Sustainable Land Management - Research

FIRST STEERING COMMITTEE MEETING OF CACILM

The First Steering Committee Meeting of CACILM Program was organized by the Multi-country Secretariat of CACILM on 30-31 October, 2007 in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.

During its meeting, the CACILM Steering Committee reviewed the progress of CACILM program, including the work of MSEK, NSEKs, national projects, regional projects as well future funding opportunities for CACILM.

Dr. Theib Oweis, Program Director, ICARDA, Dr. Raj Gupta, SLMR Project Manager, and Mr. Alisher Mirzabaev, Project Administrative Assistant, represented ICARDA during the meeting. Dr. Raj Gupta made a presentation on the progress of Sustainable Land Management Research Project of CACILM, led by ICARDA. He apprised the Steering Committee on: (i) physical and financial progress of the SLMR project, (ii) Research Prospectus, (iii) selection criteria for projects and (iv) new initiatives and project proposals on conservation agriculture and crop diversification.

The Steering committee approved the work of the SLMR multicountry project to date and endorsed the Work Plan and budget. MSEK, Bishkek, was requested by the Steering Committee to forward the ICARDA Research Prospectus for Review and comments by all parties.

The CACILM partners were appreciative of ICARDA's progress under the SLM-R project. The National CACILM Secretariats were also enthusiastic about the two multicountry project proposals namely, (i) Resource conserving technologies and (ii) Crop diversification prepared by ICARDA. It was mentioned that national programs have already endorsed and expressed their support for these projects as they felt that theses projects meet their research and developmental needs.

Following the Steering Committee Meeting, a Session for members of the Strategic Partnership Agreement (SPA) was convened by Dr. Roshan Cooke, Global Mechanism, to discuss opportunities for further strengthening of CACILM program activities, especially in view of the need to explore funding opportunities to sustain the Program.