This brochure on Global Knowledge Product provides an update of work carried out in 2020 on the development of some selected strategies, guidelines for the assessment of innovation systems, strategies for promoting agricultural innovation, and knowledge portals for sharing of technologies and good practices that integrate sustainable agricultural production and food security. The development of knowledge products contributes to FAO’s strategic objective of making agriculture, forestry, and fisheries more productive and sustainable.
Smallholders in Asia and Africa are affected by increasingly complex national and global ecological and economic changes. Agricultural innovation and technology shifts are critical among these forces of change and integration with services is increasingly facilitated through innovations in institutions. Here the authors focused mainly on innovation opportunities for small farmers, with a particular emphasis on marginalized small farm communities. The chapter elaborates on the concept of the ‘small farm’ and offers a synthesis of the findings of all the chapters in this volume.
This paper draws on data collected during 12 months of fieldwork in Northern Ghana. The fieldwork researched two communities in two districts of Northern Ghana and three Agricultural Development Agencies (ADA); Savanna Agricultural Research Institute (SARI), the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MOFA) and World Vision Ghana (WVG). Data collection was achieved through formal surveys, Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) and observations. A total of 120 individual interviews were conducted for the formal survey guided by the questionnaire.
Agriculture is central to Ethiopian economy but its sustainable development faces enormous challenges. Low innovation capacity, low productivity, dwindling natural resources and climate change, small-scale subsistence farming, and low levels of market integration and value addition have all made agricultural development more complex. In spite of the decades of research and development efforts, the rate of growth for both crop and livestock productivity has remained low.
Future technologies and systemic innovation are critical for the profound transformation the food system needs. These innovations range from food production, land use and emissions, all the way to improved diets and waste management. Here, we identify these technologies, assess their readiness and propose eight action points that could accelerate the transition towards a more sustainable food system. We argue that the speed of innovation could be significantly increased with the appropriate incentives, regulations and social licence.
Agricultural research and innovation has been a major source of agricultural growth in developing countries. Unlike most research on agricultural research and innovation which concentrated on the role of government research institutes and the international agricultural research centers of the Consultative Group for International Agricultural Research, this paper focuses on private sector research and innovation. It measures private research and innovation in India where agribusiness is making major investments in research and producing innovations that are extremely important to farmers.
Cross bred cow adoption is an important and potent policy variable precipitating subsistence household entry into emerging bulk markets. This paper focuses on the design of policies that create and sustain milk-market expansion among a sample of households in the Ethiopian highlands. In this context it is desirable to measure a household's `proximity' to market in terms of the level of deficiency of an essential input. This problem is compounded by four factors.
Afghanistan-ICARDA programs have field tested a range of rural development approaches and practices. Many of these are ripe for scaling-up at national level and can contribute to the EU-Afghanistan National Priority Programs (NPP) 2017-2021.
The core idea of the article below is the existence of complicated array of deterrent factors that influences innovation activity of agriculture organizations, and subjective, psychological factors among those factors as well. The main goal of this work is to assess the top management and proprietors’ of AIC enterprises readiness to implement the innovations. As a research’ working hypothesis used the decisive role of human factor in answering the question whether to innovate or not.
The core idea of the article is the existence of complicated array of deterrent factors that influences innovation activity of agriculture organizations, and subjective, psychological factors among those factors as well. The main goal of this work is to assess the top management and proprietors’ of AIC enterprises readiness to implement the innovations. As a research’ working hypothesis used the decisive role of human factor in answering the question whether to innovate or not.