Public-Private Partnerships in North-South Research:
Powerful Tool or Trojan Horse?
Some conclusions following the KFPE workshop of 19 August 2003 in Basel

Background
In the debate on development aid policy, various groups are demanding that, apart from public institutions, also private institutions should increasingly contribute to the development of the South. At this workshop, the potentials and limits of public-private partnerships in research (PPRPs) were discussed, particularly with regard to complementarities/synergies and expectations, but also in respect of the demands placed on research partnerships. The key question was: Can, and should, the 11 Principles of KFPE (Guidelines for Research in Partnership with Developing Countries) be applicable to these PPRPs as well? Which are the specific problems in this context, and what is to be understood by a "relevant and successful PPRP between North and South"? Four practical examples were intended to enrich the discussions. The workshop was held in cooperation with the Syngenta Foundation for Sustainable Agriculture and the Task Force Sight and Life.

The speakers were asked to refer to and emphasise the three following aspects during their presentations:

• critical review of the objectives of partners/stakeholders in the reported process (which refers to Principle 1)
• the main characteristics of cooperation between partners/stakeholders as they emerged over time (Principles 2 to 7)
• the use made of the main results (Principles 8 to 11) of the process by the partners/stakeholders

The presentations (click on the names for more Information):

Martin Frigg (Task Force Sight and Life): Experiences by Task Force Sight and Life (Roche)

Dao Daouda (Université de Cocody, Côte d'Ivoire; Centre Suisse de Recherches Scientifiques, CSRS): Partenariat entre la recherche (CSRS-Universités) et l'agro-industrie suisse (Nestlé et Syngentà) en Côte d'Ivoire: 2 études de cas cultures vivrières et maraîchères

Robert Ridley (WHO): Experiences of WHO/TDR and Medicines for Malaria Venture

Adrian Dubock (Syngenta): Learning about the 11 Principles from a PPP for GM Crops

Major conclusions

Objectives and/or motivation
None of the four examples presented at the workshop reported common objectives of all project partners or stakeholders involved. But all four examples referred to a rather general objective (a project approach, a conceptual idea, a common goal):

• around which a group of implementers elaborated a system and established a division of labour between the public and the private sector (WHO/TDR);
• which could be used to support projects (Roche);
• which served as a basis for subsequent users of a technology (Syngenta);
• or there were concrete proposals by private parties (i.e. Syngenta, Nestlé), performed by the (Southern) public sector research group (CSRS/Université de Cocody) and funded by the private partner.

At the project level, the individual objectives of the different stakeholders were always diverging or sometimes complementing each other, such as:

• the development of tomorrow's markets (private sector)
• participating in changing attitudes (private partner)
• enhancement of research and/or education (researchers)
• individual and institutional capacity building (researchers, the public partner)
• an input/impact for local development (public partners, end-users)

For PPRPs, Principle 1 of KFPE may be inappropriately formulated; it should possibly just refer to adequate reflection on a common goal, a conceptual idea or a common framework, and to an open discussion of the various objectives.


Characteristics of Partnership
The typology and institutional arrangements of PPRPs within the four examples vary widely. The range extends from simple funding or consulting to comprehensive partnership. Accordingly, there are diverging arrangements for both governance and project management:

• Sometimes the private partner offers a long-term financing platform for applicants (public or private). The involvement of the private partner (Roche) is on a consulting and funding basis only (and short-term).
• Similarly, Syngenta donates a technology for free (long-term), enabling public research partners to use it (with a possibly shorter-term involvement). There appears to be the rare problem of having no exit strategy in place for ill-behaving public partners. The involvement of Syngenta mainly focuses on consulting.
• In the WHO/TDR example, public funds create the long-term financing platform at highest institutional level, while private firms contribute research work on a 50/50 basis. For smaller Southern private companies participation within this framework ensures a living. For larger Northern firms the motivation is non-monetary. Special exit options are to accommodate private partners who do not want to be engaged over decades. Thus, in this example, the long-term frame is a matter of public stakeholders.
• In the last setting (large private stakeholder vs. financially weak public researcher at CSRS), the time horizon of the public research partner is even shorter than the one of the private contracting partner. The private stakeholder is interested in rather short-term research results, and is therefore involved mainly as a founder; the public stakeholder is satisfied with access to training and capacity building in its own institution.

‡ The 11 Principles of KFPE were mainly developed for public-public partnerships in research. Public-private partnerships involve a new context and an additional setting. Therefore, deeper reflection on certain aspects and topics is needed not only in terms of how to establish research priorities or a research agenda but also in terms of sharing information and responsibilities. The major challenge of PPRPs is how to deal with conflicting motivations and diverging expected outputs and benefits.

Further reflections

1. In general, objectives and motivations of the stakeholders involved vary widely within a PPRP. Interests of the stakeholders can be in common, at least at an overall level; they can be complementary or diverging. Divergence of interests has to be admitted, provided that objectives are not conflicting or unacceptable to some stakeholders – and that they are discussed transparently and openly. In addition, sharing of inputs and outputs/benefits (public goods or private goods?) as well as risks of all partners and their expectations for the partnership should explicitly be defined for all stakeholders involved.
   
   
2. The setting of objectives and the foreseen inputs/outputs have consequences on the time horizon under which stakeholders are operating. It appears to be one of the main challenges of PPRP arrangements to integrate stakeholders operating under different time horizons in a genuine cooperation (see the WHO example). In general, private stakeholders are more oriented towards the short term.
   Time horizon and a typology of objectives (or motivations) of stakeholders may be related – at least this requires some reflection. The KFPE Principles so far include no (explicit) reference to time horizon or motivation of partners.
   
   
3. What kind of framework or environment is needed to best reach mutual benefit, ownership and shared responsibility or risk of a PPRP project/programme for all partners involved? What governance is suited best – a clear leading institution or a board, a forum outside the partner organisations? These and other issues have to be discussed from case to case. Framework and governance heavily depend on the extent to which power is shared and on the typology of partnership (consultation vs. 'real' partnership).
   
   
4. Sustainability of results and outputs must be seen in the context of the objectives and time horizons of the stakeholders. Given the multiplicity of stakeholders there must be multiple definitions of sustainability allowed (desired/expected impact) and discussed within PPRPs.