This study identifies entry points for innovation for sustainable intensification of agricultural systems. An agricultural innovation systems approach is used to provide a holistic image of (relations between) constraints faced by different stakeholder groups, the dimensions and causes of these constraints, and intervention levels, timeframes and types of innovations needed. The authors aim at showing that constraints for sustainable intensification of agricultural systems are mainly of economic and institutional nature.
According to the authors of this paper, actual methods of scaling are rather empirical and based on the premise of ‘find out what works in one place and do more of the same, in another place’. These methods thus would not sufficiently take into account complex realities beyond the concepts of innovation transfer, dissemination, diffusion and adoption. As a consequence, scaling initiatives often do not produce the desired effect.
Research and analysis of agricultural innovation processes and policies over the last 20 years has made a major contribution to scholarship on and the understanding of the nature of innovation. To an important, but much lesser degree this has also led to re-framing practice at the research-innovation interface. Innovation studies (for want of a better word), like many branches of science, finds that it needs to deliver solutions across the full spectrum of discovery (concepts and theories) to application in both policy and practice domains.