Article

Emerging research practice for impactin the CGIAR: The case of Index-BasedLivestock Insurance (IBLI)

Rupsha Banerjee1 , Andrew Hall2, Andrew Mude3,Brenda Wandera4 and Jennifer Kelly2

AbstractUnder increased scrutiny by its funders, the CGIAR continues to search for ways of translating research excellence intoinnovation and developmental impact. Several approaches have been suggested that recognize the interactive nature ofinnovation. While these have been deemed useful, it is the deeper institutional change agenda that has been a bottleneck inthe evolving ways of the CGIAR deploying science for impact. This article documents an example in the CGIAR wheresignificant innovation appears to have taken place in research practice, and where the institutional setting of both theCGIAR center involved and its donors have adapted to accommodate this new approach. The case study presented isrecent experiences at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) of developing and facilitating the adoption ofIndex-Based Livestock Insurance (IBLI) in Kenya and Ethiopia. The approach of the IBLI program evolved as a form ofresearch practice that expands the boundaries of legitimate research practices in the CGIAR: it maintained the essentialsof international public goods, but also included activities engaging with innovation processes that led to tangible householdimpacts. While the development and use of this approach was not without its tensions both within ILRI and with donorsfunding the work, the approach proved highly successful and won acceptance and legitimacy. This suggests that organi-zations should encourage and support individual projects and teams to adapt, develop, and adopt different approaches inorder to achieve impact. Accepting pluralistic narrative of success will be a critical part of this.

KeywordsCGIAR, innovation, institutional change, technology, impact, research practice

Introduction

The international agricultural research centers of the

CGIAR were established nearly half a century ago as a way

of creating agricultural science centers of excellence to deal

with food insecurity and related agricultural development

issues in the poorest countries of the world (Herdt, 2012).

Despite considerable evolution in thinking and priorities on

international development, the core mandate of the CGIAR

remains relevant; specially a mandate as an international

public goods (IPGs) research organization dealing with the

crops, agroecologies and food systems important to the

world’s poorest household, and which the private sector

is likely to underinvest in.

Yet despite the widespread recognition of the impor-

tance of this public goods mandate, the CGIAR is under

increasing pressure to find ways of more effectively con-

necting research efforts with wider processes of innovation

that deliver economic, social, and sustainability impacts

(Leeuwis et al., 2017). This scrutiny is not new. There have

been decades of search in the CGIAR for more effective

ways of translating research excellence into transforma-

tional impacts that drastically improve food security and

rural incomes in the poorest countries (Hall and Dijkman,

2019; ISPC, 2016).

There has been no shortage of prescription of how the

CGIAR should evolve its research approach (McCalla,

2011). Participatory approaches, partnership, research con-

sortia, innovation platforms, challenge program, and vari-

ous forms of research-industry technology incubation to

name a few have all been suggested as a response to the

innovation and impact challenge (Biggs, 1990; Chambers

et al., 1989; Hall, 2006; Hall et al., 2001; Schut et al., 2019;

World Bank, 2006, 2012). However, for these tools to be

successful, they need to be accompanied by new forms of

1 International Livestock Research Institute, Nairobi, Kenya2 Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRI),

Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia3 African Development Bank, Abidjan, Lagunes, Cote d’Ivoire4 Project Concern International, Nairobi, Kenya

Corresponding author:

Rupsha Banerjee, International Livestock Research Institute, Old Naivasha

Road, Nairobi 00100, Kenya.

Email: rupsha80@gmail.com

Outlook on Agriculture1–13ª The Author(s) 2019Article reuse guidelines:sagepub.com/journals-permissionsDOI: 10.1177/0030727019866840journals.sagepub.com/home/oag

research practice and institutional designs, supported by

appropriate management systems and strategies (Chave

et al., 2012). This deeper institutional change agenda has

been the key bottleneck in evolving the way the CGIAR

deploys science for impact (Hall et al., 2003; Horton and

Mackay, 2003; ISPC, 2016; Kamanda et al., 2017; Watts

et al., 2003).

This article documents an example in the CGIAR where

a significant innovation in research practice appears to have

taken place. It is a case where the institutional setting of

both the CGIAR center involved and its donors have

adapted to accommodate the new (and successful)

approach. The case study documents recent experiences

at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) of

developing and facilitating the adoption of Index-Based

Livestock Insurance (IBLI) in Kenya and Ethiopia. The

approach of the IBLI program evolved over time and nota-

bly involved the establishment of a market and capacity

building unit as part of a wider strategy of innovation incu-

bation. While this challenged many of the accepted norms

of an IPGs research organization, the combination of break-

through science and innovation incubation proved highly

successful in terms of adoption of the insurance product

and the impact of this on the livelihoods of pastoralist

communities.

The purpose of the article is to illustrate (i) how the new

research practice emerged in the specific context of solu-

tion/application domain, (ii) the way this challenged exist-

ing views of what is a legitimate approach in an IPG

research organization, (iii) how attention to reflection and

learning by the project team helped cement a new narrative

of research practice, and (iv) how this helped articulate to

senior research managers and funding agencies the value of

this approach and its relevance to the impact agenda.

By way of conclusion, the article observes that rather than

a tension emerging between the combined research and

development agenda of IBLI and the IPGs agenda of ILRI,

a hybridized institutional logic1 has started to emerge for the

organization. This has helped safeguard the core public good

science mandate, while legitimizing much needed activity

related to the development of uptake pathways by working

with the private sector and other stakeholders and focusing

on strengthening their capacity. There are many lessons here

for public good research organizations around the world who

are trying to juggle their core mandate of public science and

research and the increasing pressures to service private sec-

tor interests and impact ambitions.

Innovation and impact scrutiny in theCGIAR: The institutional change challenge

Tightening development assistance budgets over the last

two decades have led to intense scrutiny of impact delivery

by the CGIAR (ISPC, 2016; Renkow and Byerlee, 2010).

Driving this is funders’ insistence that much clearer path-

ways to impact from research are articulated and that

impact achievements are monitored and documented (Hor-

ton and Mackay, 2003; Leeuwis et al., 2017). Investments

in agricultural research historically show consistently high

rates of return (Alston et al., 2000; Raitzer et al., 2008; von

Braun et al., 2008) and agricultural growth has high poverty

reduction impact (World Bank, 2006). These consistently

high rates of return to research are puzzling given the poor

performance of agriculture in the areas targeted by CGIAR

research.2 However, this probably reflects the challenging

agricultural systems that the CGIAR targets, where incen-

tives for technology adoption are constrained by risky pro-

duction environments, underdeveloped and inefficient

markets, and weak policy settings (Renkow and Byerlee,

2010). As the pressure mounts from funders to deliver

impact, the CGIAR faces the challenge of strengthening

the innovation and impact orientation of their approaches

and strategies. This has been particularly challenging

because of the long-term and uncertain nature of science-

initiated innovation trajectories (Liu et al., 2011). It is also

challenging because of the difficulty of stimulating the

wider institutional change needed to support new research

practice with improved impact potential (Hall et al., 2016;

Watts et al., 2003).

This challenge has long been recognized in the CGIAR.

In 2003, a group of economists, evaluators, and participa-

tory researchers from a number of different CGIAR centers

formed a loose coalition under the banner of institutional

learning and change (ILAC) (see Horton and Mackay,

2003; Watts et al., 2003). It emerged from a series of

high-profile international impact assessment conferences

organized by the CGIAR in Costa Rica in 1999 and 2002

(see https://ispc.cgiar.org/meetings-and-events/cimmyt-

feb-2002). At the time, impact assessment research had

become a prestigious area of research for economists in the

CGIAR (Horton, 1998), with many, and often positive,

impacts being reported (see, for example, Bantilan and

Joshi, 1996; Bantilan and Parthasarathy, 1999). Yet also

during this period, there was much queasiness within the

CGIAR and among its donors about the sense of the rela-

tively modest impact of the CGIAR’s research.

The second of these CGIAR impact conference in Costa

Rica in 2002 was titled “Why has impact research not made

more of a difference” (see https://ispc.cgiar.org/meetings-

and-events/cimmyt-feb-2002). The nascent ILAC coalition

thought that they knew the answer: the limited diagnostic

power of rates of return approaches to impact assessment,

the difficulty of attributing impacts to specific technologies

or actions in complex systems contexts, and more generally

the reliance on evaluation traditions that had a very weak

learning orientation that hampered the emergence and

spread of more impactful approaches (see Agricultural Sys-

tem special edition edited by Horton and Mackay, 2003).

Robert Chambers summed up the sense of ILAC (and

probably coined the name) when he said that the CGIAR

has successfully produced high yielding varieties (HYVs)

but that it now needed to develop high yielding practices

(Hall, personal communication) by this he meant research

practices that lead to high impact. Central to ILAC’s vision

was the idea that the routine use of learning approaches in

both monitoring and evaluation could support adaptive

management and overtime could improve impact perfor-

mance of research. This resonated very strongly with

2 Outlook on Agriculture XX(X)

concepts of learning organizations that had great currency

at the time in management literature (Argyris and Schon,

1974, 1978; Pedler et al., 1991; Senge, 1990)

The ILAC initiative received considerable donor sup-

port and ran for approximately 10 years between 2003 and

2015 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institutional_Learning_

and_Change_Initiative).

Despite considerable solid work, ILAC largely failed in

its core objective of getting the CGIAR to routinely use

ILAC as a way of improving impact. The point here is not

to criticize ILAC, but to underscore how difficult institu-

tional change is in large research organizations and partic-

ularly the multicenter CGIAR. A number of points here are

worth reiterating on why institutional change is needed and

describing some of the factors that make it so difficult.

Creating a research user interface

At the risk of making a gross oversimplification, interna-

tional agricultural research has a long history of

technology-led research. Iconic success such as the green

revolution HYV cereals mask a patchier record of technol-

ogy “perfected (by research) but rejected by (farmers).” At

the heart of this challenge is the search for ways to move

from a technology delivery pipeline to an approach that

creates an interactive interface between different forms of

research inquiry—discovery, adaptive testing, problem-

solving—and domains of social and economic activity

where change and innovation takes place (ISPC, 2016;

Kamanda et al., 2017). Advocacy for partnerships to help

build this interface is long-standing, but there is still much

ambiguity about how this should actually be done, with

who and how the performance of partnerships should be

evaluated (Horton, 2013; ISPC, 2016).

Dealing with complexity

The agriculture and social development issues that the

CGIAR seeks to contribute to are almost all complex sys-

tems problems. Multi-dimensional, multi-scale problems

with many interacting components, drivers and stake-

holders and stakeholder agendas—for example, food secu-

rity. It is hardly surprising that stand-alone technological

solution performs poorly in stimulating systemic changes

that complex systems problems demand. Advocacy for the

need to embed CGIAR research in wider innovation sys-

tems has again emphasized partnership, collective action,

and the coupling of technological, institutional, and policy

innovations (Hall et al., 2003; ISPC, 2016; World Bank,

2012). However, instead of introducing a stronger system

orientation in research practice, this has led to the adoption

of systems tool such as innovation platforms that, used out

of context, have struggled to deliver their multi-scale

impact promise (Davies et al., 2018; ISPC, 2016).

Shifting from best practice to good practice

Systems perspectives on agricultural research and innova-

tion stress the contextual nature of innovation, as well as

the codependence of technical and institutional change pro-

cesses (Hall et al., 2002; Hounkonnou et al., 2012; Spiel-

man, 2005; Sumberg, 2005). In other words, research

practices and organizational setting need to adapt to the

nature of the innovation process that is being engaged

with, rather than follow “best practice” approaches (Rama-

lingam et al., 2014). However, the idea of contextual design

of research and innovation engagement approaches is chal-

lenging in many public research settings where organiza-

tional structures, practices have great inertia and the

legitimacy of new approaches emerges slowly (Horton and

Mackay, 2003; Mbabu and Hall, 2012).

The tension between research and development

One impediment to institutional change is the unresolved

tension between the IPG science mandate of the centers and

the impact agenda (often externally driven by donors). This

tension arises from questions of the legitimacy of the devel-

opment and impact-oriented activities, and often non-

research activities, in the CGIAR, often at the expense of

core science (Alston et al., 1998; Bertram, 2006; Katyal

and Mruthyunjaya, 2003; Pingali and Kelley, 2007). This

plays out in narratives that argue that the CGIAR’s com-

parative advantage is in the area of science and research

and not in development. Unfortunately for the CGIAR,

whereas public good science seems to be losing political

legitimacy, impact is the key consideration for prioritizing

investments by funders (Nightingale and Scott, 2007;

OECD, 2011).

The irony is, this research–development dichotomy ten-

sion is actually an illusion. Engaging with development (and

therefore innovation and impact process) is a critical step in

connecting research into delivery pathways and wider inno-

vation systems (World Bank, 2005). Engaging in innovation

and impact processes could also be part of a critical new

science agenda—the science of understanding and progres-

sing impact and scaling (ISPC, 2016). At least one CGIAR

center has established a development center (see https://

www.icrisat.org/tag/icrisat-development-center/) and an

agribusiness hub (see https://www.icrisat.org/agribusiness-

incubators/) to help create development impact from

research. However, it is not clear how these activities feed

back into the technology development agenda of the center

and whether these are framed by a science agenda to learn

how to practice more impactful research (Hall, 2016).There-

fore, what does the IBLI case reveal about evolving research

practice in the CGIAR and how new impact-oriented

research practices achieve legitimacy.

Methodology

This case study is based on information collected through an

Institutional Histories approach, a tool for organizational

learning and institutional change (Shambu et al., 2006). The

approach is participatory, engaging internal and external

stakeholders through sensemaking workshops to understand

the effectiveness past process and achievements and to plan

future direction (Aragon Correa et al., 2007; Banerjee et al.,

Banerjee et al. 3

2017a; Johnson et al., 2019). An institutional history exer-

cise with the IBLI team was undertaken in 2015. This

involved interviews with key members of the project team,

review of project documents, a participatory workshop with

the project team, its partners and stakeholders, presentation

and deliberation of the history and its implications to senior

managers and wider audiences in the organization where the

project is located. A total of 43 participants were involved at

different stages of this exercise, which lasted for a week and

26 interviews were conducted with external stakeholders.

Case Description: ILRI’s development andmarket delivery of IBLI to pastoralistcommunities in Kenya and Ethiopia

Organizational context

The ILRI is jointly headquartered both in Kenya and Ethio-

pia and is one of the members of the CGIAR.3 ILRI was

formed in 1975, by amalgamating International Livestock

Research Center on Animal Diseases (ILRAD) and the

International Livestock Center for Africa (ILCA). In line

with its historical origins and that of the rest of the CGIAR,

ILRI has a long history of public good science broadly

divided between the development of animal disease vac-

cines, improved animal genetics, and improved animal

nutrition. ILRI currently articulates its mandate as devel-

oping and delivering science-based practices, providing

scientific evidence for decision-makers, while developing

capacities of stakeholders in the livestock sector (https://

www.cgiar.org/research/center/ilri/). Like other CGIAR

centers, ILRI has made strenuous efforts to avoid mission

creep and the transition to a development organization

rather than a science agency.

The innovation context: IBLI

The IBLI project that is the focus of this case study sits

with the Sustainable Livestock Systems, a research pro-

gram of ILRI. The program focuses on optimizing the

economic, social, and environmental roles of livestock

(SLS strategy document, forthcoming). The core of IBLI

is an insurance scheme for drought-vulnerable pastoral-

ists in the drylands, based on low cost, accessible, and

reliable satellite-generated data of pasture availability.

The insurance reduces climate-related risk. It does not

insure livestock mortality per se, but provides payouts

that can help avoid mortality during times of fodder

scarcity. As will be seen, though the insurance product

was developed within ILRI, it was customized and

delivered by private insurance providers. This required

considerable investment by ILRI in the development of

the capacity of insurance companies to provide the

insurance and equally help pastoralists understand the

concept of insurance. The IBLI project had a number

of distinct phases as follows:

Predevelopment—Technology opportunity. The origins of the

IBLI program in ILRI can be traced to number of streams of

research and collaboration between ILRI, Cornell, and the

University of California (UC), Davis. This included analy-

sis of Pastoral Risk Management (PARIMA) data, col-

lected in pastoral areas in Kenya between 2000 and 2003.

The conclusion from this analysis was that households in

the pastoral areas were most affected by drought-related

shocks. At the same time, collaborators from Cornell and

UC Davis started researching index insurance as a probable

alternative to traditional indemnity-based insurance to miti-

gate drought-related risks. Another ILRI stream of work

focused on poverty mapping in Northern Kenya including

developing drought monitoring indicators at the household

level. This highlighted a direct correlation between drought

indicators and the welfare of households. In particular, the

Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI)4 measure

was shown to be highly correlated to household welfare.

This in turn led to the realization that this could lead to a

new form of insurance product that did not rely on physi-

cally counting losses, but instead used potential losses pre-

dicted by use of the NDVI.

Phase I—Market testing for demand and acceptability. In 2009,

the World Bank funded a 3-year project with ILRI and its

collaborators to “design an insurance product to improve

the resilience of pastoralists to drought related losses.” The

design process involved a mathematical model that used

NDVI data to predict livestock losses. This formed the

basis of a prototype insurance product. Surveys and studies

were then used to gauge the acceptability of the insurance

product by private sector insurance providers, as well as by

pastoralist households. The conclusion of these studies

highlighted that:

� ILRI needed to provide technical support to the

insurance companies for testing and adoption of the

model.

� Consulting and other external agencies should

undertake more market and demand studies to assess

the needs of the pastoralist and identify delivery

channels (Matsaert et al., 2011).

� Commercial partners, besides underwriting the prod-

uct, would be the ones leading in the efforts related

to extension, marketing, and education (Matsaert

et al 2011 as cited in Johnson et al., 2019).

In anticipation of the launch of the product, a baseline

study for impact assessment was set up with 924 house-

holds in Marsabit County in Northern Kenya to track the

future impact of the introduction and spread of IBLI.

To launch IBLI, ILRI explored several private sector

delivery options. The private sector was quite keen because

of the novelty of the product and its seemingly ease of use

and the potential to open new markets in a remote area.

Finally, ILRI chose to get into a partnership with one com-

pany, which already was setting up infrastructure in Mar-

sabit County. ILRI signed a memorandum of understanding

(MOU) with the company that was in effect an exclusivity

contract. The MOU detailed roles and responsibilities

including that the company would undertake marketing and

4 Outlook on Agriculture XX(X)

capacity development work with local agents and pastoral-

ist. In reality, the company struggled to undertake the mar-

keting and capacity development work. This proved a

pivotal point in the revisiting of the approach because it

highlighted that (a) a broader set of private players and

implementers would need to be engaged; and (b) more

importantly, the project would need to devote much more

effort to capacity building of the private sector, delivery

agencies, and pastoralists.

Phase II–Developing delivery systems and creating linkages forsupporting market development. Despite the challenges

encountered in phase I, particularly the uptake, extension,

and education about the product, IBLI was gaining atten-

tion from the international media and donors. This atten-

tion was driven by the evidence that households who were

able to adopt the product were showing welfare gains,

particularly following the first insurance payout in 2011

(see Box 1).

This set the scene for a $6 million grant jointly from

EU, the Department for International Development

(DFID) UK, and Australia’s Department for Foreign

Affairs and Trade (DFAT) for further expansion of the

region targeted for insurance adoption in the Northern

Kenya. In parallel, a grant of $650,000 from USAID was

given to start IBLI in Ethiopia in 2012. As the phase II

grant was being finalized, the ILRI team realized that the

balance between research and implementation activities to

achieve project goals had shifted. Important research

inquiries associated with the data collection and analysis

of impact were still going to be important. However,

based on the experience of phase I, it was realized that

the team was going to have to make significant efforts on

education, extension, and providing sales support to the

private sector (see Box 2).

This new emphasis on capacity building was not the

usual territory for an IPGs research organization like ILRI.

However, the team realized that this effort was too critical

to be just done in an ad hoc manner; instead it needed to be

a core part of the project. This vision was incorporated in

the project design and led to the establishment of an MCD

unit. The unit not only had a mandate of hand-holding and

training insurance companies and pastoralists, but also had

a responsibility to undertake scoping studies through action

research to help target the activities of the MCD.

This led to a number of controversies with both ILRI

management and the donors. The donors were skeptical

whether a research agency like ILRI could deliver the type

of project that was proposed with its strong emphasis on

capacity building, promotion outreach, sales of the prod-

uct, and the development of a private sector insurance

delivery mechanism. In other words, did ILRI have a com-

parative advantage in development delivery. At the same

time, ILRI management was concerned about the appro-

priateness of a “public goods research agency” carrying

out the development facing activities envisaged for the

proposed MCD (Stelmnetz et al., draft: 21). ILRI’s

research collaborators in Cornell and UC Davis also raised

concerns about the prominence of the MCD unit in the

project. Although the reasons for these concerns were

never fully articulated, the more action orientation of the

new projects may have been seen as a less rigorous a test

bed for research inquiries.

Some of the internal controversies associated with MDC

unit arose also from the staffing profile that unit required.

Instead of staff with a research background, the unit needed

development practitioners and ultimately employed profes-

sionals from development nongovernmental organizations

(NGOs), the private sector, and applied social sciences. In

contrast to the usual profile of research staff, performance

criteria had to be different and adjusted to suit the profiles

Box 2. Circumstances leading to theformation of the Market and CapacityDevelopment (MCD) Unit

At the launch of IBLI, 1975 contracts were sold. In

spite of this, the next round of sales was missed in

2010.5 In 2011, there was a payout, and the insurance

companies were late in disseminating the payout to

the beneficiaries. The project team had not anticipated

the lack of capacity of the insurance companies

accompanied by the reluctance on their part to use

their own resources to invest in marketing activities,

building their own capacity and that of the pastoralists.

This realization led to the agreements between ILRI

and the donors to increase the emphasis on providing

direct implementation support to the market.

Source: Johnson et al., 2019

Box 1. Welfare impacts of IBLI

Research starting from 2010 was showing insured

households were 36% less likely to anticipate relying

on distress sales of livestock and 25% less likely to

foresee reducing meals to cope with the drought.

Furthermore, insurance was able to increase herd sur-

vival rates, improve production outcomes, and create

positive impact on nutrition. This prompted the proj-

ect team to think about expanding the IBLI product

across the border to Southern Ethiopia, which shared

similar landscapes, sociocultural characteristics such

as Northern Kenya. An evaluation of use of payouts in

2017 from the severe drought showed that most pas-

toralists used payouts for livestock inputs and human

welfare services such as food and health.

Source: Hirfrfot et al., 2014; Janzen and Carter,

2013; Jensen et al., 2015; Taye et al., 2019

Banerjee et al. 5

being hired. At the same time, the terms of references for

these positions had to be modified from the standardized

job grades and positions that the organization used.

The MCD unit was critical to the success of the project.

Part of this success concerned the way building capacity in

the private sector supported delivery as well as supporting

communities to adopt IBLI. The unit also emerged as

important due to its unforeseen roles. The first role was

related to partnership management. This had three dimen-

sions: (i) supporting and monitoring the work of implemen-

tation partners, often large NGOs with an on-ground

presence, and making sure implementation was on track;

(ii) building a communication and policy advocacy

interface with government that had a growing interest in

index-based insurance; and (iii) because of its intimate

involvement in implementation and related scoping studies,

the unit became a key mechanism for identifying emerging

challenges that needed research attention and communicat-

ing these back to the researchers on the team. For example,

pastoralists complained that the index was not triggering

payments until after their livestock died and, in some cases,

payments were triggered when livestock were not at risk.

This led to studies to better calibrate the index. This refine-

ment was particularly crucial, because at that time the

Kenyan government, with World Bank support, was look-

ing to roll out a national level index-based insurance ini-

tiative. Subsequently, this positioned ILRI to provide

technical assistance to the resulting large-scale initiative

that the Kenyan government put in place, the Kenya Live-

stock Insurance Program (KLIP). This helped further

deploy and scale ILRI expertise and research-generated

information on index-based insurance.

Planning for phase III. By 2015, ILRI realized that it had a

major success on its hands. IBLI was officially adopted as

KLIP with a consortium of private companies underwriting

it (see Box 3).

At the same time, phase II was coming to an end. In

preparation for the approaching end and the design of a

next phase, in the reflective tradition of the team, IBLI staff

started asking themselves some hard questions. These ques-

tions focused on (i) whether team’s mandate was only the

development and spread of IBLI or was it a deeper mandate

of developing a range of tools to reduce the vulnerability of

pastoralists and (ii) understanding the nature of their appar-

ently successful approach and exploring how this could be

deployed for a wider agenda of reducing pastoralist vulner-

ability (see Box 4).

The team addressed these questions through an institu-

tional history exercise in November 2015 (that forms the

basis of this case study). In addition to generating signifi-

cant debate within the ILRI team and with its partners, the

exercise helped articulate its operating model and its key

principles. This is represented in Figure 1 that combines

dimensions of a theory of change, while also illustrating the

interrelationship between different domains of activity.

This articulation recognized that the program had neither

been a research set of activities nor an implementation

(development) set of activities. Instead, it had involved a

science platform capable of deploying analysis and tech-

nology development expertise and an implementation plat-

form capable of deploying capacity building expertise

aimed at the private sector and pastoral communities. The

team had applied the triple loop learning approach, which

had enabled them to break some of the established frames

and practices and introduce changes in the organization’s

vision and approach (Stroud, 2003).

It was concluded by the team that the ability to create a

productive interface between these two platforms drove

Box 4. Reflective questions

Should we deepen our presence in our current areas

of operations through developing new technologies

to enhance pastoralist livelihoods and increase resi-

lience to climate shocks?

Would this deepening mean that we fail to exploit

donor and stakeholder interests in expansion and lose

the opportunity to test the strength of the IBLI con-

cept in diverse sites?

What is it about our iterative multi-stakeholder

approach to research and development that has led

to the multiple successes that the project can point to

and how can other institutions use these insights

going forward?

Does our approach fall in the IPG arena and belong

in a CGIAR center? Or are there particular aspects of

the program better placed in a more development-

oriented setting?

Source: Banerjee et al. (2017a). IBLI Practice Note.

Box 3. Sales and payouts

Phase I (2008–2011)—4000 clients (privately under-

written by one company).

Phase II (2012–2016)—13,500 clients (of which

5000 clients as of 2016 were privately underwrit-

ten—involving two private companies).

Phase III (2017 onward)—43,000 clients (this

includes KLIP—19,000 households).

Payouts—2016 and 2017. Payout of US$7 million in

2017 from the commercial IBLI product and the

KLIP.

Source: Press releases in leading newspapers and

https://news.ilri.org/2017/02/21/record-payouts-

being-made-by-kenya-government-and-insurers-to-

protect-herders-facing-historic-drought/.

6 Outlook on Agriculture XX(X)

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7

impact and maintained the relevance of the research and

was key to the success of the project. The team recognized

that critical to their success had been their decision to go

beyond research and enter the domain of implementation

(and delivery through the private sector). This in turn

helped to understand and incubate their technology, bring-

ing additional expertise and action, but had direct feedback

into the research agenda that they were pursuing. The ques-

tion of whether ILRI should set up an MCD unit thus

became irrelevant, as it was clear that it was part of the

research process as much as it was a capacity development

unit. The team named this approach innovation incubation

and immediately realized its relevance to a range of other

technology deployment tasks and that it could be improved

over time by practice and learning. For example, the

approach was used in the development and incubation of

digital support services for extension and information

access, and institutional studies for better service delivery

(Banerjee et al. 2017b; Hammonds and Banerjee, 2018).

The outcome of the institutional history exercise and

particularly the articulation of the operating model above

then became a boundary object for discussion with donors

and ILRI management about the third phase.

Phase III—Responding to science and market opportunitiesthrough technology incubation. Building on earlier experi-

ences, the design of phase III was quite different and rep-

resents a continuing evolution of the operating model.

Funded by a consortium of donors, the third phase empha-

sizes on scaling of IBLI. The operating model involved a

much more integrated approach, with formal distinctions

between research and capacity building disappearing. This

once again shifted the research emphasis. Instead of the

research being focused on the development of IBLI, the

research is primarily concerned with identifying and codi-

fying the process steps through which IBLI is introduced

into new contexts. The rapid analysis approach that the

previous MCD had used to understand the best extension

and education method became formalized into the research

agenda. In this sense, the research and capacity develop-

ment functions have further merged. Moreover, this has

also oriented the project to encourage and push both the

private and public sector to take up some of the roles that

the MCD unit started out with, as part of the creating mar-

ket demand and scaling strategy for IBLI.

What enabled institutional change in theIBLI case?

The history of the development and promotion of IBLI

described above illustrates many of the tensions and chal-

lenges that the international centers of the CGIAR currently

face. At the heart of this is the need to evolve a form of

research practice that maintains the essential characteristics

of IPGs research, but at the same time includes activities

that engage in innovation processes, and that lead to change

in practices and behavior of poor farmers (or in this case

pastoralists) and achieve tangible household impacts. There

is good evidence that the IBLI approach is achieving this

hybrid function, with a strong science output record even in

the apparently more scaling focused later phases (Table 1)

and a strong impact record (see earlier Boxes 1 and 3).

Nevertheless, this process featured a number of tensions

including:

Entering into an exclusive agreement with a single

company in the early phase of developing the prod-

uct. This challenged the notion of IPG principle of

ILRI, but the project team felt it was justified,

because in the launch site of the product there was

only one insurance company with the necessary

infrastructure, and they insisted on an exclusive

contract. To soften this problem, the contract was

presented as an exclusive MOU.

The creation of the MCD unit within ILRI. There were

questions on whether the MCD unit could legiti-

mately be housed in an IPG research organization

or should it be spun off or outsourced to another

agency. This question was raised by ILRI manage-

ment and by the team itself.

The donor skeptism on ILRI development delivery

capability. Being a research institute, the donors

were skeptical whether ILRI would have the capac-

ity to carry out such activities as providing sales

support, training, capacity development for both

the private sector and pastoralists, while also enga-

ging in partnership management, as these were all

very development-oriented tasks.

Employment of non-research professionals. Many of

the MCD unit staff didn’t fit into the grades of the

organization that was based around research pro-

fessional grades. Performance metric and promo-

tions; such as the unit manager, whose senior

development role didn’t fit into the parameters of

the annual appraisal formats.

As the case study demonstrated, with time these tensions

were overcome, and the new approach was negotiated into

use and acceptance. Several factors eased acceptance of the

new approach:

Development framing of project objectives

Prior to phase I, ILRI and its partners had brought together

ideas from a series of discovery research activities that

Table 1. Scientific outputs during the different phases of IBLIevolution.

PhasesJournalarticles

Briefs andcase studies

Dissertationand thesis

Numbersof outputs

Phase I(2008–2011)

1 5 1 7

Phase II(2012–2016)

14 8 3 25

Phase III(2017 onward)

17 5 0 22

IBLI: Index-Based Livestock Insurance.

8 Outlook on Agriculture XX(X)

indicated the possibility of an index-based insurance prod-

uct for the pastoral areas. The phase I project was framed

by a development objective rather than a research question;

namely “design an insurance product to improve the resi-

lience of pastoralists to drought related losses.” While

achieving this objective involved a number of different

research inquiries, it meant experimenting with private sec-

tor insurers and pastoralists in the design and development

of the insurance product. This experience in turn chal-

lenged a key assumption that the private sector would have

the capacity to market and promote the insurance product.

This capacity did not exist, and the project found that it

would need to intervene in the MCD much more explicitly,

for a significant amount of time.

Research engaging in implementation to incubateinnovation

The framing of the project in this way with a development

objective set the scene for what was to follow. In particular,

the growing realization by the project team that it had to

engage in the field of implementation not only to trouble-

shoot and facilitate the spread of the insurance product, but

also identify issues that needed further research.

Contextual design and evolution of the approach

The approach of the team also evolved considerably

between each project phase: product design, developing

delivery capacity, and finally an integrated approach to

both spread the product and develop and incubate new

products. The research practice of the team was, by neces-

sity, not static, but had to be constantly adapted to the

objectives being pursued. This sort of contextual design

was made possible in part because the team’s routine

practice of continuously questioning themselves about

how they should operate and trying to identify elements

of their success; for example, reflection workshops were a

routine practice for the team. The institutional history

exercise played a major role in articulating the logic of

the team’s approach at a critical point and explaining its

legitimacy in the context of a research organization and in

arguing to donors why a developmentally framed project

needs both research and development like activities inte-

grated together in a single project (Mude, personal

communication).

A generic articulation of the approach

A related issue was the ability of the team to articulate their

apparently successful approach not in terms of how index-

based insurance can be developed and implemented, but in

terms of how solutions generally can be developed to

reduce the vulnerability of pastoralist households. The

research and innovation approach is therefore articulated

as a multipurpose approach, the principles of which can be

applied to a variety of technology development and inno-

vation incubation issues.

High profile success overcame legitimacy tensions

It was the hybrid nature of the project—part research, part

development—that initially caused tensions with both the

donors and ILRI. The case study appears to suggest that

these tensions were in part overcome because of the aura of

success that had built up around the phase I project and that

the feeling that index insurance in pastoralist areas was an

idea whose time had come in both government and donors’

circles in the region. In other words, the uneasiness about

the capacity and legitimacy of a research team delivering a

development project and doing so in an IPGs research

agency was eclipsed by the apparent successes that were

being achieved and their alignment to an emerging agenda.

The fact that the project team made sure that they estab-

lished a robust system to track and report impacts further

bolstered the acceptance of the approach. The ability to

attract funding for further projects on IBLI was also a factor

in easing the acceptability of the approach in ILRI. The

Norman Borlaug Young Scientist Award for the project

in 2016, furthermore, helped lay to rest any remaining ten-

sion related to legitimacy.

Agency of individuals

This learning and continuous improvement type of

approach to refining contextual design cannot be boiled

down to specific steps or methodologies (although some

were clearly deployed in this case). Rather, the agency of

key individuals in the team and their routine tendency to

ask broader questions around steps needed to achieve

impact and the refinement (Banerjee and Birner, 2015) of

the operating model were critical. Classically in the arena

of institutional change, the leadership of the project was

willing to act as an institutional entrepreneur (Garud et al.,

2007), pushing the limits of what was permissible but jus-

tifying this in terms of trying to achieve the broader mission

of the organization. The leader’s vision and the willingness

to push the envelope to experiment with new methods and

skill sets, in a relatively traditional research setting, led to

the emergence of an impactful approach.

What might be some of the broaderimplications of this case beyond ILRI?

This article avoids the temptation of describing the differ-

ent elements of the IBLI operating model and contrasting

this with a business as usual approach, for danger of it

being misinterpreted as a blueprint that others should fol-

low. The wider lesson here is about how individual projects

and research teams can actively engage in a contextual

design process that may challenge accepted ways of work-

ing. Enabling this process allows teams to purposefully

evolve their approach though reflection and questioning

while keeping impact in focus as an end point.

This finding resonates with a large body of business

literature that recognizes the importance of constantly

refining organizational practice in order to better achieve

goals (Edmonstone et al., 2019; Pedler et al., 1991). The

Banerjee et al. 9

idea of adapting practice to context is quite common in

other fields; for example, clinical practice in the health

sector. In the context of research practice, much is written

about how to match research approach to research ques-

tions. However, what was observed in the IBLI case was

different; design of research practice as part of the wider

innovation process, where it was the wider innovation pro-

cess that formed the context. A central idea in much of the

agricultural innovation system thinking over the last two

decades is that it is necessary to reconfigure approaches to

match changing characteristics of the innovation task and

context at hand (Klerks et al., 2010). IBLI’s ability to adapt

its approach to its innovation task and context—a process

of contextual and iterative design—appears to have been a

key part of its success.

This suggests that international centers can and should

feel comfortable in adopting hybrid institutional logics

where organization do note stick to a monolithic approach

and legitimizing justification. Instead, individual projects

and teams develop and adopt different approaches in order

to achieve impact and mission goals. It is possible for

development activities to coexist with research activities

aiming at IPGs. For example, Upton and Warshaw (2017)

illustrate a similar phenomenon in North America, where

market and industry-like behaviors in academia are coex-

isting with the core values of public good intellectual pur-

suit, without the former eclipsing or compromising the

later. In fact, there is a strong argument that suggests enga-

ging directly in the domain of implementation can add

value to the core public good research mandate of the

CGIAR centers. Cash et al., (2002) suggest it does this

by allowing research organizations to engage in boundary

work that improves the salience, credibility, and legitimacy

of research activities and helping evolve more impact-

orientated research approaches.

However, there are some caveats to this. This does not

mean that the international centers should establish stand-

alone development wings, units, or “centers within centers”

as purely outreach mechanisms. While it may be tempting

to do this at a time when donors are focused on outreach,

scaling, and impact, stand-alone units will not contribute to

the strategic intent of the centers (CGIAR, undated). The

IBLI case is very different from this as it was designed

explicitly to create an interface between the implementa-

tion domain and the research domain. Indeed, in the third

phase, an entirely integrated approach has emerged that has

blended the two.

As is observed in IBLI and other cases, the emergence

and institutionalization of new approaches is always going

to be tension-filled (Sumberge et al., 2012) and the institu-

tionalization of innovations in research and impact practice

is not going to happen automatically. As Biggs and Smith

(2003) explain, institutional change is rarely characterized

by seismic shifts in attitudes and behavior, but by contin-

uous incremental improvement. It requires leadership and

institutional entrepreneurs of a sort that are willing to ask

questions about approaches and their effectiveness (Bane-

rjee and Birner, 2015) and push boundaries in order to

achieve impact (Garud et al., 2007). It requires investments

in articulating the principles of new approaches and sharing

these with others (Watts et al., 2003). It also suggests that

there is a science inquiry in its own right that explores and

critically assesses the effectiveness of research and innova-

tion practice and its relevance to different development

impact ambitions (ISPC, 2016).

There is also an important paradox. It seems infeasible

that the IBLI case is the only example of valuable institu-

tional innovations emerging in the CGIAR. However, the

counterpoint to this is the success story culture which is

used to communicate impact achievements and which,

Sumberg et al. (2012) argue, tends to reinforce approaches

and never calls into question their appropriateness and

effectiveness. Switching from success stories to innovation

stories, that is, stories of new ways of using research for

impact could help legitimize promising approaches in the

CGIAR.

Finally, the case study illustrates the way a hybrid insti-

tutional logic can emerge, that safeguards a core science

mandate while at the same time improving the impact

orientation and impact delivery of research. A cautionary

point for donors is that while the push for impact has been

important in stimulating institutional innovation, this has to

be tempered by the ongoing core strategic intent of the

CGIAR in generating IPGs (Leeuwis et al., 2017). Setting

unrealistic expectations and short-time impact horizons

could also unwittingly lock the centers in focusing on incre-

mental innovation at a time when strategic long-term

emphasis is needed to support the sustainability transitions

that the SDGs imply (Hall and Dijkman, 2019).

Conclusion

This article has explored institutional change for impact in

the CGIAR, focusing on an innovation in research practice

associated with the development and adoption of IBLI in

Kenya and Ethiopia. The case illustrates the way a core

research agenda can sit comfortably with more develop-

ment facing activities and the way this can create important

synergy that strengthens both research and impact perfor-

mance. This sort of hybrid institutional approach is likely to

be increasingly common, as the comparative advantage of

the CGIAR is being context-specific. Understanding the

capacities and capabilities of its partners within the wider

innovation system is an important step in determining what

type of research practice is required and the type of balance

between the implementation and science platforms.

Encouraging the emergence of a diversity of such

approaches could go a long way in stimulating institutional

changes that improve impact that the CGIAR has long been

searching for.

Acknowledgment

The authors would like to acknowledge all the staff members of

the International Livestock Research Institute, the collaborators,

partners, and members of the donor community who were part of

discussions and the institutional history workshop in 2015; the

basis of this article. The authors would also like to thank friends

and colleagues for comments on the earlier versions of this article.

10 Outlook on Agriculture XX(X)

Declaration of conflicting interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with

respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this

article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research,

authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iD

Rupsha Banerjee https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7858-227X

Notes

1. Institutional logics are the “belief systems and associated prac-

tices that predominate in an organizational field” (Scott et al.,

2000: 170) and as such can serve as a “template for action” for

organizations (Bastedo, 2009: 211).

2. Crop and genetic improvement versus animal breeding and

natural resource management.

3. The CGIAR, formerly known as the Consultative Group on

International Agriculture Research, was established 40 years

ago. It is a network of 15 international agricultural research

centers with the mandate to deploy public good science to

advance food security and poverty reduction for smallholder

farmers in the poorest countries of the world.

4. NDVI is a satellite-based measure of vegetation cover on the

ground and can be used to corelate crop yields and livestock

mortality in an area.

5. IBLI has two sales windows within a year (January/February

and August/September), corresponding to the bimodal season-

ality of the arid and semiarid regions.

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