Public-private partnerships are a new way of carrying out research and development (R&D) in Latin America's agricultural sector. These partnerships spur innovation for agricultural development and have various advantages over other institutional arrangements fostering R&D. This report summarizes the experiences of a research project that analyzed 125 public-private research partnerships (PPPs) in 12 Latin American countries. The analysis indicates that several types of partnerships have emerged in response to the various needs of the different partners.
This study examines interventions in two agricultural development projects in Ghana which aimed to build competitiveness of selected value chains to generate growth and reduce poverty – the Northern Rural Growth Project, implemented between 2009 and 2016, and the Market Oriented Agriculture Programme, which began in 2004 and is still in place.
National governments, especially in sub-Saharan Africa, have limited budgets and are forced to make difficult funding decisions regarding the provision of social services and the support of agricultural programs. These provisions can play a critical role in rural incomes and agricultural production but due to data constraints, the effects of different types of social services on agricultural productivity in this region have not been analyzed in detail.
IFPRI’s flagship report reviews the major food policy issues, developments, and decisions of 2016, and highlights challenges and opportunities for 2017 at the global and regional levels. This year’s report looks at the impact of rapid urban growth on food security and nutrition, and considers how food systems can be reshaped to benefit both urban and rural populations. Drawing on recent research, IFPRI researchers and other distinguished food policy experts consider a range of timely questions:
■ What do we know about the impacts of urbanization on hunger and nutrition?
This report assesses trends in investments and human resource capacity in agricultural R&D in countries in West Asia and North Africa (WANA), focusing on developments during 2009–2012. The analysis is based on information from a set of country factsheets prepared by the Agricultural Science and Technology Indicators (ASTI) program of the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), using comprehensive datasets derived from primary surveys targeting over 300 agencies in 11 countries during 2013–2014.
Science and technology (S&T) are major contributors to food security, poverty reduction, and economic growth, as has been proven in Asia since the early-1970s through the Green Revolution in agriculture. Continuing to secure such gains, however, is becoming an increasingly complex undertaking. More than ever, quantitative data are vital for measuring, monitoring, and benchmarking the performance of agricultural S&T systems, including their inputs and outcomes.
In Bangladesh, IFPRI has received support from USAID through its Policy Research and Strategy Support Program in Bangladesh (PRSSP) to work in the geographic areas targeted by Feed the Future interventions (known as the Zone of Influence) to construct this new WEAI4VC module.
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.
What are key characteristics of rural innovators? How are their experiences similar for women and men, and how are they different? To examine these questions, this study draw on individual interviews with 336 rural women and men known in their communities for trying out new things in agriculture. The data form part of 84 GENNOVATE community case studies from 19 countries. Building on study participants’ own reflections and experiences with innovation in their agricultural livelihoods, we combine variable-oriented analysis and analysis of specific individuals’ lived experience.
Early applications of the innovation systems framework to developing-country agriculture suggest opportunities for more intensive and extensive analysis. There is ample scope for empirical studies to make greater use of the theoretical content available in the literature, and to employ more diverse methodologies, both qualitative and quantitative. Further, there is room to improve the relevance of empirical studies to the analysis of public policies that support science, technology, and innovation, as well as to policies that promote poverty reduction and economic growth.