Sustainable Agriculture Tanzania (SAT) is inviting undergraduate students from Sokoine University of Agriculture (only final years) to the 5th Workshop for Participatory Research Design (WPRD) which will be held on 1st December 2018 at the New Lecture Theatre MLT9 from 08:00am – 6.00pm. WPRD is part of the Farmer Centred Research Program (FCRP) which provides solutions for small scale farmers who are practicing agro-ecological farming methods. The FCRP decentralizes the research process and puts the farmers at the centre where they can express their key issues. With addressing these issues students start collaborations with farmers for designing and conducting participatory research. Interested students who want to attend the WPRD, are required to fill the online application form for registration. Only registered students can attend the workshop.
The research clusters for 2018/19 will be:
- Unreliable market for livestock and milk
- Pests and diseases:
- Livestock diseases
- Crop diseases
- Pasture management
- Soil ecology
- Seeds management
The WPRD will provide a platform where researchers, research supervisors, organic farmers and pastoralists work together and focus on existing problems related to land management, marketing, organic crop and livestock production. The output of the WPRD will be questions identified by farmers, pastoralists and students, which can later be answered through action research (special projects – Bachelor theses).
All registered students can attend the 1st part of the WPRD (8:00am till 12:30pm) which will include:
- Introduction to Agroecology
- Introduction to Participatory Research
- Research Presentation from FCRP 2017/2018
- Podium Discussion with Farmers & Pastoralists
Afterwards SAT will announce 60 students who will be selected according to their submitted applications. Those students are invited to attend the 2nd part of WPRD (01:30pm till 6.00pm) which will include:
- Defining Research Questions & Design (Group-work together with farmers and lecturers)
- Presenting Research Questions & Design
The 60 students who will attend the 2nd part of the WPRD will be afterwards invited to submit a concept note. This concept note will be a suggested special project (Bachelor thesis), which must be in line with a WPRD cluster outcome. 10 selected students will receive research grants of TZS 1,100,000/= to conduct research in collaboration with farmers.
The deadline for receiving applications is 25th November 2018. All applications must be filled online.