The global trend to critically examine the legitimate role of government has affected African R&D institutions. New forms of sharing the responsibility are being examined, so that those who benefit most also share in the costs and reduce the fiscal burden on taxpayers. Research on export crops has a long tradition of close private-sector involvement, because producers of exports generally reap most of the benefits of research and development on these commodities. Hence, they are more willing to fund all or part of it. Six of the seven African countries studied (the exception being Ethiopia) revealed a reinforcement of shared responsibility between the government and the private sector for research in recent years on commercial/export crops. In addition, a complete privatization of research on coffee, tea and tobacco is under way in Tanzania and of research on sugar in Kenya. In Tanzania, even extension in tea is being privatized.
With non-tradable food commodities, consumers are often the main beneficiaries of research and development in terms of reduced prices. As a result, producers have been less willing to fund research and development involving these crops and public funding has been the primary source of support. However with trade liberalization and market-led/farmer-driven R&D agendas, the possibility of turning previously non-tradable commodities into tradables becomes more likely, increasing the incentives and scope for producer support for agricultural research and development.
New public management ideas and concepts, which have strongly influenced the current NARS reform agenda, argue for a clear separation between funding, priority setting and implementation functions within government. The establishment of autonomous or semi-autonomous NARIs in Africa during the past 25 years, for example, has resulted in a separation of research funding from priority setting and implementation.
In several African countries, the responsibility for priority setting in agricultural research has been delegated to either external committees composed of farmer and industry representatives (e.g., Cote d'Ivoire, Senegal) or to democratically elected district councils (e.g., Uganda, Tanzania). The expectation is that by giving stakeholders control over the research budget, agricultural research will become more impact oriented.
The Study Panel views these as desirable developments while noting the following caveats: