NEWS:

18 Aug, 2016


Dr Chilongo: CARD needs a clear strategic plan on how it can fit into LUANAR

Recently LUANAR management appointed Dr Thabbie Chilongo as an Acting Director for Centre for Agriculture Research and Decelopment (CARD). Patricia Nkhoma caught up with the Dr Chilongo to discuss his new position and strategies put in place. Excerpts:

Q. Congratulations Sir for making it as an Acting Director for Centre for Agriculture Research and Development (CARD), what would be your first task to embark on in your new role?

A. Thank you very much for your congratulations. First, let me take this opportunity to thank the LUANAR Administration for entrusting me with this position. I will work to my level best to take CARD to greater heights. There are so many things to be done to make CARD realize its full potential. Here I highlight a few:
o First there is need to do a small SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) analysis about CARD. Having worked for CARD for over 12 years, I already have an idea of some of these SWOT elements but ascending to the position is already an eye opener to some of the things I couldn't see in the past 12 years as an ordinary member of CARD. We need to brainstorm both within and outside CARD on how we can move forward. I have already made arrangements to meet different sets of CARD staff members and other key stakeholders to kick start that process.
o Then we need to do proper planning for short, medium and long term goals for CARD in harmony with the LUANAR Strategic Plan. Fortunately, LUANAR is implementing the Performance Monitoring System (PMS). This can be a good starting point so that from the word go everybody's role in contributing to CARD's plans and eventually into LUANAR strategic goals is clearly spelt out and ready to be monitored. Resources permitting, we want to reintroduce retreats where we take every CARD member out to reflect on our performance. In this way, each member of CARD will realize that they have important roles to play as individuals.
o CARD does a lot of activities, which I have realized many people are not aware of. Therefore, people may be justified when they think that there is nothing tangible happening at CARD. Of course, we have our shortfalls but it is important to raise our visibility and be transparent in the process of conducting our CARD mandates. Thus, another most immediate thing to do is to raise the visibility of CARD within LUANAR, nationally and internationally. It is only when people are aware of what we do that they can give constructive criticisms for the advancement of CARD in particular and LUANAR in general. On this one, your office can also be very vital in raising this CARD awareness. In short, we need to blow our trumpet louder.


Q. What will be your strategies in running this centre?
A. The most important strategy is to strategize. We need proper planning in all what we want to achieve. CARD needs a clear strategic plan on how it can fit into LUANAR's structure and goals. I know we have LUANAR strategic plan but it's also important for various Departments and Sections, including CARD, to have their own strategic plans to feed into the broad LUANAR strategy. The absence of CARD strategic plan however should not be an excuse not to plan. Remember "failing to plan is planning to fail". So the most immediate thing is to come up with an annual plan for this 2016/17 year. This needs to be done in a participatory manner so that there is sense of ownership for all members. Plans are already in the pipeline to do this as soon as possible as one of the building blocks of the PMS.
In order to execute our plans, CARD needs enough resources both financial and human. For me the most important resource is the human resource because when you have the right and well motivated members of staff who can competently execute the plans, the financial resources will automatically follow. Therefore, I will strive to work with a motivated and disciplined human resource.

Q. In brief what is CARD and what’s its main contribution to LUANAR and the nation at large?
A. The Centre for Agricultural Research and Development (CARD) is a research centre of the Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources (LUANAR. CARD was operationalized in 1994 through the establishment of the Agricultural Policy Research Unit (APRU) in 1994 with funding from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) as a centre of excellence for undertaking high quality and timely policy research in agriculture and rural development, sustainable utilization of natural resources and environmental management. Later The World Bank funded the establishment of a training unit, Agricultural Policy Analysis Training Unit (APATU), which as the name suggests, conducts policy-related training.
CARD is mandated to conduct research, training and provision of consultancy services to both public and private sector clients, which CARD has satisfactorily done over the years.

Q. It is suggested elsewhere that research is crucial for economic development of a country, what’s your views on this? And as CARD how are you contributing to this?

A. That is very true. Research is a necessary condition for economic development. It is only research that enables development planners to formulate evidence-based policies that are in sync with realities on the ground as opposed to policies based on opinion, speculations or anecdotal evidence. The challenge of such non-evidence-based policies is that during implementation they miss out real issues on the ground. CARD's research over the years has contributed to feeding into evidence-based policy formulation. However, there is still more room for improvement on how best CARD can contribute to this.

Q. What are the recent research works that are taking place at CARD?

A. As I indicated earlier, there are a lot of research activities taking place at CARD in collaboration with both local and international partners. Just to highlight a few:
o CARD partnered with the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC-CH) to write a joint proposal of this three-year project. The project was approved in June 2015 and will officially commence on 1st October 2016 and will run up to 30th September 2018. The overall goal of the project is to investigate linkages between the use of biomass fuels and impacts on the human, terrestrial, and atmospheric systems. Quantitative field observations of both human and natural systems, scenario development and land cover land use change and atmospheric modelling will be used to investigate these linkages and determine ways in which natural and human system resilience can be enhanced at local, national and regional scale.
o CARD in collaboration with the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) are implementing a project in Salima, T.A. Ndindi, aimed at promoting resilience of flood-affected households.
o CARD in collaboration with ICF Macro, a USA-based consultancy firm, will conduct a study to evaluate an mHealth Application in the iCCM Programme in Malawi. The primary objective of the evaluation is to assess the value added of using the D-Tree mobile application in Integrated Community Case Management (iCCM) programs to improve the quality of care delivered to children under five years old. CARD's main role in this collaboration will be to coordinate data collection, which will begin on 22 August and expected to end on 23 September 2016.
o These are just very few of the many research activities taking place at CARD right now. We will be using your office and other media to publicize these activities as widely as possible. Feel free to come to CARD any time to get details of the specific activities we are undertaking.

Q. Who is Dr Thabbie Chilongo? How you do like being looked at as...what are you?

A. Professionally I am an Economist with a PhD in Economics majoring in Development and Resource Economics from The Norwegian University of Life Sciences (NMBU). I also have a background in Agricultural Economics through my specializations at BSc. and MSc. levels.
As to how I want to be looked at, let everyone be the judge.

Q. Any final words?

A. I am deeply humbled by this position of Acting Director of CARD. It is a very big challenge knowing that people have high expectations from how CARD should operate. There is a lot to do to achieve these expectations. However, this cannot be achieved through a one-man's show. I will do my best as an individual but this would not be enough if I do not get the required support from all the stakeholders including the University Administration, CARD staff and the entire University at large. If CARD succeeds, then LUANAR also succeeds. A vibrant research centre in one of the important ingredients of a World Class University. Together we can!