Enabling agricultural innovation systems to promote appropriate technologies and practices for farmers, rural youth and women during COVID-19

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic will vary for different groups of rural population, with the highest impact expected to be on farmers and other vulnerable groups, especially women and youth. Targeted support is feasible only by activating a network of actors or organizations within agricultural innovation systems (AIS) and promoting customized technologies and practices suitable for location specific contexts.

AIS actors include experts engaged in agricultural education, research (public and private), business enterprises (agricultural value chain actors, agricultural marketing committees, regulated markets, input suppliers, procurement arrangements), formal and informal bridging institutions (public extension and advisory services, farmers organizations, private extension agents, commodity groups etc.,) and enabling the environment (government policies and programmes to respond to COVID-19 pandemic). AIS actors can readily access technologies and practices from existing knowledge portals, guidelines and manuals available at national and/or global levels and quickly adapt to local contexts to improve the effectiveness of their response. This brief illustrates the extensive repository of good practices and technologies provided by FAO as part of its online knowledge portals. These practices and technologies can be easily adopted to respond to the needs of the smallholders, rural youth and women affected by lockdown due to the COVID-19 pandemic, improve their food security and create income-generating opportunities. They have been applied and tested on the ground and packaged for the benefit of various AIS actors