The International Assessment ofAgricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology forDevelopment (IAASTD) was a multidisciplinary andmulti-stakeholder assessment by about 400 experts which hadfour primary goals: 1) to assess the effects of agriculturalknowledge, science and technology policy and institutionalenvironments, as well as practices, in the context ofsustainable development; 2) to identify where criticallyimportant information gaps exist in order to moreeffectively target research; 3) to make the resulting stateof the art, objective, analyses accessible to decisionmakers at all levels from small producers to those whocreate international policy; and 4) to further the capacityof developing country nationals and institutions togenerate, access, and use agricultural knowledge, scienceand technology that promote sustainable development. TheIAASTD was a useful experience at the nexus of politics andscience. However, agricultural technology, with itscomplexity, diversity and politics, proved to be a bridgetoo far. The process itself was instructive and there ismuch useful information in the reports. However, the presentreview concludes that, for the substantial resources used,the program did not offer sufficient new knowledge orconceptual frameworks for decision makers.
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