How does one design, implement and evaluate participatory agricultural research? Taking farming systems research as a point of departure, and with the objective of developing monitoring and evaluation guidelines, the authors of this volume describe and critique how farmer participatory research is presently being used within a broad range of agricultural research and development programmes. The authors suggest that a priority is the linkage of project objectives with implementation strategies. To this end they provide a conceptual and methodological framework for the analysis of farmers' experimentation and local information exchange. Using this as a base, more appropriate project designs and monitoring and evaluation strategies will be possible.