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.
This work has largely focused on the developed world, yet the majority of people and future economic growth lies in the developing world. Further, most research examines micro data on consumers or firms, limiting what is known regarding the role of macro factors on diffusion, such as social systems. Addressing these limitations, this research provides the first high-level insights into how green building adoption is occurring in developing countries.
An analysis of the impact of simulation modelling in three diverse crop-livestock improvement projects in Agricultural Research for Development (AR4D) reveals benefits across a range of aspects including identification of objectives, design and implementation of experimental programs, effectiveness of participatory research with smallholder farmers, implementation of system change and scaling-out of results. In planning change, farmers must consider complex interactions within both biophysical and socioeconomic aspects of their crop and animal production activities.
In recent years, the international status of agriculture in the BRICS countries—Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa—has been continuously improved. In 2018, the gross agricultural production of the BRICS countries accounted for more than 50% of the world’s total. Further strengthening the developing cooperation of the BRICS countries is of great significance for ensuring global food security.
This paper reviewed the potential of underutilized indigenous and traditional crops to bring about a transformative change to South Africa’s food system. South Africa has a dichotomous food system, characterized by a distinct, dominant agro-industrial, and, alternative, informal food system. This dichotomous food system has inadvertently undermined the development of smallholder producers.
With a large proportion of sub-Saharan African countries’ GDP still heavily reliant on agriculture, global trends in agri-food business are having an increasing impact on African countries. South Africa, a leader in agribusiness on the continent, has a well-established agri-food sector that is facing increasing pressure from various social and environmental sources. This paper uses interview data with corporate executives from South African food businesses to explore how they are adapting to the dual pressures of environmental change and globalisation.
Agriculture faces an enormous global challenge of feeding nine billion people by 2050. This means a comprehensive intensification of agriculture is required. Ecological intensification is gaining momentum as a clearly defined vision for increasing agriculture productivity and sustainability. How ecological intensification could be tailored to benefit smallholder farming systems in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) remains the major question. In this study, we develop pathways relying on ecological intensification technologies and suiting different farm types of smallholder agriculture.
This paper briefly analyse the genesis, development and change in public sector-led extension approaches in India showing its temporal pattern, emerging innovations in extension approaches and the way forward. It discusses decentralized, community based, pluralistic extension approaches and their opportunities as well as limitations in changing agricultural and natural resources scenario.
The aim of this survey is to identify and characterize new products in plant biotechnology since 2015, especially in relation to the advent of New Breeding Techniques (NBTs) such as gene editing based on the CRISPR-Cas system. Transgenic (gene transfer or gene silencing) and gene edited traits which are approved or marketed in at least one country, or which have a non-regulated status in the USA, are collected, as well as related patents worldwide. In addition, to shed light on potential innovation for Africa, field trials on the continent are examined.
In Cameroon, women as the primary gatherers and traders of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) have limited access to processing technologies, marketing strategies and market information. The objective of this paper is to explore how CIFOR research and capacity building implemented from 2000 have been perceived by Cameroonian traders. An evaluation of the program took place in 2006 with thirty-eight traders out of seventy-two traders trained. Of the traders initially interviewed, 95 percent of them were women.