2nd IDRC-SEARCA Fellowship Plus Conference-Workshop

The 2nd IDRC-SEARCA Annual Fellowship Plus Conference-Workshop was the second in a series of three annual fellowship plus conference-workshops under The Southeast Asian Upland Agriculture Fellowship, a five-year (2012-2017) collaborative project of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) of Canada and the Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA). The project aims to establish a critical mass of high-quality human resources in Cambodia, Lao PDR, Myanmar, and Vietnam (CLMV) who will serve as catalysts for developing sustainable agriculture programs for upland communities that are generally vulnerable to food insecurity. The annual fellowship conference/workshops intends to foster the fellows’ knowledge through information-sharing and learning from high caliber resource persons and by providing firsthand experience in the uplands through site visits.

The first three days of this year’s Annual Fellowship Plus Conference-Workshop was merged with the 1st International Conference on Asian Highland Natural Resources Management (AsiaHiLand, see http://www.asiahiland2014.agri.cmu.ac.th/) and was hosted by Chiang Mai University. It was held at the Empress Convention Center, Chiang Mai, Thailand, from 7-9 January 2015. With more than 80 experts from 16 countries who gave presentations on topics that emphasized mountain development in Asia, the Conference highlighted scientific knowledge and innovations that contribute to the development in the uplands.