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The goal of CIMMYT Capacity
building & knowledge sharing
The researchers who attend CIMMYT courses
play a critical role in meeting their countries’ national
food security and resource conservation goals. They work on
behalf of the world’s poorest and most marginal farmers.
By creating an agricultural community of knowledge in critical
regions through quality and gender-balanced training, CIMMYT
empowers researchers to help these farmers and, in so doing,
to help their countries towards a more food-secure, sustainable
future.
 What
makes CIMMYT Capacity building & knowledge sharing different?
In contrast to formal academic training
in plant breeding and agronomy in most countries, which is
mainly broad and theoretical, CIMMYT training activities are
highly specialized and ‘hands-on’. Through a unique
training program that combines practical experience in the
everyday processes of maize or wheat research and the theoretical
knowledge to support their actions, course participants develop
and sharpen researcher skills in conducting efficient research
that responds to the challenging circumstances of developing
countries.
Furthermore, CIMMYT offers a global perspective.
Because CIMMYT works throughout Asia, Africa, and Latin America,
the researchers who attend CIMMYT courses benefit from the
mass of information and data assembled and handled in a global
research program.
Because course participants are drawn from
many nations, they have an opportunity to exchange information,
experiences, and strategies that may prove useful in other
settings. This same exchange occurs between participants and
the CIMMYT researchers – many of them internationally
recognized scientists – who lead the courses.
Human resource development at CIMMYT connects
researchers to a broad, interactive scientific community.
Course participants and CIMMYT staff form a community of ‘best
practices’ for research that continues to function informally
long after the course work ends. Alumni of CIMMYT courses
often become a significant force for agricultural change in
their countries.
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What are the impacts of CIMMYT Capacity
building & knowledge sharing?
CIMMYT has been providing human
capacity building with success for the last 30 years.
More than 10,000 researchers from around the world are alumni
of CIMMYT’s various human resource development efforts,
including more than 700 scientists from 74 countries who have
completed bachelor’s, master’s or doctoral research
with CIMMYT support ( See A
Checklist of Academic Theses).
The achievements of CIMMYT’s training
efforts extend beyond mere numbers. Many participants in our
courses report that training improved their competence, inspired
confidence in undertaking research and transferring technology
to farmers, and positively influenced the quantity and quality
of their work.
Participants also credit CIMMYT courses
with helping them find better ways to work, such as the use
of new breeding and screening methodologies. Researchers report
that working relationships improved within and among divisions
in their institutes after one or more staff members attended
CIMMYT courses.
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