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Preface

Diversity means life; diversity means choice. Unfortunately, around the world the spaces for the maintenance and creation of (new) diversity are becoming more and more confined. Biological diversity, in environments increasingly disturbed by human intervention, is under serious threat. Globalization forces are imposing limits on the ways people shape and reshape socioeconomic, cultural, and political diversity.

At the same time, in many places efforts are underway to maintain or open up new room for the appreciation, use, and further evolution of diversity. In 1992, following the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED or the "Earth Summit"), staff at Canada's International Development Research Centre (IDRC) developed a program to support these efforts. IDRC's biodiversity program was born to put and keep biodiversity high on the agenda of research and development organizations in the South, in Canada, and around the globe. In 1997, the biodiversity program evolved into the Sustainable Use of Biodiversity (SUB) program initiative, retaining its major objectives and approach:

• to promote the use, maintenance, and enhancement of the knowledge, innovations, and practices of indigenous and local communities to conserve and sustainably use biodiversity;
• to develop incentives, methods, and policies that facilitate the development of strategies for the conservation and enhancement of in situ agricultural and aquatic biodiversity; and the participation of communities in their design and implementation; and
• to support the creation of policies and legislation that recognize the rights of indigenous and local communities to genetic resources and to the equitable sharing of benefits of the use of these resources.

This In_Focus book presents fragments of the arduous biodiversity research work carried out and ongoing in numerous, often far away and little known places around the world. The book builds on an internal review of 10 years of IDRC support to agricultural biodiversity. Both the book and the review aim to take stock of the cumulative efforts in terms of research and development achievements and challenges. They are meant to be formative: to enhance ongoing work, conceptually, methodologically, and practically.

Over the last 10 years I have had the great privilege to interact with and learn from the researchers, farmers, extension agents, and government officials who carry out or support the participatory plant breeding efforts described here. I thank them all for trying out unwalked paths and showing the way.

Salvatore Ceccarelli, Noemi Espinoza, Sanjaya Gyawali, Humberto Lambrada Ríos, Yiching Song, and Louise Sperling have given extra voice to my story. I acknowledge their enlightening contributions. Marcel Vernooij and Louise Sperling, in their roles as agricultural and biodiversity policy director and participatory plant breeding research manager, respectively, were so kind to respond in very clear words to the key question: "What decisions do you make in your day to day work concerning agrobiodiversity?" I hope that the recommendations presented here to guide decision-making will be positively received by them and by their colleagues.

Numerous IDRC colleagues over the years have shaped and reshaped the biodiversity and SUB programs. Without their strong commitment, innovative ideas, and constructive critiques, IDRC's support for participatory plant breeding would never have made it to its 10th anniversary!

Bob Stanley, accomplished wordsmith, accepted to embark on the writing train with me. His craftsmanship can be found throughout this book. I am grateful for his invaluable contribution, and for his endurance to process the never-ending stream of corrections.

Bill Carman and the IDRC Communications team had the courage to review the manuscript and provided excellent feedback. They also took care of the production and publication process. It has been a pleasure to work with them.

The pioneering efforts highlighted in this book to maintain or enlarge the space for the dynamic evolution of diversity, for the improvement of agricultural productivity, and for the recognition of both farmers' and breeders' knowledge and skills are a great inspiration. I hope that these efforts and the new initiatives building on them will receive the strong and much needed support from key decision-makers in research and policy.

This book is dedicated to the memory of Marie Béatrice Dubé.

Ronnie Vernooy
January 2003

Ronnie Vernooy is a senior program specialist at the International Development Research Centre, Ottawa, Canada. Trained as a rural development sociologist, his interests include farmer experimentation and organization, natural resource management, agricultural biodiversity, and participatory (action) research methods including monitoring and evaluation. His current work focuses on Southeast Asia, Central America, and Cuba. He has a special interest in Nicaragua, where he carried out field research in both hillside and coastal environments during 1985­86, 1988­91, and 1997­98. Recent publications include Taking care of what we have: participatory natural resource management on the Caribbean coast of Nicaragua (editor and coauthor, IDRC/CIDCA-UCA 2000), Para una mina de oro se necesita una mina de plata: historiando sobre la Costa Caribe de Nicaragua 1910­1979 (CIDCA-UCA, 2000), and Voices for change: participatory monitoring and evaluation in China coeditor, IDRC/YSTP 2003).

Document(s) 1 of 9