A number of international agricultural research and development centres are independently managed, working on behalf of their member countries and development aims. These include CABI, CATIE, AVRDC, ICBA, ICIMOD, ICIPE, IFDC, INBAR and CFFRC. These are centres of significant scale, that work through a range of different funding models and partnerships in agricultural research, extension and capacity development, all as not-for-profit international organizations.

 

The Centres are seeking to bring their work more closely together and further increase their collective value and development impact.  The Directors-General of these centres have come together for the first time, in a meeting at FAO hosted and facilitated by GFAR, the Global Forum on Agricultural Research. This meeting is exploring areas of common focus among the centres concerned and working to develop new collective actions, synergies and partnerships in and beyond this group, to deliver development impacts at scale in their areas of expertise.

 

GFAR works to transform and strengthen AR4D systems at all levels to be more relevant and effective in meeting development needs around the world.  The meeting at 2pm on Friday provides an excellent opportunity for staff of FAO to meet with the Directors General of all these centres, to hear the outcome of their discussions and have opportunity to explore potential partnership with their activities and programmes.