Insight
 "We do things differently at the CGIAR Challenge Program on Water and Food. Our researchers strive to develop innovative ways to use and conserve water in order to help poor farmers improve their livelihoods, and to protect the resources of their natural environment. We can't do that alone.It can only be together that we genuinely address global challenges. By uniting as one, and sharing knowledge, best practices and innovations, we strengthen our ability to stabilize the global degradation of the very foundation of human and environmental wellbeing: Water. That's why the CPWF's expertise is drawn from a network of partnerships, a diverse community of research-for-development practitioners. It is why we were so very pleased to have had as the IFWF2 conveners, presenters and facilitators, the very scientists, development specialists, and policymakers who are the agitators for real change in agricultural practices. Many project members say they are grateful that the CPWF has given them an opportunity to test innovative ideas and cross-scale research that is not typically within the scope of their home institutions. Indeed, as the Challenge Programs were created to test CGIAR reform, I am grateful for the lessons and progress on addressing global water-scarcity that our community of wide-ranging partnerships and multi-discipline scientists has borne.  Please use this portal to peruse the diverse papers, stemming from IFWF2 science sessions, that cover, among many, the following areas: Combining fish, livestock and crops based on productive water use; Developing innovative water-harvesting systems and conservation agriculture in regions with inadequate rainfall; Building collective governance over water through the participation of farming communities, and; Changing the way people throughout society think about, and use water.In the spirit of the CPWF, I hope you find something on this portal which encourages the exploration of research opportunities, or the expansion of impact of new innovations, in order to best promote sustainable livelihoods in the world's poorest river basins." Jonathan Woolley CPWF Program Coordinator February 2003 - June 2009 |
