Download or read book Agricultural Innovation Systems written by The World Bank and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2012-02-21 with total page 685 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Managing the ability of agriculture to meet rising global demand and to respond to the changes and opportunities will require good policy, sustained investments, and innovation - not business as usual. Investments in public Research and Development, extension, education, and their links with one another have elicited high returns and pro-poor growth, but these investments alone will not elicit innovation at the pace or on the scale required by the intensifying and proliferating challenges confronting agriculture. Experience indicates that aside from a strong capacity in Research and Development, the ability to innovate is often related to collective action, coordination, the exchange of knowledge among diverse actors, the incentives and resources available to form partnerships and develop businesses, and conditions that make it possible for farmers or entrepreneurs to use the innovations. While consensus is developing about what is meant by 'innovation' and 'innovation system', no detailed blueprint exists for making agricultural innovation happen at a given time, in a given place, for a given result. The AIS approach that looks at these multiple conditions and relationships that promote innovation in agriculture, has however moved from a concept to a sub-discipline with principles of analysis and action. AIS investments must be specific to the context, responding to the stage of development in a particular country and agricultural sector, especially the AIS. This sourcebook contributes to identifying, designing, and implementing the investments, approaches, and complementary interventions that appear most likely to strengthen AIS and to promote agricultural innovation and equitable growth. It emphasizes the lessons learned, benefits and impacts, implementation issues, and prospects for replicating or expanding successful practices. The information in this sourcebook derives from approaches that have been tested at different scales in different contexts. It reflects the experiences and evolving understanding of numerous individuals and organizations concerned with agricultural innovation, including the World Bank. This information is targeted to the key operational staff in international and regional development agencies and national governments who design and implement lending projects and to the practitioners who design thematic programs and technical assistance packages. The sourcebook can also be an important resource for the research community and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs).
Download or read book Promoting Farmer Innovation written by Will Critchley and published by . This book was released on 1999 with total page 162 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Unlocking the potential of agriculture innovation for family farmers Thematic catalogue for smallholder farmers to promote innovation written by Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and published by Food & Agriculture Org.. This book was released on 2018-11-13 with total page 103 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: TECA is an FAO online platform for the exchange and sharing of agricultural technologies and practices for smallholder farmers and producers. The platform facilitates the transformation process in rural areas by making relevant and innovative technologies available to farmers in the field. In doing so, TECA further enhances the access to knowledge of smallholder producers in rural areas increasing their capacity to innovate and contribute to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This catalogue promotes a set of successful innovations for farmers on the occasion of the FAO International Symposium on Agricultural Innovation for Family Farmers: Unlocking the potential of agricultural innovation to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, which will be celebrated in FAO Headquarters on 2123 November 2018. The technologies presented are concrete actions that have solved specific development challenges and promote sustainable and inclusive rural transformations. The technologies and practices are designed following the FAOTECA platform standards and have been tested and refined in the field. Each practice supports smallholder farmers and those providing advisory services to agricultural producers, to identify specific needs, select the correct practices and to implement technologies adequately. Developed with the help of FAO in cooperation with the FAO Departments of Agriculture and Consumer Protection, the Department of Fisheries and Aquaculture and other key partners, the GIZ, ICRAF, IFOAM and Swisscontact, this catalogue aims at illustrating how sharing knowledge may unlock innovation throughout the farming process.
Download or read book Farmer Innovation in Africa written by Chris Reij and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-07-10 with total page 405 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of Africa's major untapped resources is the creativity of its farmers. This book presents a series of clear and detailed studies that demonstrate how small-scale farmers, both men and women, experiment and innovate in order to improve their livelihoods, despite the adverse conditions and lack of appropriate external support with which they have to contend. The studies are based on fieldwork in a wide variety of farming systems throughout Africa, and have been written primarily by African researchers and extension specialists. Numerous lively examples show how a participatory approach to agricultural research and development that builds on local knowledge and innovation can stimulate the creativity of all involved - not only the farmers. This approach, which recognizes the farmers' capacity to innovate as the crucial component of success, provides a much-needed alternative to the conventional 'transfer of technology' paradigm. This book is a rich source of case studies and analyses of how agricultural research and development policy can be changed. It presents evidence of the resilience and resolution of rural communities in Africa and will be an inspiration for development workers, researchers and policy-makers, as well as for students and teachers of agriculture, environment and sustainable development.
Download or read book Farmer Innovation in Africa written by Chris Reij and published by Earthscan. This book was released on 2001 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Based on fieldwork and involving farmers, extension workers and researchers, this is an edited volume of studies of how farmers successfully experiment and innovate to increase productivity, often in adverse and resource-poor conditions. It covers a wide range of countries and varieties of farming and shows how successful and motivating an approach that builds on farmer innovation can be. It confirms the resourcefulness of the farmers themselves and provides an alternative to the conventional "transfer of technology" development paradigm - one that recognizes the farmers themselves as the major resource.
Download or read book Enhancing Agricultural Innovation written by World Bank and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2006-11-03 with total page 184 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An innovation system can be defined as a network of organizations, enterprises, and individuals demanding and supplying knowledge and bringing it into a social and economic use. This book's primary aim, therefore, is to focus on the largely unexplored operational aspects of the innvoation systems concept and to explore its potential for agriculture. 'Enhancing Agricultural Innovation' evaluates real-world innovation systems and assesses the usefulness of the concept in guiding investments to support knowledge-intensive, sustainable agricultural development. A typology of innovation systems is developed; strategies to guide investments for strengthening innovation capacity are drawn up; and concrete interventions options defined. In its conclusions, the book emphasizes the importance of mechanisms for collaboration and interaction. Intermediary organizations, innovation councils, farmer organizations, and other means to strengthen collaboration are central to creating the exchange of knowledge and perspectives that will convert knowledge into valuable new social and economic products and services.
Download or read book Proceedings of the International Symposium on Agricultural Innovation for Family Farmers written by Food and Agriculture Organization and published by Food & Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO). This book was released on 2019-08-15 with total page 119 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This first International Symposium on Agricultural Innovation for Family Farmers called for inclusive research and education systems to facilitate innovation; robust bridging institutions; support to family farmers; and integrated policies and increased investments to create an enabling environment for innovation and scaling up. Innovation is the process whereby individuals or organizations bring new or existing products, processes or ways of organization into use for the first time in a specific context. Innovation in agriculture cuts across all dimensions of the production cycle along the entire value chain - from crop, forestry, fishery or livestock production to the management of inputs and resources to market access. The symposium provided inspiration for innovation actors and decision makers to unlock the potential of innovation to drive socio-economic growth, ensure food and nutrition security, alleviate poverty, improve resilience to changing environments and thereby achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.
Download or read book Agricultural Extension written by Raj Saravanan and published by New India Publishing. This book was released on 2008 with total page 438 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Agricultural extension is in a great transition worldwide. The demand for public extension reform is greater than ever before. The agriculture knowledge infrastructure is evolving in a big way with the emergence of pluralistic extension actors and innovations to cater the needs of the farmeThis book is an attempt to document the past experiences and recent developments in the agriculture knowledge information systems. The compilation of 14 country s such as; Afghanistan, Benin, Cote d'Ivoire, Ghana, India, Iran, Mozambique, Nepal, Peru, Philippines, Trinidad and Tobago and Zimbabwe is intended to document the experience of extension systems. The fourteen country s highlight the worldwide agricultural extension reform measures (Decentralization, Privatization, Demand driven and Cost-recovery approaches), Institutional Pluralism (Public, Private, and NGOs) and Innovations (Farmer to Farmer extension, Participatory and Self-Help Group (SHG) approaches and ICT initiatives). The agricultural extension students, academicians, scientist, practitioners, administrators, and policy makers will find this compilation of extension experiences from the fourteen countries relevant for designing future reforms, advancing pluralistic extension system and also to integrating innovations in their extension approaches.
Download or read book Innovative markets for sustainable agriculture written by Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and published by Food & Agriculture Org.. This book was released on 2018-07-20 with total page 390 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Between 2013 and 2015, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the French National Institute for Agricultural Research (INRA) undertook a survey of innovative approaches that enable markets to act as incentives in the transition towards sustainable agriculture in developing countries. Through a competitive selection process, 15 cases from around the world provide insights into how small-scale initiatives that use sustainable production practices are supported by market demand, and create innovations in the institutions that govern sustainable practices and market exchanges. These cases respond to both local and distant consumers’ concerns about the quality of the food that they eat. The book evidences that the initiatives rely upon social values (e.g. trustworthiness, health [nutrition and food safety], food sovereignty, promotion of youth and rural development, farmer and community livelihoods) to adapt sustainable practices to local contexts, while creating new market outlets for food products. Specifically, private sector and civil society actors are leading partnerships with the public sector to build market infrastructure, integrate sustainable agriculture into private and public education and extension programmes, and ensure the exchange of transparent information about market opportunities. The results are: (i) system innovations that allow new rules for marketing and assuring the sustainable qualities of products; (ii) new forms of organization that permit actors to play multiple roles in the food system (e.g. farmer and auditor, farmer and researcher, consumer and auditor, consumer and intermediary); (iii) new forms of market exchange, such as box schemes, university kiosks, public procurement or systems of seed exchanges; and (iv) new technologies for sustainable agriculture (e.g. effective micro-organisms, biopesticides and soil analysis techniques). The public sector plays a key role in providing legitimate political and physical spaces for multiple actors to jointly create and share sustainable agricultural knowledge, practices and products.
Download or read book Innovations in Sustainable Agriculture written by Muhammad Farooq and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2019-10-29 with total page 627 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume is a ready reference on sustainable agriculture and reinforce the understanding for its utilization to develop environmentally sustainable and profitable food production systems. It describes ecological sustainability of farming systems, present innovations for improving efficiency in the use of resources for sustainable agriculture and propose technological options and new areas of research in this very important area of agriculture.
Download or read book The New Harvest written by Calestous Juma and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2015 with total page 355 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: African agriculture is currently at a crossroads, at which persistent food shortages are compounded by threats from climate change. But, as this book argues, Africa can feed itself in a generation and can help contribute to global food security. To achieve this Africa has to define agriculture as a force in economic growth by advancing scientific and technological research, investing in infrastructure, fostering higher technical training, and creating regional markets.
Download or read book Farmer First Revisited written by Ian Scoones and published by Practical Action Publishing. This book was released on 2009 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Agriculture is an urgent global priority and farmers find themselves in the front line of some of the world's most pressing issues- climate change, globalization and food security. Twenty years ago, the Farmer First workshop held at the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, UK, launched a movement to encourage farmer participation in agricultural research and development (R & D), responding to farmers' needs in complex, diverse, risk-prone environments, and promoting sustainable livelihoods and agriculture. Since that time, methodological, institutional and policy experiments have unfolded around the world. Farmer First Revisited returns to the debates about farmer participation in agricultural R & D and looks to the future.The book presents a range of experiences that highlight the importance of going beyond a focus on the farm to a wider innovation system, including market interactions as well as the wider institutional and policy environment. If, however, farmers are really to be put first, a politics of demand is required in order to shape the direction of these innovative systems.
Download or read book Farmer Innovation in Africa written by Chris Reij and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-07-10 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of Africa's major untapped resources is the creativity of its farmers. This book presents a series of clear and detailed studies that demonstrate how small-scale farmers, both men and women, experiment and innovate in order to improve their livelihoods, despite the adverse conditions and lack of appropriate external support with which they have to contend. The studies are based on fieldwork in a wide variety of farming systems throughout Africa, and have been written primarily by African researchers and extension specialists. Numerous lively examples show how a participatory approach to agricultural research and development that builds on local knowledge and innovation can stimulate the creativity of all involved - not only the farmers. This approach, which recognizes the farmers' capacity to innovate as the crucial component of success, provides a much-needed alternative to the conventional 'transfer of technology' paradigm. This book is a rich source of case studies and analyses of how agricultural research and development policy can be changed. It presents evidence of the resilience and resolution of rural communities in Africa and will be an inspiration for development workers, researchers and policy-makers, as well as for students and teachers of agriculture, environment and sustainable development.
Download or read book Innovation Africa written by Pascal Sanginga and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-05-04 with total page 433 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Agricultural research, extension and education can contribute greatly to enhancing agricultural production in a sustainable way and to reducing poverty in the developing world, but achievements have generally fallen short of expectations in Africa. In recent years, growing economic and demographic pressures - coupled with the entry of new market forces and actors - have created a need and an opportunity for more interactive approaches to development. Understanding the existing innovation processes, recognizing the potential for catalysing them and learning how to support joint innovation by different groups will be the key to success. This book covers new conceptual and methodological developments in agricultural innovation systems, and showcases recent on-the-ground experiences in different contexts in Africa. The contributions show how innovation is the outcome of social learning through interaction of individuals and organizations in both creating and applying knowledge. It brings examples of how space and incentives have been created to promote collaboration between farmers, research, extension and the private sector to develop better technologies and institutional arrangements that can alleviate poverty. In 25 broad-ranging chapters the book reflects cutting-edge thinking and practice in support of innovation processes in agriculture and management of natural resources.
Download or read book Innovation systems written by Francis, J. (ed) and published by CTA. This book was released on 2016-12-31 with total page 255 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The result of an expert consultation, this publication examines ‘innovations systems’ – a concept suggested as underpinning industrial development – as a strategy for agricultural development. Innovation systems approaches conceptualise change as a long-term, socially-embedded process, and recognise the important role policy plays in shaping the parameters within which decisions are made. Providing a collection of papers and commentaries from the world’s top scholars and practitioners, this book looks at the strengths – but also the weaknesses and challenges –
Download or read book Publicly Funded Agricultural Research and the Changing Structure of U S Agriculture written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 2002-03-18 with total page 158 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) requested that the Board on Agriculture and Natural Resources of the National Research Council (NRC) convene a panel of experts to examine whether publicly funded agricultural research has influenced the structure of U.S. agriculture and, if so, how. The Committee to Review the Role of Publicly Funded Agricultural Research on the Structure of U.S. Agriculture was asked to assess the role of public-sector agricultural research on changes in the size and numbers of farms, with particular emphasis on the evolution of very-large-scale operations.
Download or read book Class Dynamics of Agrarian Change written by Henry Bernstein and published by Kumarian Press. This book was released on 2010 with total page 161 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Henry Bernstein argues that class dynamics should be the starting point of any analysis of agrarian change. Providing an accessible introduction to agrarian political economy, he shows clearly how the argument for "bringing class back in" provides an alternative to inherited conceptions of the agrarian question. He also ably illustrates what is at stake in different ways of thinking about class dynamics and the effects of agrarian change in today's globalized world. CONTENTS: Introduction: The Political Economy of Agrarian Change. Production and Productivity. Origins of Early Development of Capitalism. Colonialism and Capitalism. Farming and Agriculture, Local and Global. Neoliberal Globalization and World Agriculture. Capitalist Agriculture and Non-Capitalist Farmers? Class Formation in the Countryside. Complexities of Class.
