Research is a widely applied instrument for har-nessing knowledge and providing insight into complex development issues. It helps in gener-ating options for policy, management and action, and in empowering people and organizations in developing and transition countries, as well as industrialised countries. Ultimately this should make it easier to cope with the challenges of sus-tainable development under increasingly difficult circumstances. Research for development is therefore frequently placed in an application-oriented context, in which concepts like inter-and transdisciplinary research, equity, owner-ship, participation, etc. are widely accepted, but are not always put into practice. Research part-nerships of various types and intensities, involv-ing research institutions in industrialised and developing or transition1 countries, are impor-tant means for contributing to knowledge gener-ation and capacity building (SDC 2002, Laws 2003). Read the Manueal / Handbook
