The meeting of the Board of Trustees of the World Agroforestry Centre in Nairobi in April 2011 will review current progress, but more significantly will make several decisions that will influence the future development of the Centre.

The term of the present Director General, Dennis Garrity, will expire in September 2011 and three candidates for his replacement will make presentations and interact with the Board and Centre staff during the meeting. The outcome of the selection process is expected to be announced at the end of the week.

A new Director General will certainly bring new dimensions to our agenda, at the time when the Centre’s work on agroforestry for food security and climate change adaptation and mitigation is gaining international attention. This will put World Agroforestry in an even stronger position to pursue a programme of scientific work, in concert with widespread policy innovation in an increasing number of countries.

Board members will hear that the Centre is financially secure, even though this is a period of great uncertainty, with the CGIAR undergoing the most profound reforms in its history. In 2010 a new Consortium was developed, with a new Consortium Board operating and a Fund Council well established. High on the horizon will be discussions on how best to interact with the new structures.

The Consortium has defined a Strategy and Results Framework, placing a strong emphasis on outcomes and impact. Future funding will be linked to performance and greater accountability, and the Board will consider the challenges that the new Consortium brings, especially the new opportunities to take research outcomes and work with new partners to make significant development impacts.

The reforms have involved the creation of seven CGIAR Thematic Areas and fifteen CGIAR Research Programmes (CRPs), which will lead to more collaboration and less overlap with other research centres. The Centre will be involved in six of the seven Thematic Areas/CRPs, with major collaboration in two of them: CRP6, Forests, Trees and Agroforestry, and CRP7, Agriculture and Climate Change. The Board will discuss the mechanisms that will allow the Centre to develop and participate in these large-scale enterprises. 

2011 is also the International Year of Forests, which presents a ready-made opportunity to place agroforestry firmly in the context of agriculture and forests, as well as demonstrate its continued relevance to the three UN Environmental Conventions (CBD, UNCCD, UNFCCC). Agroforestry has a major role to play in improving food security and creating a healthier environment. That is why the research conducted by the World Agroforestry Centre over the coming years, in partnership with others, will be more important than ever before.

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Watch and download presentations of the Director General, research group and regional leaders to the Board of Trustees April 2011

The list of guests who attended the opening sessions of the Board meeting

Check this page later to see some videos of the Board of Trustees