Rashad Muhammad of Michigan State University presenting at RUFORUM AGM

Ephraim Mhlanga

AgShare at RUFORUM 11th Annual General Meeting

AgShare II, an exciting project in agricultural education at university level was recently given an opportunity to present its unique AgShare methodology and the resultant open education resources (OER) to the Regional Universities Forum for Capacity Building in Agriculture (RUFORUM). The presentation was made at the RUFORUM 11th Annual General Meeting (AGM) which took place from 25 – 29th August 2015 in Windhoek, Namibia. Ephraim Mhlanga, the AgShare project leader reports on AgShare participation at the AGM.

The AgShare methodology involves:

  • Carrying out field-based action research into farmers’ practices and needs by students, working closely with their faculty supervisors. Research is participatory and involves relevant community-wide partners within respective value chains.
  • Students, faculty and staff participating in capacity-building workshops to enhance their participatory action research, OER and media production skills.
  • Publishing students’ work as OER multimedia learning packages for incorporation into degree programs; as information for farmers that is used for extension materials; and as research in Master’s and PhD theses.
  • Publishing the OER in appropriate formats and locations leading to recognition for scholarship, teaching, research and extension. 

The value of the methodology lies in its potential to encourage more rigorous fieldwork by postgraduate students, address real problems faced by farmers through research, and link theory with practice.

The Windhoek AGM which was jointly hosted by the Government and the University of Namibia attracted many similar organisations working in the agriculture/development space in Africa. These include the Food Agricultural and Natural Resources Policy Analysis Network (FANRPAN), the African Network for Agriculture, Agroforestry and Natural Resources Education (ANAFE) and the Conservation Agriculture Regional Working Group (CARWG). The meeting was officially opened by the Namibian Minister of Agriculture, Water and Forestry, Honourable John Mutorwa.

RUFORUM - AgShare Synergy
RUFORUM is a dynamic regional platform that fosters collaboration, coordination and learning within its network of 46 member universities. Founded in 2004, the organisation’s mission is to:

…strengthen the capacities of universities to foster innovations responsive to demands of small-holder farmers through the training of high quality researchers, the output of impact-oriented research and the maintenance of collaborative working relations among researchers, farmers, national agricultural research institutions and governments.

Aims of AgShare II
The AgShare II project aims to achieve three main objectives:

  • Creation of an enabling institutional environment to support the adoption of the AgShare student-centred research methodology in identified programmes;
  • Peer-reviewed OER are produced and used to support and enhance post-graduate agricultural curricula using the AgShare method; and
  • Widespread dissemination of the AgShare methodology and related quality African OER, using multiple methods.

Both the mission and the objectives of RUFORUM are in harmony with the aim of the AgShare II initiative, namely to generate agricultural knowledge through action research involving small-holder farmers and to share that knowledge widely by packaging it in a variety of forms and releasing it as OER. There is synergy between RUFORUM’s initiatives and the various innovations AgShare is supporting in selected universities in Ethiopia and Uganda, hence the partnership in implementing the latter’s innovations in the universities.

Project implementation
There are five project teams that are implementing different initiatives in selected agricultural value chains at the three project universities being supported by Saide and Michigan State University:

  • The College of Computer and Information Science (CoCIS), working together with the College of Agriculture and Environmental Science (CAES) at Makerere University is focussing on generating indigenous agricultural knowledge.
  • The College of Veterinary Sciences Animal Resources and Biosecurity (CoVAB) also at Makerere is working on dairy hygiene.
  • The Department of Agricultural Economics (AE) at Haramaya University is working on marketing of agricultural products
  • The Department of Agricultural Information and Communication Management (AICM) also at Haramaya University is working on use of mobile technology to provide timely information to farmers, and
  • Mekelle University of dry land agriculture is working on water conservation.

Agshare Activities at the RUFORUM AGM
Ephraim Mhlanga, Andrew Moore, representing Saide, and Rashad Muhammad, from Michigan State University, all of who are part of the team supporting implementation of AgShare II in institutions co-presented at the afore-mentioned AGM. Their presentation highlighted the various initiatives being implemented by the five project teams at the three universities. They also presented on the concept of AgShare as a teaching and learning methodology that is appropriate for African universities.

Apart from presenting in the Deans’ meeting, the AgShare team also enjoyed sharing with a group of delegates in the social networking session that gave the team a good opportunity to talk with delegates, in smaller groups, about the aims, activities and implementation processes, and partners of the AgShare project. A number of participants in this session showed interest in the methodology.  In order to disseminate the methodology widely, the project support team needs to follow-up with partners that showed interest in the methodology and explore possibilities for implementing the initiative in a sustainable way.