Capacity development
our research, learning and innovation agenda
Alongside our research, dialogue, and impact collaborations, the Observatory aims to address its agenda by building critical capacities among people working in and for the drylands, enhancing the transformative anticipatory and management capacities of pastoral communities and the agencies serving them.
Facing more frequent droughts and other environmental shocks in East Africa’s drylands, early and anticipatory actions are priorities for communities to enhance their resilience and manage uncertainties. Skilled people and effective institutions are critical to achieve this. Recognizing that diverse capacities already exist at different levels – locally, nationally and regionally – capacity development was identified by Observatory partners and collaborators as a high priority intervention to deal with complex challenges and transition towards greater resilience to shocks.
Our emphasis so far has been on early career doctoral and post-doctoral training. At our Community of Practice meeting in May 2023 we began to scope the need for other streams of capacity development, and we identified strong demand from regional stakeholders and a desire for co-creation and co-delivery of shorter training programmes.
Following an initial desk review of existing capacity development courses offered across the domains where we work, we further explored the needs expressed in meetings with four Kenyan universities in November 2023.
Arising out of these and other discussions, in late 2023 we agreed that the capacity development activities of the Jameel Observatory for Food Security Early Action should be delivered through a ‘Dryland Futures Academy’ rooted in East Africa.
The aim is to deliver face to face, online and blended learning through several pathways:
- Dryland leadership: This pathway is for early career professionals who aim to grow their expertise on drylands and the tools that they need to be future leaders on drylands food security early action and related issues.
- Continuing education: This pathway aims to develop capacities through taught and self-study short professional, technical and academic courses, designed and delivered with regional institutions.
- Academic and formal education: This pathways aism to provide a wider range of undergraduate and postgraduate degrees and vocational training in which individuals can advance their learning on dryland issues
- Community development: This pathway focuses on pastoralist and agro-pastoralist communities themselves and ways to facilitate their sharing and gaining livelihood and resilience building knowledge and skills – through “peer to peer” learning methodologies, exchanging local and indigenous knowledge, and other forms of individual and collective learning.
We are currently (November 2024) formulating priority activities, mapping demand and existing opportunities, developing an educational framework and discussing modalities for content and delivery with collaborators and partners.
Key milestones:
In May 2024, we convened a workshop to start developing an ‘education framework’ for the Academy.
- In September 2024, we contributed to the second Drylands Summer School on agrosilvopastoral systems
- In September 2024, we convened a curriculum development workshop with Garissa University
- In September 2024, we published the ‘Education Framework’ for the Academy
- In February 2025, we co-convene a drylands summer school on ‘building resilience from below in the face of chronic uncertainty in the drylands’.
Contact us for more information or to discuss collaboration:
- Professor Geoff Simm, University of Edinburgh: geoff.simm@ed.ac.uk
- Dr Guyo Malicha Roba, International Livestock Research Institute: g.roba@cgiar.org
