The institutional and organizational implications of integrating natural resource management and production-oriented research

Abstract

This paper discusses some of the organizational and institutional implications for national agricultural research systems (NARS) of integrating natural resource management and environmental concerns into their agricultural research agendas. Integrating these concerns adds significantly to the responsibilities of NARS at a time when there is already a heavy demand on their shrinking research resources. NARS face the difficult task of maintaining a balance between production-oriented research and environmental concerns. This paper discusses the implications for NARS of four key issues related to organizational and institutional change: cross-sectoral planning as the key to integrating environmental and development goals; information as a key requirement for the planning process; a participatory, decentralized approach in both planning and implementation as a key to success; and institution building as an essential objective in all sectors related to agriculture.