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Program coordination team meeting
10 January 2014
Venue: Virtual
Time: 16:00 pm EAT , Nigeria 14:00 pm, DC 08:00 am
[edit | edit source]

Agenda[edit | edit source]

  • Overall action points
  • USAID Update
  • Africa RISING Project update

Eastern and southern Africa and West Africa

  • Research update
  • Staff update
  • Work plans and priorities

The Ethiopian highlands

  • Research update
  • Staff update
  • Work plans and priorities
  • M & E update
  • Communication update
  • Scientific Advisory Committee
  • AOB: Next Learning Event date and place
  • Next PCT meeting

Overall action points[edit | edit source]

Overall action points
Action Status Status
Develop program-level good practice ‘rules of engagement’ with farms and households (including data practice); the final version is reviewed by all Peter Balalntryne needs to see it befor is attached
Develop the regional logframes MEETING TOOK PLACE AND FIRST LOGFRAME DEVELOPMENT WAS STARTED. CHIEF SCIENTISTS OF ESA AN WA FELT THEY COULD NOT COMPLETE BEFORE HAVING THE LONGER TERM RESEARCH PLANS FROM THEIR REGIONS. THESE HAVE JUST BEEN FINALIZED IN ESA AND WILL BE IN WA AFTER THE FEBRUARY PLANNING MEETING. I AIM FOR END OF FEBRUARY TO HAVE THE TWO LOGFRAMES. Irmagrd to finalize by February for ESA

Ethiopia also to be finalized by February

Update online events lists See events list. Send updates to Simret

THE EVENT PAGE HAS BEEN RESTRUCTURED

Science Advisory mechanism All invitees agreed in principle

See details

Date for the next meeting – Iain to circulate provision date

First chair – Maggie Gill
Iain to ask Maggie and inform the PCT meeting

Gender strategy Peter and Annet have a complete draft gender strategic plan for Ethiopia to be discussed and finalised for circulation next week.

-It was suggested to have an overall strategy

Jerry to connect with the USAID gender person

Peter ,Annet and Irmgard to meet with USAID person to look in to a program level strategy
To look at the humidtropics and use it as a basis gender strategy
Irmgard and Peter to get the copy of the humidtropics Gender strategy
if each project feels there needs a separate one they can work on it and attached to the generic strategy

Framework for livestock integration JERRY:(Update 01/09/14) I'M NOT SO CONCERNED ABOUT THIS NOW GIVEN THIS YEAR'S WORKPLANS WHICH MORE CLEARLY & CONSISTENTLY INCLUDE LIVESTOCK ACTIVITIES. it was agreed to drop this off
General Assembly, Scientific Conference and Exhibition to take place 9-13 December in Bujumbura Simret and Catherine to follow up with ASARECA. Irmgard to provide contact. This meeting has been conducted , we have sent some Africa RISING materials to be displayed .
Formation of small working group on sustainability to come up with a framework and indicators Peter and Tracy have discussed this in November

-We need few specific indicators for research projects , indicators that we could measure in the short project time
We needs to be focused
-Before USAID commission an external evaluators

Irmgard to follow up with Asmoha (from the learning event )

-Iain to ask the convener to come up for a draft report by March
-Peter T . to feedback from the vital science meeting in London in February

Preparation for project program review? it was suggested to have an evaluation Before USAID commission an external evaluators Suggested to sure that the first advisory committee picks this up for their first meeting
New fund allocation Oct 2013- Sept 2014(USAID financial year )

-Peter talked to Eric and he said that we will get the same amount of allocation of the last year

Jerry to check with Eric an give us update

USAID Update[edit | edit source]

Enter MAJOR ongoing/planned and completed tasks

Enter MAJOR ongoing/planned and completed tasks
Task Status Notes for PCT review
Tracy to report on discussion about FtF indicators for Africa RISING - and all of us in the project to share possible questions to Tracy for that discussion. IHZ and Carlo agreed that IHZ will continue entering the data for ESA and WA. IHZ will request access to FTFMS for IFPRI colleagues.
Funding for scaling up 4th year of the ftf and push on impact on the group and USAID is looking for scaling up .So if AR woks on scaling up there could be money channel for that purpose

Thought AR is a research project there are other CG center that work on scaling up
Jerry suggested for AR cg partners to develop a concept note on What could be scaled up that Africa RISING project could help on the scaling up

Jerry to send some of the concept note already submitted

Jerry to discuss with the USAID mission in Mail and Tanzania on what they want to focus and how much they will spend
Project coordinators to give a thought and also discuss with their team and project partners and if there are ideas to develop a 2 pager concept note and discuss with the relevant mission

Request for application for sustainable intensification innovation lab That serves as a coordinator as sustainable intensification work

It will be announced next
Applicants will have 90 days to submit application

Jerry to keep the team in the loop
Data management and curation There seems no scientist providing data about soil…

- There has not been any transfer to IFPRI
- This needs to happen soon
- There is a plan to have data management protocol and a training by M&E coordinators

M&E will contact the relevant people

- The management protocol will be finalized by March
- Training will be organized by early April
- Data management plan to be finalized by the next PCT meeting
- Peter and Irmgard to work with Carol

ESA Update[edit | edit source]

Enter MAJOR ongoing/planned and completed tasks

Enter MAJOR ongoing/planned and completed tasks
Task Status Notes for PCT review
April 2013 - Sep 2013 report REPORT PREPARED AND SUBMITTED TIMELY
2013 -2014 workplan and budget WAS ONLY COMPLETED RECENTLY. MOST NEW CONTRACTS ISSUED. IMPLEMENTATION PARTLY STARTED. RAINS ARE NOT YET REGUALAR. PARTNER MEETING ON IMPLEMENTATION CURRENTLY TAKING PLACE IN BABATI.
USAID FIELD VISIT TO TANZANIA ASARECA AND COSTECH (STEERING COMMITTEE MEMBERS) WILL BE INVITED.
Africa RISING - SIMLEZA AGREEMENT WITH SIMLEZA SIGNED, FUNDS DISBURSED. DATA SHARING STILL TO BE DISCUSSED (LED BY TRACY). MATEETE AND I WILL VISIT THE SITES LATER THIS MONTH. Irmgard to go to Zambia to check what has been implemented
New partnerships In DC, USAID has signed partnership agreement with, food security , economic growth and education and environment . There has not been any identification who to implement it but hopefully through Africa RISING will
Field visit in Tanzania 3rd week of March

WA Update[edit | edit source]

Enter MAJOR ongoing/planned and completed tasks

Enter MAJOR ongoing/planned and completed tasks
Task Status Notes for PCT review
Annual review and planning meeting MEETING WILL TAKE PLACE 3-5 FEBRUARY IN BAMAKO
April 2013 - Sep 2013 report PREPARED AND SUBMITTED TIMELY
Scientist visit VERY GOOD EXCHANGE VISIT TOOK PLACE. USAID WASHINGTON COULD NOT ATTEND.
USAID visit to project sites in northern Ghana From 6-9 July Jerry, Tracy, Biniam, together with Justice (M&E officer), Asamoah, Irmgard and partners visited project activities in Upper East and Northern Region
Implementation of workplan THE SEASON IS OVER AND PARTNERS ARE ANALYZING DATA.

Ethiopia Update[edit | edit source]

Enter MAJOR ongoing/planned and completed tasks
Task Status Notes for PCT review
Development of SLATE tool Reasonably stable version of software now available (contact PT). Will be used at HT action sites too. Does this qualify as an example of scaling innovation by AR?
Sustainable Livelihoods Analysis at AR field sites Limited progress since last report due to time constraints.

Field work completed at all eight sites. Currently completing data entry and have started analysis and typology identification (one site complete - the approach appears to work delivering a meaningful and interpretable typology)

Oct 2012 - Mar 2013 report Completed.
April 2013 - Sep 2013 report Ready to review and submit next week.
2013 -2014 workplan and budget See below
IP establishment Training of site coordinators and site partners 23-24 January. Establishment activities from 27 January
Field visits for USAID team done
2013 Field activities Complete. Reporting in progress.
Planning meeting Work plans currently being finalised to feed into IP establishment.
Training on Facilitation for IP Planned for the 23rd and 24th of January , for the site coordinators and other relevant people

M&E Update[edit | edit source]

Enter MAJOR ongoing/planned and completed tasks

Enter MAJOR ongoing/planned and completed tasks
Task Status Notes for PCT review
Joint Africa RISING (AR)-Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia (CSISA) M&E meeting: Completed Custom indicators
Version 2.0 demo at the M&E meeting
PMT updated based on feedback at the M&E meeting Completed
AR data management protocol Ongoing Level of reporting for FtF indicators
Actions:

Version 3 to be ready by end of March
PMT training early April
Finalize data management plan by March (for April PCT meeting)

Ongoing
AR baseline surveys (planning)

Malawi
Tanzania
Ghana
Mali
Ethiopia
Actions:
Ghana: Review the additional proposal submitted by ISSER (on Jan 9) and sign contract (ISSER or Panafield) in January
Mali: Finalize discussions with Marikani and sign contract in January
Ethiopia: Review proposal submitted by BDS (Dec 31st), finalize negotiation with BST (that did FTF-Ethiopia, and AGP surveys) and sign contract in January
Follow up with Zambia team (for data access and site characterization/justification) --with Tracy's help

Completed

Ongoing
Feb-April
Feb-April
Feb-March

Actions:

Ghana: Review the additional proposal submitted by ISSER (on Jan 9) and sign contract (ISSER or Panafield) in January
Mali: Finalize discussions with Marikani and sign contract in January
Ethiopia: Review proposal submitted by BDS (Dec 31st), finalize negotiation with BST (that did FTF-Ethiopia, and AGP surveys) and sign contract in January
Follow up with Zambia team (for data access and site characterization/justification) --with Tracy's help

Collaborations

Vital Signs
VS shared documentation on indicators, data use policy, shape files for TZ and Ghana
Chief scientist to review VS agricultural intensification thread and select key indicators
IFPRI aligned AR control sites with Vital Signs sites in northern Ghana
But access to VS's household-level data can become a problem

Ongoing/done
Site/field visits

Tanzania, Ethiopia
Ghana, Mali

ongoing/completed
Update

-Talks b/n IFPRI Finance and IITA/IWMI for WA and ESA M&E coordinators (positions)
-M&E coordinator for Ethiopia (consultant)
-A survey resident for WA (consultant)
-A consultant to assist with all the upcoming surveys

ongoing

Identified
Identified
Identified

Actions

Finalize negotiations and sign contracts for the new positions in January

Comms Update[edit | edit source]

Enter MAJOR ongoing/planned and completed tasks

Enter MAJOR ongoing/planned and completed tasks
Task Status Notes for PCT review
ESA poster preparation will start soon May follow the one from Ethiopia
WA poster preparation will start soon May follow the one from Ethiopia
ESA brochure preparation will start soon
WA brochure preparation will start soon
Malawi video in preparation On agro-ecological intensification options to be used in training workshops for extensionists and development partners
Program generic presentation en and fr drafted and will be shared to the concerned people for review
Wiki usage guidelines not yet started ELB: What is this? Clarify and I'm happy to help. The wiki structure and content have been majorly overhauled over the turn of the year
Program framework Version 1 published

Suggest regular review and update as part of each annual learning event (living document)

ELB: This is supposed to be addressed early this year again but is not strictly a 'Comms' item
IITA comms person for ARISING Being recruited by IITA Will start on 1 November - (ELB) done (Faith Afolabi). However, she needs to go through training on the various comms tools/approaches we use in Africa RISING
Virtual comms catchups Irregular Simret/Ewen/ comms people
Half-yearly comms metrics/stats Latest report
Blog updates ongoing Need regular stories from all regions. ELB: However for 2013 very balanced inputs from all regions (granted, thanks to the 3 posts about Ghana, otherwise WA would be lagging behind): 8 from ESA, 10 from Ethiopia, 10 from West Africa, 10 from program level.
Wiki gardening/management regular (ELB) Major update done on the wiki over the turn of the year. Data management and M&E pages have to follow (ELB in touch with M&E team about this shortly) and regional project pages need to be updated by respective comms officer with regional management's help.
Documents to CGSPACE regularly updated IITA to join cgspace training late october (tbc)
Use of yammer for internal updating initiated Needs wider promotion and buy-in. (ELB) This would be a useful topic to discuss properly in a PCT at some stage - we need a good platform to share information on a regular basis, it's not a 'nice to have' it's a 'non-negotiable' for a program which has to show strong integration across components, teams and regions...
Photo sharing on flickr regularly updated Simret to follow with Catherine and Katy - to inform partners to send four-five pictures with caption
Presentations shared on slideshare regularly updated
ARISING calendar updating regularly updated
Branding Guidline Finalized
Template and banners revison due to the ftf logo change we have revised most of our templets and logo banners
Website revision the website now has a new look , still open for comments
wiki revision we have revised the wiki See above
Photojournalist work -Next year, Ethiopia Informed the PCT that the Next Photographer will be commistion to take pictures in ethiopia and planned for October 2014
Key things to be considered by the PCT PCT to look at the global communication plan and comment

the three project pages in the wiki to get updated
what to be done about the action points from the learning event
to comment on the institutional history (also on Yammer )
to see the new websit and give feedback/comment

Simret to send all the links for the PCT

- PCT to give comment on the communication plan by the end of January
- To Update the project page of the wiki – mid February and WA and EA mid-march
- Simret to circulate the action points from the learning and PCT to look at them and decide how to go about them
- Simret to send the institutional history link and the website and the PCT members to send feedback as soon as they can

Next Learning Event (when and where ) Tanzania , September Irmgard and her team to come up with the date