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 Irrigated Rice Research Consortium
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Research to Impact in Postharvest: Lessons learned
A sharing of experiences and learning from project implementation to adoption and impact, as well as an outlining of future activities, was done as 37 postharvest experts, researchers, private company representatives, and government officials gathered in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, on 6-8 May 2008 for a workshop on “Research to Impact in Postharvest: Lessons Learned.” Participants gathered to assess the progress of activities of the Postproduction Work Group of the Irrigated Rice Research Consortium (IRRC) and the Asian Development Bank/Japan Fund for Poverty Reduction project “Improving Poor Farmers’ Livelihoods through Improved Rice Postharvest Technology.” These two projects will both end in December 2008. Martin Gummert, PPWG Workgroup leader and workshop organizer pointed out to the participants, who were from Laos, Cambodia, Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia, Thailand and Myanmar that the workshop was very timely considering the ongoing rice crisis. He also stressed the challenge of reducing postharvest losses by at least 5%, which could result to rice self-sufficiency in a country such as Indonesia. The Vietnam Institute of Agricultural Engineering and Postharvest Technology co-sponsored the workshop, which was funded by ADB and the IRRC. On the first day, each representative presented status of the implementation of activities in country, the validation of technologies, local adaptation and related innovations, as well as technology adoption at community level. After a full day of presentations, the groups mapped out what needs to be done as the next step in the project towards wide-scale dissemination of technologies. The second day started off with the identification of success cases for documentation and inclusion in the Cereal Knowledge bank, formerly the Rice Knowledge Bank. The participants discussed and set the scene for the planning of follow-up initiatives with focus on out-scaling the technologies that were successfully verified in the ongoing postharvest projects. The participants also confirmed the value of the cross-country learning and mini combine and dryer technology transfer from Vietnam to Laos, Myanmar, and Cambodia that the projects have facilitated during the last 3 years and pointed out that those activities should be continued in the future. An interesting part of the workshop, according to Dr. Pyseth Meas, participant from Cambodia, is the field trip which gave firsthand ideas from and facilitated connections with local postharvest equipment manufacturers. From Ho Chi Minh City, participants went to Long An Province where they visited Vinapro, local manufacturer of equipment such as the combine harvester (see photo below). Some of the participants had bought equipment from this company, and others are planning to do the same.
Participants also visited the ADB project site where an improved and locally designed flat-bed dryer was installed and copied by farmers in the area. The trip ended with a last stop at a company that manufactures rice mill equipment, Buivanngo Industrial & Agricultural Machinery Co., Ltd. The trip completed a full circle from research and project implementation to the world of private equipment manufacturers that appropriately concluded the workshop.
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