Opening Agricultural Knowledge for All

"The impact that public knowledge and research can have on agricultural and rural development and natural resources management is limited because most of these outputs are not easily or widely accessible. But this doesn’t have to be the case..."

This toolkit is designed for researchers, scientists, managers, and information/communication professionals with an interest in opening up agricultural knowledge and research. It is a response to their need to advocate to raise awareness and change behaviour with regard to agricultural innovation systems - described here as vital in the struggle to improve productivity, nutrition, food security, and environmental conservation in developing countries. In the case of opening up agricultural knowledge, advocacy is about:

• raising awareness amongst various groups about the reality of "locked up" knowledge, how to open it up, the benefits, the incentives for doing so, costs, and the necessary action;
• making a case for unlocking agricultural knowledge - including key issues and evidence;
• convincing decisionmakers to provide decisions, resources, policies, or other forms of support towards actions to unlock agricultural knowledge; and
• moving forward an agenda and action plan to open up agricultural knowledge in an organisation or institute.

Examples of opportunities for advocacy are described, such as internal meetings, technical seminars, technical workshops, training events for researchers, launches of organisational websites and intranets, and an internal newsletter.

The tools here are designed to help people prepare a supporting argument that outlines the possible benefits and incentives that would be applicable and provides some supporting evidence. There are pages on designing approaches, selecting targets, building case methods and tools, and using evidence to support advocacy, as well as some case studies. Specifically:

1. "What is advocacy and why it is useful
2. How to build an advocacy case for an organization
3. What evidence to use to support advocacy
4. When and where to advocate
5. How to plan and develop a strategic approach to advocacy
6. How to select and target key decision-makers
7. Methods and tools to support advocacy
8. Top 10 tips for advocacy
9. Examples of advocacy - case studies
10. References and resources used in this Toolkit"

This toolkit has been compiled and is housed by the global movement on Coherence in Information for Agricultural Research for Development (CIARD). This movement is working to make the outputs of agricultural research publicly available and accessible to all. This means working with organisations that create or hold knowledge and information - to help them disseminate it more efficiently and make it easier to access. The CIARD partners coordinate their efforts to promote common formats for information sharing and exchange, and adopt open information systems approaches. The toolkit was prepared with input from various CIARD partners. It particularly involved: the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR); Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO); Global Forum on International Agricultural Research (GFAR); and the regional research forums in: the Asia/Pacific (Asia Pacific Association of Agricultural Research Institutions, or APAARI), Latin America and the Caribbean (Forum for the Americas on Agricultural Research and Technology Development (FORAGRO)/Interamerican Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture, or IICA), and the Near East (Association for Agriculturel Research Institutes in the Near East and North Africa, or AARINENA).