Guidelines for innovation platforms in agricultural research for development: Decision support for research, development and funding agencies on how to design, budget and implement impactful innovation platforms

Over the past years, Innovation Platforms have increasingly been established within the framework of AR4D initiatives. The Innovation Platform approach is particularly being embraced as a model for achieving development outcomes and impacts. Given the growing momentum of Innovation Platforms, this seems to be a good time to consider both their promise and their limitations. The objective is to generate realistic expectations about what Innovation Platforms can and cannot achieve in AR4D initiatives. As the implementation of Innovation Platforms can consume significant time, energy, and other resources, these guidelines are geared towards development practitioners, researchers, funding agencies, or farmer unions themselves interested in using Innovation Platforms in their AR4D or business development programmes.PRIFPRI5DSGDCGIAR Research Program on Roots, Tubers, and Bananas (RTB