Allen, W. 2001. Working together for environmental management: the role of information sharing and collaborative learning. PhD Dissertation, Development Studies, Massey University, New Zealand.

Van Mele, P. and A.K.M. Zakaria. 2003. Women-to-Women Extension of Post-harvest Innovations. CABI Bioscience and Rural Development Academy, Bogra, Bangladesh.This comprises four award-winning training videos(English and Bangla):    * Spotted seed means diseased seed    * Seed cleaning by floatation    * Well-dried seed is good seed    * Seed preservation techniquesOrdering information: contact Mamunul Haque (IRRI-Bangladesh

Wollenberg, E.; Anderson, J.; Lopez, C. 2005. Though all things differ: pluralism as a basis for cooperation in forests. Bogor, Indonesia, CIFOR. vii, 101p.Beginning in the mid 1990s, practitioners and theoreticians working in forestry and rural development around the world observed that conflicting interests and increasingly different and independent perspectives on forests required a fundamentally new approach to forest decision-making. Relying on recommendations and decisions made by centralized forest departments and experts was no longer sufficient for meet the diverse needs of society. Pluralism offered an alternative that more closely matched social realities. Pluralism could also provide checks and balances to help learning and control power imbalances. In 1997 a working group on pluralism, sustainable forestry and rural development therefore met at the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) in Rome to explore the possibilities for developing cooperation among different groups in the forest sector. One of the conclusions of the workshop was the need for “more research, including comparative analysis and detailed case studies” (1999:8).

Allen, W. NRM-Changelinks.Net. Links for developing Change in Natural Resource Management: an on-line resource guide for those seeking to improve the use of collaborative and learning-based approaches. Manaaki Whenua - Landcare Research, New Zealand and Natural Resource Management Programme, Massey University, New Zealand.

van de Fliert, E and A. R. Braun 2001. Conceptualizing Integrative, Farmer Participatory Research for Sustainable Agriculture: From Opportunities to Impact. Working Document No. 16. PRGA Program. Cali, Colombia.

Vaughan, C., Mulonga, S and Katjiua, J.B. 2003. Cash from Conservation: Torra Community Tastes the Benefits. A Short Survey and Review of the Torra Conservancy Cash Payouts to Individual Registered Members. WILD Working Paper 15.Between January and October 2003, Torra Conservancy implemented the ongoing process of distributing N$ 630 to each of its registered members. Torra Conservancy Committee (TCC) allocated N$ 200,000 in total for the cash payout to individual registered members. The WILD Project in conjunction with the TCC and community members conducted a short questionnaire survey (67 respondents) and held a number of interviews with TCC, NGOs, MET and community members to review the payout. The research documents the experiences from the payout and provides options to support future payouts.Torra is a premier conservancy that is financially self-sustaining. It has generated considerable income (approximately N$ 1.2-1.5 million) from its joint venture with Wilderness Safaris at Damaraland Camp, trophy hunting and live game sales. The payout to individual registered members is a clear demonstration of the potential of the conservancy and CBNRM programme to make tangible livelihood benefits available to communal-area residents and stands as an example for other conservancies to follow. The majority of respondents were pleased with the payout and receipt of cash income. However, 97% of respondents were unaware of how the conservancy generated its income and 85% were unaware of the how the money was spent, which indicates a shortfall in terms of disseminating information, especially financial, to conservancy members. This limits the ability of members to make the link between income generated and wildlife conservation and tourism, and their awareness of alternative (i.e. financial) values for wildlife. The conservancy should disseminate more information, especially financial information, to its members to increase transparency, instil ownership, pride and awareness of income-generating activities and alternative wildlife values.Monitoring needs to be conducted into how receiving distributed cash acts as an incentive for living with wildlife. The community was not consulted in the decision- making process for the payout, not involved in setting the total amount for distribution, nor the amount allocated for individual members. The primary rationale for the payout was a response to community pressure to ‘taste’ the cash. The community was not consulted as to who (e.g. members versus non-members, or individuals versus households) should receive the payout or on the criteria used to confirm eligibility for receipt of the payout. There was minimal community involvement in setting the criteria and ‘rules’ for the process of the payment. In future, full community involvement should be incorporated to ensure transparency and accountability for decision-making over payouts. This could be achieved through publications, the radio, holding meetings on specific issues, and by conducting farm visits and action-orientated research.The payout was a positive step in Torra’s development and demonstrates the potential for conservancies to generate and distribute tangible and meaningful livelihood benefits to its members. However, key challenges remain for supporting inclusive decision-making, developing simple processes for monitoring and evaluating payouts, and promoting good governance. Most important is to understand and document the extent to which the payout was not a ‘quick fix’ to resolve community tensions, but the development of a foundation for supporting the long-term livelihood and conservation needs of Torra Conservancy

Allen, W., Bosch, O., Kilvington, M., Oliver, J. and Gilbert, M. 2001. Benefits of collaborative learning for environmental management: Applying the Integrated Systems for Knowledge Management approach to support animal pest control. Environmental Management 27:2 pp. 215-223.

Carberry, P.S., Z. Hochman, R.L. McCown et al. 2002. The FARMSCAPE approach to decision support: farmers', advisers', researchers' monitoring, simulation, communication and performance evaluation. Agricultural Systems, 74:141-177.FARMSCAPE (Farmers', Advisers', Researchers', Monitoring, Simulation, Communication And Performance Evaluation) is a program of participatory research with the farming community of northeast Australia. It initially involved research to explore whether farmers and their advisers could gain benefit from tools such as soil characterisation and sampling, climate forecasts and, in particular, simulation modelling. Its current focus is facilitating the implementation of commercial delivery systems for these same tools in order to meet industry demand for their access. This paper presents the story of what was done over the past decade, it provides performance indicators of impact, it reflects on what was learnt over this period and it outlines where this research is likely to head in the future.Over the past 10 years, the FARMSCAPE team employed a Participatory Action Research approach to explore whether farmers could value simulation as a decision support tool for managing their farming system and if so, could it be delivered cost-effectively. Through farmer group engagement, on-farm trials, soil characterisation, monitoring of crops, soils and climate, and sessions to apply the APSIM systems simulator, FARMSCAPE represented a research program on decision support intervention. Initial scepticism by farmers and commercial consultants about the value of APSIM was addressed by testing its performance both against measured data from on-farm trials and against farmers' experiences with past commercial crops. Once this credibility check was passed, simulation sessions usually evolved into participants interactively inquiring of the model the consequence of alternative management options. These `What if' questions using APSIM were contextualised using local climate and soil data and the farmer's actual or proposed management rules.The active participation of farmers and their advisers, and working in the context of their own farming operations, were the key ingredients in the design, implementation and interpretation of the FARMSCAPE approach to decision support. The attraction of the APSIM systems simulator to farmers contemplating change was that it allowed them to explore their own system in a manner equivalent to learning from experience. To achieve this, APSIM had to be credible and flexible. While direct engagement of farmers initially enabled only a limited number of beneficiaries, this approach generated a commercial market for timely and high quality interactions based on soil monitoring and simulation amongst a significant sector of the farming community. Current efforts are therefore focused on the training, support and accreditation of commercial agronomists in the application of the FARMSCAPE approach and tools.

Aarnink, W., S. Bunning, L. Collette, P.Mulvany. 1998. Sustaining Agricultural Biodiversity and Agro-ecosystem functions: Opportunities, incentives and approaches for the conservation and sustainable use of agricultural biodiversity in agro-ecosystems and production systems . Report of International Technical Workshop organized by FAO and the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity, with the support of the Government of the Netherlands. 2 - 4 December 1998, FAO, Rome, Italy.

Heong, K.L. and Escalada, M.M. 1997. Perception change in rice pest management: A case study of farmers' evaluation of conflicting information. Journal of Applied Communications 81, 3-17. Journal of Applied Communications Article of the Year 1997 Request reprintA simple rule-of-thumb, or heuristic, in pest management which was in conflict with farmers' prevailing perceptions was communicated to farmers to examine whether their cognitive dissonance would challenge them to evaluate it and change their perceptions. The simple rule used was: "In the first 30 days after transplanting (or 40 days after sowing), leaffolder control is not necessary." The participatory experiments were carried out by 101 rice farmers. Although farmers' perceptions of pests and pesticide use were deeply entrenched, the simple experiment reduced their early-season insecticide applications and number of sprays. Farmers' attitudes toward leaf-feeding insects also changed. Besides dissonance resolution, the main incentives that had encouraged farmers seemed to be money savings and labor reduction. Few studies in communication, if any, have explored the impact of the use of conflicting information on changing farmers' perceptions. This article presents the results of a study which examined farmers' evaluation of conflicting information and its influence on their perception changes in rice pest management. It also documents the process and effects of farmer experimentation with a simple decision rule or heuristic.

Hambly Odame, H., . A. Kassam 2002. Listening to Stakeholders: Agricultural research and Rural Radio Linkages. ISSN 1021-2310 / 6 pp. ISNAR Briefing Paper.In October 2000, ISNAR, along with partners in Africa and Canada, initiated a project to investigate the linkages between agricultural research and rural radio. This project was concerned with developing a working relationship between researchers and broadcasters to ensure a two-way exchange of knowledge with farmers. The study initially focused on sub-Saharan Africa. This Briefing Paper serves to highlight results from the study’s training needs and organizational constraints assessment (TNA) workshop held in March 2001 in Ghana. The top two training priorities that emerged were facilitating partnerships between research and radio, and mobilizing financial resources for collaborative activities.

Hambly Odame, H. and A. Kassam. 2002. Linking Agricultural Research and Rural Radio. ISNAR Briefing Paper No. 48. ISNAR: The Hague.Radio remains the most important medium for communicating with the rural populations of developing countries. This is particularly true in Africa where, according to the BBC World Service, there were an estimated 65 million radio receivers in 1996 (see figure 1). By the end of the 1990s, there were approximately 12 newspapers, 52 televisions, and 198 radios for every 1000 Africans (Niang 2001). This lack of newspapers and televisions plus the “digital divide” that exists between those who have access to the Internet and those who do not merely reinforces the importance of radio in Africa (table 1). Rural radio is technically defined in terms of its relatively local range (25–50 km radius) or functioning at frequencies of less than 1000 MHz. However, the terminology of rural radio is more often used to refer to the multiple technologies behind rural broadcasting, which may include satellite communications and the Internet. Radio is relevant to any strategy that involves rural development in Africa

Hambly Odame, H., N. Hafkin, G. Wesseler, and I. Boto. 2002. Gender and Agriculture in the Information Society. ISSN 1021-2310. 8 pp. ISNAR Briefing Paper.While in most developing countries women constitute the majority of the population working in agriculture, they are still being marginalized with respect to access to information and communication technologies (ICTs) for economic and social empowerment. ISNAR and the Technical Centre for Agriculture and Rural Cooperation (CTA) have formed a partnership to study the theme of gender and ICTs in agriculture and rural development and to increase the awareness of policymakers, donors, researchers, nongovernmental organizations, and farmers’ organizations, of the need for dialogue and action on issues of ICT and gender in the context of food security, poverty reduction, and sustainable development. This Briefing Paper is one of the collaborative activities through which ISNAR and CTA endeavor to prepare inputs to future international deliberations.

Escalada, M.M., Heong, K.L., Huan, N.H. and Mai, V. 1999. Communications and behavior change in rice farmers' pest management: The case of using mass media in Vietnam. Journal of Applied Communications, 83 (1), 7-26 .Winner of the 2002 St. Andrew Prize for the Environment  Request reprintRice farmers' unnecessary insecticide use for leaf folder control is due to misperceptions. A mass media campaign was organized to motivate farmers to test a conflict information expressed as a heuristic. After the campaign, insecticide use dropped from 3.35 sprays per farmer to 1.56. Proportions of farmers spraying at the early and late tillering and booting stages decreased from 59%, 84% and 85% to 0.2%, 19% and 30%, respectively. Leaf folder control perceptions, expressed as the belief index, changed from 11.25 to 7.62. Proportions of farmers believing that leaf folders could cause damages, yield loss and needed sprays, dropped from 66%, 70% and 77% to 24%, 25% and 23%, respectively. The study showed that mass media could effectively transfer some elements of knowledge-intensive pest management, especially simple non-site specific information designed to motivate.

Van Mele, P. & N.T.T. Cuc. 2003. Ants as Friends: Improving your Tree Crops with Weaver Ants. CABI Bioscience¸ pp. 67. (English, Bahasa Indonesia, and from 2005 also in Vietnamese)Contains practical tips on how to make best use of the weaver ant to protect your fruit and other tree crops. The authors have combined rich sources of scientific and farmers' knowledge to provide an attractive and colourful manual that will appeal to university students, NGO workers, extension staff and all engaged in communicating agricultural science to farmers. English versions can be ordered from Simon Lea at CABI Bioscience. The Bahasa Indonesia version can be ordered from Subekti Rahayu at ICRAF-Indonesia.