Facilitating the Development of a Knowledge Sector in Indonesia

Cydney Gumann is a Knowledge Management Specialist with the Feed the Future Knowledge-Driven Agricultural Development Project. She attended this event as a participant and shares below her views on some of the key highlights. 

How can development practitioners help cultivate demand for locally-produced knowledge within partner governments? By what means can practitioners ensure an evidence-based supply is available to meet this demand? These were two key questions discussed at the recent Society for International Development (Washington, DC Chapter) event, “Shifting the Balance: Strengthening Knowledge to Policy Systems in Indonesia,” held on May 28, 2014. 

For the first half of the event, speaker Fred Carden, a senior research governance specialist at RTI International, shared his experience of building a knowledge sector within Indonesia through the recently launched Knowledge Sector Initiative (KSI). This joint project between Indonesia and Australia focuses on strengthening research institutions and the use of research in public policy. The project works with four intersecting components: 1) supply (research institutions); 2) demand (governments); 3) intermediaries (knowledge delivery channels), such as journalists and advocacy organizations; and, 4) the enabling environment. This will be a long-term effort lasting 15 years. The work will be broken into three five-year phases, with the first phase largely focusing on the supply side. Following this, the second phase will build the other three components of the project and the third will work to consolidate and institutionalize the changes. The importance of the project taking on more of a facilitator role was mentioned throughout the event. Many of KSI’s activities that Carden highlighted included building the organizational capacity of research institutions, supporting networks, helping to map interests, collaborating with stakeholders from the beginning, and diagnosing key intervention points.

This presentation was followed by a stimulating discussion, led by Tony Prior and Stacey Young, both from USAID, and moderated by RTI International’s Derick Brinkerhoff. Young asked about how the project and its partners contribute to the change management process within different organizations and about Carden’s role in building and managing relationships through the project. Carden responded by emphasizing that donors and implementers are only facilitators in the creation of a knowledge sector. To help with this process, Carden stressed that the project should provide opportunities and resources to support the ideas of local actors and encourage ownership. He also spoke during the discussion about the importance of constantly monitoring, evaluating, and learning within the project to determine whether all the activities are in fact strengthening the overall knowledge sector. The process requires staff to be self-critical and to incorporate stakeholders in this reflection period. He also spoke of the challenges of being a relationship manager when coming into a new environment without the cultural background and language fluency.   

To read an overview about this event, please visit SID-Washington’s Event Summary. 

A recording of the event is available here. 

The presentation slides from this event are available here.