This paper draws lessons from two years of work with ‘innovation platforms’ that were established by the Nile Basin Development Challenge (NBDC) program in an attempt to strengthen landscape-level rainwater management in Ethiopia. The NDBC’s work included the use of an innovation fund to support pilot interventions.

Faba bean (Vicia faba L.), also called broad bean or horse bean is an annual crop, which mainly grows in the highlands of Ethiopia for human consumption. The objective of this study was to improve the quantity and quality of forages produced from intercropping of faba bean (Vicia faba L.) with forage oats (Avena sativa L.) on forage biomass, straw, grain yields, and straw quality. Farmers have an experience of not weeding faba bean plots to get more weed biomass.

This paper explores the potential benefits of working to improve the resilience of complex adaptive systems in agriculture and aquaculture through engaging in diverse partnerships among different types of research and development institutions, and the people in those institutions. We use five case studies of CPWF research-for- development efforts to draw lessons about achieving effective results in system resilience. The paper gives concrete examples of effective partnerships and the positive changes that resulted for farmer and fisher communities.

The “Improving water productivity, reducing poverty and enhancing equity in mixed crop-livestock systems in the Indo-Gangetic Basin”

was designed and conducted by the International Water Management Institute (IWMI),

in partnership with international and national partners, to address the relative neglect of

livestock water needs of crop-livestock farming systems.

The primary objective of this project was to optimize the productive use of water in the

crop-livestock farming systems of semi-arid areas to enhance livelihoods, reduce

The purpose of the project "Increasing livestock productivity in mixed crop-livestock systems in South Asia" is to develop a crop-livestock typology that will ultimately improve the effectiveness of technical and socio-economic interventions aimed at improving animal performance and protecting the natural resource base at farm level in South Asia.

Livestock production plays a key role in tropical Latin America in a changing economic environment. This study focuses on documenting the transformations of extensive production systems by using superior forage germplasm supplied by regional research systems. The adoption of improved Brachiaria grasses was evaluated from 1990 to 2003 to estimate its impact in terms of animal productivity and income in Central America and Mexico.

As the problems of impact assessement are rather intractable, a fairly simple dual approach is proposed. First the major components of environmental impact of current agricultural production systems in Africa (i.e. impact of cropping, livestock keeping, fuelwood and timber extraction and burning) are summarised. Second, "danger zones" in which current and future environmental impacts will be most severe and on which ILCA has focused its problem solving-research is identified.