Curriculum Implementation Support for Training Institutes (CISTI)

Group photo of tutors from public and private Agricultural Training Institutes and facilitators after entrepreneurship training at SAT FTC Vianzi

CISTI stands for Curriculum Implementation Support for Training Institutes. Sustainable Agriculture Tanzania (SAT) implements this project in collaboration with the Ministry of Agriculture (MoA), especially the Division of Training, Extension Services and Research (DTER). DTER supervises, oversees, advises, and controls the quality of curriculum implementation in the Ministry of Agriculture Training Institutes (MATIs).

The long-term impact goal of the CISTI project is to have competent technical personnel who work effectively to meet the demand of Tanzania’s agriculture sector, increase climate resilience and strengthen the livelihoods of smallholder farmers, thus alleviating poverty and food insecurity for sustainable development.

Project Manager presenting SAT and CISTI project activities during the training for basic mathematics in agriculture.

At outcome level, the project purpose is to support public and private training institutions to produce graduates who are in line with the need of the country through successfully integrating and implementing organic agriculture, gender, environmental management, cooperatives and communication skills through the new training curriculum for agriculture on certificate and diploma levels.

Ingredients for organic plant protection agent

Organic plant protection agent — Ingredients and processing: Producing organic plant protection agents is among the fundamentals of sustainable agriculture. To ensure that every year, more than 3,000 Tanzanian students acquire the necessary skills, tutors and garden-attendants get trained on organic gardens’ management using natural botanical extracts.

The CISTI project began as a pilot project from January 1^st to December 31st, 2019. During this pilot phase, it collaborated with seven (7) Agricultural Training institutes in (3) three agro-ecological zones. The institutes covered by the pilot project are:

HORTI-Tengeru and KATC-Moshi (Northern Highlands zone)
St. John’s University and TRACDI (Central zone)
MATI-Ilonga, NSI, and KATRIN (Eastern/Coastal zone)

This project is carried out for 3 years from 2020 to 2022 as a fully-fledged project covering a wider scope of 29 Agricultural Training Institutes, both public and private, in 7 agro-ecological zones in the country. The results, experiences, lessons accrued from the pilot phase inform this mature phase.

CISTI Module Implementation Diagramm — An overview of the processes that facilitate compendium implementation: The brownish and blue boxes illustrate the process completed during the pilot phase. The green boxes show the facilitation cycle for 261 tutors of 29 Agricultural Training Institutes.

The main areas of focus for the CISTI project are:

The development of compendiums as teaching resources for tutors and learning resources for students in the five new thematic areas:
- Communication Skills for NTA level 4
- Environmental Management and Principles of Co-operatives in Agriculture for NTA level 5
- Organic Farming and Gender in Agriculture for NTA level 6
Capacity building of tutors through a series of workshops and training in the new subject areas integrated into the new training curriculum.
Establishing organic demonstration gardens in agricultural training institutes
- for students to conduct their practical training which accounts for 60% of the learning time.
- for public farmers’ days where various stakeholders get access to up-to-date knowledge and methods through demonstration.
Improving the teaching and learning facilities in institutes with special focus on restocking the libraries and modernising the ICT laboratories.
Expansion of the capacity of the SAT Farmer Training Centre. The FTC hosts most of the training sessions. The aim is to provide a conducive environment for various trainees including both tutors and students. >> watch our FTC video clip for lively impressions
Improvement of the capacity of the Division of Training, Extension Services and Research (DTER), so that it performs its mandated supervisory, advisory, monitoring and controlling functions effectively. The DTER oversees the implementation of the new curriculum in agricultural training institutes.

Sprouting vegetables in organic demo garden — Sprouting vegetables at HORTI-Tengeru’s organic demo garden. This one of seven gardens for practical learning was established by SAT in seven Agricultural Colleges.

Farmers gathered in the hall of Kilombero Agricultural Training and Research Institute (KATRIN).. — During the Farmers’ Days, the Agricultural Training Institutes open the doors of their demonstration gardens to the public. Here at Kilombero Agricultural Training and Research Institute (KATRIN) and elsewhere, too, the first events of this kind were a tremendous success.

Farmers following demonstrations on organic farming — During the Farmers’ Days, the Agricultural Training Institutes open the doors of their demonstration gardens to the public. Here at Kilombero Agricultural Training and Research Institute (KATRIN) and elsewhere, too, the first events of this kind were a tremendous success.

The primary target groups of this project are (i) tutors (ii) students in MATIs (iii) the DTER Office and (iv) the farming community around project training institutes.

The project continues to impart change towards sustainable farming in Tanzania.

Here are some of the success stories.

CISTI is kindly supported by LED Liechtenstein Development Service (funding) and the United Republic of Tanzania (coordination).

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