Latin America has historically been a vanguard of agroecology. In Nicaragua, an agroecological transition is occurring, with three decades of building a groundswell based on the farmer-to-farmer movement and the recent institutionalization of agroecology in national law. Yet, problems remain with agroecology’s diffusion. We introduce the Technological Innovation Systems approach to examine systemic barriers to the agroecological transition and cycles of blockages caused by barriers’ interactions.
Many indigenous vegetables are generally underutilized across different cultures, but they remain alternatives to exotic vegetables that often are expensive. This study investigated effects of participation in indigenous vegetable production on livelihood of farmers. Multistaged sampling was used to collect data from 222 vegetable farmers sampled from using a semi-structured questionnaire. Principal component analysis and endogenous switching regression (ESR) were employed for analysis
This paper draws from interviews with (1) US farmers who have adopted automated systems; (2) individuals employed by North American firms that engineer, manufacture, and/or repair these technologies; and (3) US farm laborers (immigrant and domestic) and representatives from farm labor organizations. The argument draws from the literature interrogating the fictional expectations that underlie capitalist reproduction, reading it through a distributed (ontological) lens.
Agricultural policies in sub-Saharan Africa have paid insufficient attention to sustainable intensification. In Uganda, agricultural productivity has stagnated with aggregate increases in crop production being attributed to expansion of cultivated land area. To enhance sustainable crop intensification, the Ugandan Government collaborated with stakeholders to develop agricultural policies using an evidence-based approach. Previously, evidence-based decision-making tended to focus on the evidence base rather than evidence and its interactions within the broader policy context.
This paper provides a retrospective look at a systems-oriented research program, on the increasing occurrence of parasitic weeds in rainfed rice in sub-Saharan Africa, to qualitatively assess merits and identify challenges of such approach. Was gained a broad contextual overview of the problem and different stakeholders' roles, which enabled identification of entry points for innovations in parasitic weed management
Private sector actors bring expertise, resources, and new perspectives to agricultural development, but the tendency to short-term approaches and market-based orientation has been unable to drive a systemic change in the development agenda. We explore how multi-stakeholder dialogues can capitalize on and trickle systemic change through private sector involvement. Analysis from the farmer-led irrigation development multi-stakeholder dialogue space (FLI-MDS) in Ghana shows the need for a physical and institutional space to cater for and merge different stakeholder interests.
Working with women in the agriculture sector in Pakistan poses a challenge as agricultural extension and development staff are predominantly male and interactions for women with men outside the family are culturally not acceptable. At the same time, women in Pakistan play an equal role in agriculture as well as taking responsibility for household chores, including cooking and taking care of the nutrition of the family.
Poverty in Pakistan is overwhelmingly rural. Some two-thirds of Pakistan's population, and over 60 percent of the country's poor, live in rural areas. In 2005, average per capita expenditures in rural areas were 31 percent lower than in urban areas. This inequality between urban and rural areas is re-enforced by inequality within and between rural areas.
This paper analyzes the status of Pakistan’s agriculture in the world and quantifies the potential of improving productivity and quality of value chain at its different nodes. A great potential of expansion in the value chain of large number of agricultural commodities produced in Pakistan are observed. Just bringing the average crop yield levels at par to the world average yield can generate over US$11 billion additional revenues to the producers. Despite lower yield, majority of commodities have lower prices compared to the world average prices at the farmgate.
This study aims to analyse three case studies of smallholder dairy farming in Pakistan. The study involved two stages. The first stage involved a scoping study which used a purposive sampling method to identify and sample fresh, unpackaged milk and informal and formal chains in both districts. Twenty-seven producers, eleven small, eight medium and five large Dhodhis, twenty-two retailers, two formal processors and eleven consumers were interviewed personally by the first author, using four different questionnaires.