national dollar invested

23. Discussion • Discrepancy between real and required investments ⇒ more investment required • Some small countries may have higher investments (do not benefit from economies of scale) • The quality of spending is as important as the overall spending targets • What should be the Priority investment areas? • Reform of extension - institutional/org. innovations • Research and extension human capacity • Demand side financing of extension and programme benefiting FOs • Programme management efficiency/effectiveness • Technology, information access, infrastructure

24. Recommendations • more reliable primary data needed • comparability of data • sustainable data collection in the countries • capacities in the countries need to be improved • testing of how investments can be done in a more efficient and effective way • financial innovations needed and testing of new financial mechanisms, particularly pull mechanisms

25. What do we want to know? • What amount is invested in a given sector in a given country? For whom? • What amount should be invested? For what? For whom?based needs/demands/criteria • How should be invested to reach certain goals/impact? - ownership, empowerment, inclusive growth, gender equity, institutional capacities, innovation capacity, outreach/to whom?, etc. • What importance has each question for development effectiveness?

26. How to reach sustainability? • Institutional anchorage in the countries • national statistical offices • platforms of extension services • federations of Fos • Research councils • Training of HR in order to establish • data collection capacities • data analysis capacities (to a certain extend) • Streamlining within national data systems • including some national funding

27. Thank you for your attention!