Photo credit: S. Mojumder/Drik/CIMMYT

LANSA engaged in strengthening our own capacity and that of stakeholders in South Asia. This is an integral part of LANSA’s programme. Capacity strengthening has supported our efforts to inform nutrition sensitive agricultural policies and practices.

Our approach

We work on strengthening capacity by:

1. Periodically reviewing our strengths, weaknesses and opportunities for undertaking and disseminating high quality research;
2. Developing capacity amongst key stakeholders, using systematic frameworks focusing on the needs of three audiences: individual, organisational and institutional
3. Conducting joint/multidisciplinary research to experientially transfer individual and organisational capacity strengths across partners;
4. Building capacity of young researchers in the region to carry on high quality research 

Strengthening our own capacity

We are strengthening individual and organisational capacity to establish research collaborations and successful research programmes. Amongst programme partners we are strengthening capacity in several areas: nutritional assessment, impact evaluation and value chain analysis. Doctoral studies of a few researchers working on LANSA, is also being supported as part of capacity strengthening of researchers in the region.

A key strategy to strengthen capacity at the individual and organisational level is the development of active research collaborations across all partner institutions.  For example, IDS and LCIRAH are working with South Asian partners to develop skills in value chain analysis to support our research under this theme. LCIRAH is collaborating with South Asian partners to develop partners to enhance skills in research uptake. 

We strengthen our capacity to promote research uptake by using a specially designed uptake self-assessment tool, The capacity assessment exercise informs a training / mentoring  programme tailored to meet the needs of LANSA partners.

Find out more about the Research Uptake Self Assessment Tool here. This is essential for generating interest in, and creating demand for, our research.

STRENGTHENING CAPACITY AMONGST CRITICAL STAKEHOLDERS

LANSA's South Asian partners have developed networks and advocacy skills to sensitise policy makers and NGOs about nutrition sensitive agriculture. We work on strengthening the capacity of critical stakeholders to access, use and demand research evidence.

Several such workshops organised in 2014 and 2015 in India have broadened stakeholder understanding to identify and use research evidence, and have also helped us draw out 'windows of opportunity' for policy impact. Cross-learning and knowledge sharing has encouraged us to keep the engagement with stakeholders and has shaped our uptake strategy. In 2016, we organised a workshop to build uptake capacity for Afghanistan agriculture scientists - a first successful attempt for LANSA!

Capacity strengthening of stakeholders at the community level has been crucial for sustainability of action research undertaken. This component was therefore inbuilt into the ongoing research.

Before and after assessments are undertaken to track the effectiveness of capacity strengthening activities. LANSA has also found it effective to engage in capacity strengthening of stakeholders in the region by partnering with large stakeholder events like the annual conference of the Agriculture Nutrition and Health Academy (ANH) and conducting learning labs. This was successfully done in 2017 and 2018.