The report synthesises the research conducted under the PRO AKIS project for the topic "Designing, implementing and maintaining agricultural/rural networks to enhance farmers’ ability to innovate in cooperation with other rural actors".
In the 90’s first steps were taken in Cuba to strengthen family farming. A participatory seeds breeding, multiplication and diffusion project started, a challenge to Cuban scientists, not used to involve farmers in the decision making process and recognizing them as equal partners. This project further evolved to become the Local Agricultural Innovation Programme, Spanish acronym PIAL (Programa de Innovación Agropecuaria Local).
This policy brief consolidates lessons learned from an in-depth literature review on small-scale farmer (SSF) innovation systems and a two-day expert consultation on the same topic, hosted in Geneva by Quaker United Nations Office (QUNO) in May 2015. This review draws together published literature on the evolution of the concept, how on-farm innovation systems function in practice, and the roles of outside actors in supporting them.
Emilio Ruz, executive secretary of the Cooperative Programme for Agri-food and Agroindustrial Technological Development of the Southern Cone (PROCISUR), presented the PROCISUR’s frame-work of innovation management at the 3rd GFRAS Annual Meeting, "The Role of Rural Advisory Services in Agricultural Innovation Systems", 26-28 September 2012, Philippines. His presentation has been prepared with Julio C. Catullo,
Extension Group Coordinator of PROCISUR.
This document summarizes the insights of YPARD young professionals and their opinions on AIS. In particular, the document refers to the YPARD e-discussion, which was held in September 2012 and raised the concern of the impact of the global economic recession and climate change on agriculture. This could lead to declining agricultural productivity, and low production further impacts the declining interest of youth in Agricultural activities.
This brief explores the definition of Agricultural Knowledge and Information System (AKIS) and the inventory of AKIS in Europe.
Agricultural research programs that are driven by Agricultural Innovation System concepts usually target to change the way in which low income rural agrarian households in a nation like Nigeria communicate with the market and the decision making strategies pertaining to development of their agri-business and the scarce resources which are at their disposal.
The paper explores the implications of rural livelihood diversity for agricultural innovation policies. It summarises literature on the nature of rural poverty, with particular emphasis on the relative roles of farm and non-farm income. It also reviews the various roles, direct and indirect, that agricultural innovation can play in rural poverty reduction. Finally, it uses an agricultural knowledge and information systems (AKIS) perspective to argue for a differentiated approach to targeting agricultural innovations, based on an analysis of rural assets.
Presented at the ‘Building Livelihoods Resilience in a Changing Climate’ conference, Kuala Lumpur, 3-5th March 2011, this paper focuses on the Local Adaptive Capacity framework (LAC), developed under the Africa Climate Change Alliance Project (ACCRA), as an innovative initiative that attempts to move towards a better understanding of its core features through isolating five characteristics of adaptive capacity. Demonstrated through findings from field research across three African countries (Ethiopia, Mozambique and Uganda), this paper argues that frameworks for understanding and supporting
The purpose of this issues paper is to provide an overview of the issues, numbers, disputes, and approaches so that contributors to SOW11 can share a common framework and consider how the innovations they describe fit into the larger international discourse. The paper is structured as follows: • Section 2 describes diverse perspectives on food security that emphasize global supply chains to feed middle-class populations in cities; smallholder farmers who still supply much of the world; and smallholder farmers who are relatively disengaged in commercial markets.