This report discusses general innovation issues and how they are affecting economic growth. It emphasizes how the advances in ICT, biotechnology and other fields of science are changing the innovation landscape and what are the implications for CD.

This report reviews recent trends in agricultural innovation systems (AIS) and discusses the impact of a wide range of policies on the creation and diffusion of innovation in the agricultural and agrifood sector. It suggests a framework for analysing the role of governments in fostering increased innovation, with a view to helping to identify practical actions that governments could take to improve productivity growth, sustainable use of resources, and resilience to future market developments in national and global agriculture and agri-food systems.

The Challenge of Capacity Development: Working Towards Good Practice draws on four decades of documented experience provided by both bilateral and multilateral donors, as well as academic specialists, to help policy makers and practitioners think through effective approaches to capacity development and what challenges remain in the drive to boost country capacity. The analysis is underpinned by a conceptual framework which guides practitioners to view capacity development at three interrelated levels: individual, organisational and enabling environment levels.

This conference proceedings from the OECD Conference on Agricultural Knowledge Systems (AKS), held in Paris, on 15-17 June 2011, discusses a large range of experiences and approaches to AKS  explores how to foster development and adoption of innovation to meet global food security and climate change challenges. The conference considered developments in institutional frameworks, public and private roles and partnerships, regulatory frameworks conducive to innovation, the adoption of innovations and technology transfers, and the responsiveness of AKS to broader policy objectives.

This chapter outlines the role of a well-functioning agricultural innovation system in ensuring good use of public funds, and higher responsiveness to the needs of ‘innovation consumers’ through improved collaboration between public and private participants, including across national borders. A well-functioning agricultural innovation system is key to improving the economic, environmental and social performance of the food and agriculture sector.

This chapter analyses the functioning of the Brazilian agricultural innovation system. It discusses the role of the different actors and describes governance mechanisms to define priorities and evaluate performance. It analyses trends in agricultural R&D expenditure and sources of funding, the role of intellectual property protection in fostering knowledge markets, and outlines mechanisms used to facilitate knowledge transfers, including collaboration at the national level and the adoption of innovation at the farm or firm level.

The aim of this study was to explore the interactions that exist among agricultural stakeholders in the southwestern highlands of Uganda as a way of identifying opportunities and gaps for operation of Innovation Platforms (IPs) under the proof of concept of Integrated Agricultural Research for Development (IAR4D) research project.

An innovation platform is a space for learning and change. It is a group of individuals (who often represent organizations) with different backgrounds and interests: farmers, traders, food processors, researchers, government officials etc. The members come together to diagnose problems, identify opportunities and find ways to achieve their goals. They may design and implement activities as a platform, or coordinate activities by individual members. This brief explains what innovation platforms are and how they work, and it describes some of their advantages and limitations.

Policy processes are formal and informal negotiations in which heterogeneous groups of stakeholders seek to influence policy agenda setting and the development and implementation of policy. Innovation platforms can help balance the vested interests of market actors, civil society and other stakeholders to support policy processes. They can bring together different types of expertise, experience and interests, and facilitate learning between policymakers and market and civil society actors to develop negotiated and implementable policies and regulations.

Innovation platforms can be complex and challenging so effective monitoring is critical to ensure that they function effectively and achieve their intended purposes. A monitoring system is a collection of methods and tools to track and measure innovation activities, processes among partners, and the results of these processes. This brief describes what a monitoring system does, who is involved, how it works, and what to do with the findings. It is available in Chinese, English, Hindi, Thai and Vietnamese.