Key stakeholders from public institutions, the private sector, civil society and farmer's organizations met in Kigali for the inception workshop that marked the start of the Capacity Development for Agricultural Innovation Systems (CDAIS) project in Rwanda. The project, designed to benefit particularly small scale farmers and agribusiness, aims to  build a more productive and sustainable agricultural sector by increasing efficiency and coherence of capacity development interventions in agricultural innovations systems. 

The two-day workshop (10-11 November 2015) brought together 35 participants to raise awareness about the project and to understand its goal and expected results. At the end of the workshop, participants concluded that it is crucial to strengthen the capacity of the agricultural innovation system in Rwanda and pledged to start developing a national action plan to achieve this goal. In addition, participants were encouraged to identify potential organizations that could promote capacity development for agricultural innovation in Rwanda, map stakeholders' linkages and constraints, and establish a short list of innovation niches in the country. 

With financial support from the European Union, CDAIS is a global initiative in support of more productive and sustainable agricultural sectors. Its objective is to promote Agricultural Innovation Systems (AIS) that meet the demands of farmers, agri-business and consumers. In addition to Rwanda, CDAIS is being implemented in 7 pilot countries: Angola, Bangladesh, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Guatemala, Honduras and Laos. 

The project will allow the implementation at country level of the Common Framework developed under the Tropical Agriculture Platform (TAP) to consolidate the different approaches to CD for AIS. 

More information about CDAIS in Rwanda is available here.