Social and Environmental Trade-offs in African Agriculture

Theory of change: Impact

Agricultural policies, strategies and investment decisions in Ethiopia, Ghana and Zambia, and increasingly in other countries in sub-Saharan Africa, are routinely based on relevant, high quality applied research on the impacts, risks and trade-offs within and between social, economic and environmental dimensions of different agricultural development pathways that relate to SDGs 2, 10 and 15.

Beneficiary countries:

•• Ethiopia GCRF •• Ghana Challenges: •• Zambia •• Sub-Saharan Africa overall • UK Context: • Sustainable Economies & Societies Resilience and action on short-term environmental shocks and long-term environmental change

Challenge: Challenge: Human Rights, Good Equitable Access to Governance & Social Sustainable Development Results-focused, participatory monitoring & evaluation Governance structure: Justice Access to secure and Reduce poverty and resilient food systems The M&E of the Programme will be results-focused, monitoring progress towards inequality, including gender supported by sustainable objectives and vision-level outcomes as outlined in the theory of change. This inequalities marine resources and involves capturing progress towards improving the quality of research, agriculture strengthening research partnerships, and enhancing the capacity of researchers as well as assessing influence on discourse, policy and practice of relevant stakeholders within government, civil society, private sector and academia. Changes in quality of research: •• Participatory design of research quality assessment tool by stakeholders, including decision makers and influencers (using both ‘conventional’ quality criteria and criteria focused on relevance and usability of results) ••Stakeholder surveys using the assessment tool to be carried out in years 3 & 4 Changes in research relationships: ••Baseline mapping of existing partnerships of participating researchers and institutions ••Mid-term assessment of strength, functionality and effectiveness of research partnerships, to be repeated at project completion Changes in capacity of researchers: ••Individual and institutional capacity needs assessments conducted at baseline, mid-term and completion Changes in policy and practice: •• Stakeholder surveys at mid-term and completion using outcome mapping and harvesting techniques to monitor progress in terms of increased consideration of impacts, risks and trade-offs related to agriculture in discourse, policy and practice of government actors, civil society organisations, private sector and research organisations.

Programme Leadership Team: Barbara Adolph (PI) & Phil Franks (IIED, UK); Jacob Mwitwa (Copperbelt University, Zambia); Tagel Gebrehiwot (EDRI, Ethiopia); Joseph Tobias (Imperial College London, UK); Moses Osiru (RUFORUM Africa, Uganda); Tim Newbold (UCL, UK); Dora Neina (University of Ghana, Ghana); Adrienne Martin (University of Greenwich, UK); Nathalie Seddon (University of Oxford, UK); Elizabeth Robinson (University of Reading, UK)