Many policy makers, business partners and researchers often think about innovations related to sustainable agriculture as the natural outcome of best practices and that scaling can be easily done once it becomes the responsibility of some manager or engineer. However, work done by researchers from Wageningen UR found that the scaling of innovations has tended to be an unpredictable, complex process, depending on the interactions between the 'DNA' of the innovation and the context within which it is taking place.
Click here to access the full brief "Blowing the seeds of innovation. How scaling unfolds in innovation processes toward food security and sustainable agriculture".
Building on local dynamics: 5 policy recommendations for enhancing innovation by African smallholder farmers.
Introducing improved technology does not automatically lead to innovation and desired change! It is one of many inputs into an ongoing, collective, interactive and multi-faceted innovation process that involves continuous adaptation to new conditions so as to improve system productivity, food security, resilience and income. By acknowledging this reality and building on it, policymakers, institutional decision-makers and donors will be better able to foster a dynamic and enduring agricultural sector responding to the needs and wishes of African societies.
Proceedings of the International Workshop on Agricultural Innovation Systems in Africa (AISA), 29-31 May 2013, Nairobi, Kenya
Editors: Bernard Triomphe, Ann Waters-Bayer, Laurens Klerkx, Marc Schut, Beth Cullen, Geoffrey Kamau and Ewen Le Borgne 20 March 2014
Le Warrantage Paysanne, un outil de protection des ressources:
Le developpement de warrantage au Burkina Faso
How are innovations in the Agrifood Sector going to scale: Towards a methodology for comparative analysis of transitions towards sustainability food provision in Europe and Africa.