Guidelines for participatory monitoring & evaluation of technologies with farmers. Kitale: Kenya Agricultural Research Institiute.

Abstract

Current trends in agricultural development have led to an increase in technology development through farmer participatory research (FPR). This is true within both governmental research institutes and non-governmental organizations. Farmers are often involved in some or all of the stages of the technology development (TD) process, from defining the problem through to dissemination. Participatory rural appraisal (PRA) is a common starting point for many research projects to ensure the programme is demand led and to guide the selection of researchable issues which address the real needs of rural people. However, as observed by Okali et a/ (1994), in their review of FPR projects, monitoring and evaluation is often limited to conventional technical indicators. These guidelines address the issues of participatory monitoring and evaluation of research activities and the potential benefits such approaches bring to agricultural development.