IRRI, through the Closing Rice Yield Gaps Project (CORIGAP-PRO), has been working with partners to facilitate various activities for scaling out technologies to improve farming practices of smallholder farmers in irrigated rice environments.
Representatives from Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Vietnam, together with IRRI scientists and a project partner from the Philippines, participated in an Impact Pathways Workshop to share experiences and describe country-specific outscaling strategies.
In addition to commonly employed extension strategies, partners have actively used different forms of social media to reach out to farmers and other stakeholders. According to Dr. Arlyna Budi Pustika, plant protection researcher and former Collaboration and Dissemination head at the Yogyakarta Assessment Institute for Agricultural Technology, “the national and local government encourages the use of social media-based extension. More than 50 farmers and other stakeholders have formed instant messaging groups, called Food Hero and Farmer Friend as platforms for knowledge exchange to improve farming practices in Indonesia.”
Partners from Vietnam also shared their experience on a policy-driven initiative through 1M5R (One Must Do, Five Reductions). They implemented about 120 learning sessions, where farmers were introduced to practices in order to reduce seed rate, irrigation water use, fertilizer, pesticide, and postharvest losses, while using certified seeds.
The workshop participants also mapped out their network for scaling out CORIGAP technologies in each country. Furthermore, participants discussed how they can more effectively engage the network for scaling out technologies to more farmers. They also identified recommended strategies for CORIGAP technologies.
“Through this activity, we can learn from each other’s experiences to increase our repertoire of strategies and tailor-fit those for scaling out and creating impact in the associated CORIGAP countries”, says Dr. Rica Joy Flor, IRRI postdoctoral fellow focusing on innovation systems.
The workshop was facilitated by Dr. Melanie Connor and Dr. Rica Joy Flor from May 3-4 at IRRI Headquarters, Philippines.