Agricultural extension in sub-Saharan Africa has often been criticised for its focus on linear knowledge transfer, and limited attention to systemic approaches to service delivery. Currently, the region is experiencing a new-ICT revolution and there are high expectations of new-ICTs to enhance interaction and information exchange in extension service delivery. Using an innovation systems perspective, we distinguish the roles demand-articulation, matching demand and supply, and innovation process management for innovation-intermediaries.
The book contains seven chapters that exhaustively covers the Innovation Opportunities in Mango production in Mali and make a smart proposition on the plausible pathway to ensure that agricultural technologies delivers a vibrant and economically sustainable agrarian sector. This book make an analysis about the mango food chain in Mali and discuss about the constraints regarding the production, productivity, and profitability
This report make an analysis of Sorghum value chain in Uganda. Based on that, innovation opportunities in Uganda that can influence expansion of sorghum Value Chain and enhance socio-economic gains of all the actors are identified. Some of the identified opportunities among others include increasing farm level production through enacting supportive policy and providing support to organizations in seed production and distribution, introduction of small scale sorghum processing, and increasing their capacity as well as that of the existing processing entities
This article examines how research on the agriculture and agrifood systems mobilizes the concept of Innovation System (IS). A literature review on the IS provides an analytical framework for determining its theoretical frame of reference, its area of application and its uses.
Regional agroecological systems are examples of complex adaptive systems, where sustainability is promoted by social networks that facilitate information sharing, cooperation, and connectivity among specialized components of the system. Much of the existing literature on social capital fails to recognize how networks support multiple social processes.
L’article analyse, à l’aide de la méthode ImpresS conçue par le Cirad, un processus d’innovation impulsé par les utilisatrices d’un équipement de transformation : le décortiqueur et blanchisseur de fonio (Digitaria exilis Stapf) en Afrique de l’Ouest. L’identification du système d’acteurs et le récit chronologique du processus d’innovation ont été mobilisés pour caractériser les mécanismes et les conditions qui expliquent la réussite de cette innovation.
Este documento trata del nacimiento y actuación de la REAF (Reunión Especializada de Agricultura Familiar) como órgano asesor de los órganos ejecutivos del Mercosur. El documento trata también del reconocimiento de la agricultura familiar como una categoría que requiere de políticas diferenciadas, instalado en el lenguaje a nivel del bloque y de los países que lo integran.
Changes in the structure of value chains have opened up lucrative opportunities for smallholder producers to increase income as a means to improve their livelihoods. Yet, recent literature argues that smallholder producers are better off in their current markets than when integrated in high value chains on disadvantageous terms. This article studies the terms of integration of smallholder producers in high value chains from a marketing systems perspective
Despite myriad challenges, Kenya has emerged in recent years as one of Africa’s frontier economies, with headline growth in the most recent decade propelling the country toward middle-income status. Less well understood is how risk dynamics associated with production, markets, and policy adversely impact sector performance, in terms of both influencing ex ante decision making among farmers, traders, and other sector stakeholders and causing ex post losses to crops, livestock, and incomes - destabilizing livelihoods and jeopardizing the country’s food security.
This brief illustrates the different forms of knowledge, and the ways to create and manage it.