ENGAGING PATHWAYS

Environmental Change and
Maize Innovation Pathways in Kenya:
Mapping Pathways In and Out of Maize
John Thompson (j.thompson@ids.ac.uk)
Food and Agriculture Domain Convenor
STEPS Centre – July 2013

Project Focus
• Examine prospects for
‘broadening out’ and
‘opening up’ of
alternative innovation
pathways ‘in and out of
maize’
• Assess responses of
various actors to rapid
environmental, social
and technical change

narrow inputs
Dominant maize
pathway driving
agricultural R&D
and policy
priorities and
excludes
alternatives
Addressing Maize ‘Lock in’:
Narrowing and Closing Down
POSSIBLE
PATHWAYS
GOVERNANCE
COMMITMENTS
SOCIAL
APPRAISAL
‘closed down’ outputs

narrow inputs
Addressing Maize ‘Lock in’:
Narrowing and Closing Down
POSSIBLE
PATHWAYS
GOVERNANCE
COMMITMENTS
SOCIAL
APPRAISAL
‘closed down’ outputs
Dominant maize
discourse focused
on adding a new
pathway – DT
maize

‘opened up’ outputsbroad inputs
POSSIBLE
PATHWAYS
GOVERNANCE
COMMITMENTS
SOCIAL
APPRAISAL
Seeking Alternatives:
Broadening and Opening Up
Can the STEPS
Pathways Approach
help to identify viable
agricultural
innovation pathways
and open up debate
about them?

A: ENGAGE ACTORS
1: review relevant histories
2: analyse associated
networks
3: snowball salient interests
4: prioritise most marginal
5: examine power relations
6: identify basic pathway
visions
7: be alert for hidden plurality
8: seek critical feedback
B: EXPLORE FRAMINGS
2: elicit notions of systems
3: explore related narratives
4: address Sustainability
values
5: scope key possible
pathways
6: review aspects of
incertitude
7: differentiate perspectives
D: REVEAL POLITICAL
ACTIONS
2: confirm key protagonists
3: explore forms of agency
4: define possible interventions
5: review winners/losers
6: examine possible responses
7: establish accountabilities
C CHARACTERISE DYNAMICS
2: explore challenges/opportuniti
3: scrutinise likely shocks/stresse
4: look at actors’ strength/weakne
5: examine decision/branch point
6: identify winners/losers
7: attend to issues of power/politic
STEPS METHODOLOGY
appreciative
process:
help appreciate alternative pathways
APPRECIATE
PATHWAYS
• The four distinct stages
in this process are
overlapping and
mutually co-constituting
• The logical sequence is
therefore heuristic. The
actual practice is more
iterative and recursive
• Any ‘broadening out’ or
‘opening up’ of social
appreciations of
alternative pathways
must in some way
consider all these
stages and tasks and
thoroughly address a
majority of tasks defined
in each stage

Activities – 4 Key Stages
1. Engage actors: Interviews with stakeholders engaged in work on
maize R&D, adaptation to climate change, food security, etc
2. Explore framings: particularly their ideas about ‘resilience’,
‘innovation’ and ‘pathways‘ and test concepts in relation to
environmental change and maize in Kenya
3. Characterise dynamics:
• Phase I – Rapid rural appraisals and panel data comparative
studies – 3 sites (low, [medium], high potential agroecozones)
• Mapping ‘pathways in and out of maize’ (based on the RRAs
and panel studies and key informant interviews)
• Phase 2 – Analysing pathways and what facilitates/inhibits
access to them in risk-prone areas based on stakeholder
criteria (using Multicriteria Mapping - MCM)
4. Reveal strategies: policy engagement and outreach

Multi-disciplinary Team
• African Centre for Technology Studies (ACTS) –
African science and technology policy, climate policy
• Centre for African Bio-Entrepreneurship (CABE) –
agricultural biotechnology, seed policy
• Tegemeo Institute of Agricultural Policy and
Development, Egerton University – agricultural
economics, Kenyan agricultural policy, agricultural
panel data
• Science and Technology Policy Research,
University of Sussex (SPRU) – science and
technology policy, multi-criteria mapping, STEPS
pathways approach
• Institute of Development Studies (IDS) –
agricultural and environmental policy, rapid appraisal
methods, political economy of policy processes,
STEPS pathways approach

A: ENGAGE ACTORS –
together:
1. review relevant histories
2. analyse associated networks
3. snowball salient interests
4. prioritise most marginal
5. examine power relations
6. identify basic pathway
visions
7. be alert for hidden plurality
8. seek critical feedback
STEPS Methodology –
Stage 1

Engage Actors
• Review relevant histories 
– Literature review  Kenya’s agricultural
(maize) history; environmental change;
resilience; maize R&D/innovation
– Panel data analysis  agricultural
production and socio-economic trends
in selected districts and sites
– Trends analysis  dynamics of seasonal
and long-term change in selected field
sites
• Analyse associated networks and snowball
salient interests  key informants in
scientific organisations, government
ministries, farmers’ organisations, seed
companies, NGOs, donors, others ; feedback

Engage Actors
• Prioritise most marginal  field
studies
– ‘Low potential’ zone (5 villages)
Sakai, Mbooni East District, Eastern
Province
– ‘High potential’ zone (3 villages)
Mmbasu, Likuyani Division, Lugari
District, Western Province
• Rapid rural appraisals + focus group
and key informant interviews
– Analysed dynamic drivers of
change in agricultural systems
– Disaggregated communities –
gender, wealth, production and
marketing strategies

Main story  Diversification…
Multiple pathways –
Both in and out of maize?
But where is it leading? 
Towards more resilient livelihoods
and agri-food systems?
Or are there constraints to pursuing
these alternative pathways?
Identify Basic Pathway Visions

B: EXPLORE FRAMINGS
2. elicit notions of systems
3. explore related narratives
4. address Sustainability
values
5. scope key possible
pathways
6. review aspects of
incertitude
7. differentiate perspectives
Stage 2

Scope Key Possible Pathways 
‘In and Out of Maize’
• Fieldwork findings have been distilled into a
set of 9 core pathways in drought-prone
farming regions (e.g. Sakai, Eastern
Province):
1. Reliance on internal/external inputs 
including local vs. certified seed (OPVs,
hybrids, etc.) and their sources (informal
vs. formal channels)
2. Reliance on maize as key crop
3. Diversification out of maize  other
key crops (‘orphan’ dryland staple crops,
horticulture)

Typology of Pathways
Low Maize High Maize
Low-
External
Input
High-
External
Input

Typology of Pathways
Low Maize High Maize
Low-
External
Input
High-
External
Input
1 – Alternative dryland
staples for subsistence
2 – Alternative dryland
staples for market
3 – local improvement of
local maize
5 – Assisted seed
multiplication of maize
4 – Assisted seed
multiplication of alternative
dryland staples
6 – Individual high-value
crop commercialization
7 – Group-based high-value
crop commercialization
8 – Commercial delivery of
new DT maize varieties
9 – Public delivery of new
DT maize varieties

Differentiate perspectives
• The pathways served as a starting point
for opening up the discussion with
farmers, scientists and policy makers on:
1. Range of pathways  analysing
‘pathways in and out of maize’
2. Discussion about relevant criteria
for choosing one pathway over
another in such a way as to factor in
the cross-scale dynamics and
constraints
3. Critical examination of alternative
visions of the future and
institutional arrangements needed
to support them

Stage 3
C CHARACTERISE DYNAMICS:
2. explore challenges/opportunities
3. scrutinise likely shocks/stresses
4. look at actors’ strength/weakness
5. examine decision/branch points
6. identify winners/losers
7. attend to issues of power/politics

Multicriteria Mapping (MCM)
• MCM is an interactive, decision analysis
technique that provides a way of appraising a
series of different options or pathways
• Helps individuals to explain their views about
a complex issue in a systematic way
• Involves:
– developing set of criteria
– evaluating the performance of each pathway
under each criterion
– weighting each criterion according to its relative
importance

Multicriteria Mapping (MCM):
The Interview Process
2. Develop a
set of criteria
5. Reflect on
outcome
1. Discuss
pathways
3. Score pathways
under each
criterion; optimistic
& pessimistic
scores to reflect
uncertainty
4. Assign
weight to
each criterion


Designs: Multicriteria Mapping (MCM)
and Policy Engagement Process


Groups of Informants
1. Farmers (11 stakeholder groups)
a) Gender
b) Income level
2. Nairobi-based Informants (12 stakeholder
groups)
a) Senior government officials
b) Commercially oriented
c) Science and technology institutes
d) Biotechnology focus

Sets of Criteria:
Macro and Micro Issues
• Economic and Market Issues 71 criteria
– Resource costs 23 criteria
– Availability and access to resources 30 criteria
– Market aspects 18 criteria
• Stress Tolerance Issues 43 criteria
– Water use 17 criteria
– Pests and disease resistance 14 criteria
– Suitability of crop to agro-ecological conditions 12 criteria
• Social, Political & Cultural Issues 33 criteria
– Knowledge and skills 14 criteria
– Social and cultural 9 criteria
– Food security 10 criteria

Evaluating Pathway
‘Performance Rankings’
• Performance rankings are literal ‘maps’ of pathway
scores
• Averaged across groups of stakeholders & sets of
criteria (issues)
• High end of range indicates average optimistic scores
• Low end of range indicates average pessimistic scores
• Length of range (or bar) indicates uncertainty &
ambiguity expressed
– Uncertainty is expressed by individuals in a stakeholder group
– Ambiguity is the result of disagreement between stakeholders

Qualitative Analysis of the
Pathways Evaluations
• Used to identify groups of stakeholders
with shared points of view
• Used to group criteria according to shared
themes
• Clarifies the reasons for convergence
and divergence in the pathways
performance rankings

Pathways Out of Maize: Orphans or Siblings?
Performance rankings for different groups of stakeholders shows a surprising
amount of optimism about alternative dryland staple crops, especially under a set of
stress tolerance criteria
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60
Performance Rankings
Alternative staples for subsistence
Alternative staples for market
Local improvementoflocal maize seed
Assisted seed multiplication (alternative crops)
Assisted seed multiplication (maize)
Individual high-value crop commercialization
Group-based high-value crop commercialization
Commercial deliveryofnew maize varieties
Public deliveryofnew maize varieties
Sakai Farmers
(11 interviews)
Stress Tolerance
issues (22 criteria)
Biotech Focus
(5 interviews)
Stress tolerance
issues (9 criteria)
Public sector
(3 interviews)
Stress tolerance
issues (8
criteria)

Pathways in Maize:
Sakai farmer performance rankings show a preference for local maize,
not new maize
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Localimprovement of localmaize seed
Individualhigh-value crop commercialization
Commercialdelivery of new maize varieties
Public delivery of new maize varieties
SakaiFarmers (all)
11 interviews
SakaiFarmers
(low income)
3 interviews
SakaiFarmers
(high income)
8 interviews

Pathways in Maize:
Performance rankings for groups of Nairobi-based informants show a
variety of high performing pathways, but rarely high maize options
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
S&TInstitutes
(5 interviews)
Biotech Focus
(5 interviews)
Commercially
Oriented
(5 interviews)
Public sector
officials
(3 interviews)

Pathways in Maize: Living in Parallel Worlds?
Performance rankings for different groups of Nairobi-based informants
show assisted seed pathways are ‘consistent’ performers
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Local improvement of local maize seed
Commercial delivery of new maize varieties
S&TInstitutes
(5 interviews)
Biotech Focus
(5 interviews)
Commercially
Oriented
(5 interviews)

Stage 4
D: REVEAL POLITICAL ACTIONS
2. confirm key protagonists
3. explore forms of agency
4. define possible interventions
5. review winners/losers
6. examine possible responses
7. establish accountabilities

‘opened up’ outputs
acknowledged plurality
and conditionality
broad inputs
POSSIBLE
PATHWAYS
GOVERNANCE
COMMITMENTS
SOCIAL
APPRAISAL
Pathways In and Out
of Maize
Using the STEPS
Pathways Approach
to foster dialogue
and debate and
encourage
appreciation of
alternative pathways
APPRECIATE
PATHWAYS

Policy engagement
• National policy workshop
– Involved key policy actors
– Farmer representatives actively engaged
– Presented STEPS approach, findings and
recommendations
– Video: ‘Pathways In and Out of Maize’
– Working groups  linked to pathways
– Policy issues and options; ‘action points’
for different actors
• Key Stakeholder Group meetings –
– Climate Change and Arid Lands Group
– Seeds and Seed Policy Group
– Drought Tolerant Crops and Plant
Breeding Group
– Rockefeller Foundation Climate Group
APPRECIATE
PATHWAYS

Policy engagement
• Follow up project: ‘Beyond Biosafety’ 
biotechnology regulation in Kenya
• International conferences 
environmental change and food systems
• Video: ‘Seeds and Sustainability’
• Kenya Agricultural Research Institute 
informed ‘National Climate Change and
Agriculture Programme’
• Future Agricultures Consortium 
informed projects on the ‘Political
Economy of Seed Systems’ + ‘Integrated
Seed System Development’

ENGAGING PATHWAYS

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