The creation of Competitive Research Grants (CRGs) is globally recognized as an institutional innovation for improving the effectiveness of agricultural research. Unlike block grants for research, CRGs are expected to bring in many top-quality proposals from a wide range of actors, selecting the best out of them and thus getting more value for money.
In India, Farmer Producer Organizations (FPOs) are considered as the most preferred institutional mechanism for enhancing productivity and income of farmers. This is based on the resounding success of a few farmer collectives that have aggregated their produce to realise better incomes. However, when efforts were made to scale up this interesting model across the country, several challenges emerged.
La innovación se implementa en un entorno de objetivos de desarrollo productivo a través de un sistema que incluye incentivos, tecnología y redes público-privadas. El objetivo principal de este estudio es analizar la innovación en los agronegocios de El Oro y determinar cómo incide en la competitividad del sector agropecuario. La metodología utilizada en este estudio es descriptiva y documental, con carácter científico, además está enmarcada bajo el enfoque cuantitativo.
In the face of the climate emergency, around 140 countries, which emit close to 90% of the global greenhouse gas emissions, are planning to reduce their emissions to as close to zero as possible (known as net zero) in the upcoming decades. Around a third of these are low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), the countries most affected by climate change. So how can countries in the Global South achieve a socially-just transition? One key element is innovation, and potentially mission-oriented innovation.
This research note explains the results of social experiment designed with three primary objectives. These include (1) to mitigate the digital divide concerning the accessibility of forecasted weather information and crop advisories for women farmers in Bangladesh and (2) to assess the potential impact of a digital climate advisory tool on the agricultural practices of climate-smart agriculture facilitated by digital advisory tools for stakeholders in the value chain, such as microfinance institutions offering crop loans in areas facing higher weather-related risks.
In Nepal, the Plantwise programme, in collaboration with International Development Enterprises (iDE), has established networks of locally owned plant clinics, run by community business facilitators (CBFs) trained as plant doctors, who provide practical plant health advice. This study examines how gender is integrated into this programme in three purposively selected study districts. It presents the experiences of farmers, the challenges they faced in accessing plant health services through a gender and social inclusion lens.
Many countries are facing growing levels of food insecurity, reversing years of development gains, and threatening the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. Even before COVID-19 reduced incomes and disrupted supply chains, chronic and acute hunger were on the rise due to various factors, including conflict, socio-economic conditions, natural hazards, climate change and pests.
In order to bring about sustainable transformation and business orientation into the Indian Agriculture sector, there have been schematic interventions to promote unique forms of social capital for farmers, called Farmer Producer organizations (FPOs). Many stakeholders, particularly NGOs, are involved in promoting and handholding these FPOs in a target-driven mode by promoting a large number of such institutions across the country.
India is witnessing dwindling gains from agriculture for the smallholder farmers because of high cost of inputs, changing climate impacting production, fluctuating market prices of outputs, and weak delivery of services at the last mile. The value share of farmers in the commodity supply chain needs to be increased to ensure that farming remains a remunerative livelihood option. There has to be a wider acceptance of the fact that the country needs partnerships among multiple players with complementary knowledge and expertise for its agricultural development.
The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) financed the second Cordillera Highland Agricultural Resource Management Project (CHARMP2), in areas where poverty is most severe among indigenous peoples in the highlands of the Cordillera Region in northern Philippines. The aim is to reduce poverty and improve the livelihoods of indigenous peoples living in farming communities in the mountainous project area. The indigenous peoples consist of many tribes whose main economic activity is agriculture.