This presentation for the Third Global Conference on Agricultural Research for Development (GCARD3,Johannesburg, South Africa, 5-8 April 2016) illustrates the topic of competitiveness in Africa smallholders system, focusing on the Integrated Agricultural Research for Development (IAR4D) and Agricultural Innovation Systems (AIS) concepts and on the role of the innovation platforms.
What are key characteristics of rural innovators? How are their experiences similar for women and men, and how are they different? To examine these questions, this study draw on individual interviews with 336 rural women and men known in their communities for trying out new things in agriculture. The data form part of 84 GENNOVATE community case studies from 19 countries. Building on study participants’ own reflections and experiences with innovation in their agricultural livelihoods, we combine variable-oriented analysis and analysis of specific individuals’ lived experience.
This study sought to examine the gaps and draw lessons for effective Innovation platforms (IPs) formation using the case of the coffee IPs in the four districts of Luwero, Ntungamo, Bushenyi and Rakai in Uganda. Data were collected through key informant interviews with 32 actors of the coffee steering committees and from document review. Qualitative data analysis was conducted using content and thematic analysis
The Participatory Market Chain Approach (PMCA), which aims to stimulate gender-responsive innovations in commodity chains, was used to improve the performance of ALVs market chains in central Uganda. This paper presents the results of applying the PMCA in a phased manner on the Indigenous African Leafy Vegetables (ALVs) commodity chain in the context of a collaborative research project implemented in central Uganda
The markets and value chains approach has recently become fashionable in agricultural development interventions. So too have innovation platforms. This brief shows how innovation platforms can be a useful vehicle to promote market development. It is available in Chinese, English, Hindi, Thai and Vietnamese.
Over the years, CTA has contributed to building ACP capacity to understand innovation processes, strengthen the agricultural innovation system and embed innovation thinking in agricultural and rural development strategies. The CTA Top 20 Innovations project set out to prove that innovation is taking place in ACP agriculture and in the process has demonstrated that smallholder farmers are beneficiaries as well as partners in agricultural innovation.
One of the most important things that innovation platforms do is to build the capacity of their members to innovate. Some key elements of innovation capacity include: self-organization, learning new skills, changing mindsets, valuing others’ roles in innovation, having a holistic view, being able to adapt to changing situations, creating new ideas, recognizing opportunities, being proactive, using indigenous ideas, and looking to the future. This brief uses the analogy of a traditional African cooking pot to explain how innovation capacity is developed within an innovation platform.
This publication brings some sucessful experiencies in Digital Agriculture in African countries. In this issue of Spore, it is explored how digitalisation is providing women with better access to finance, information and markets, as well as opening up new opportunities for young entrepreneurs to develop apps and other digital services in agribusiness
Over the last 10 years much has been written about the role of the private sector as part of a more widely-conceived notion of agricultural sector capacity for innovation and development. This paper discusses the emergence of a new class of private enterprise in East Africa that would seem to have an important role in efforts to tackle poverty reduction and food security. These organisations appear to occupy a niche that sits between mainstream for-profit enterprises and the developmental activities of government programmes, NGOs and development projects.
The 2021 Global Report on Food Crises (GRFC 2021) highlights the remarkably high severity and numbers of people in Crisis or worse (IPC/CH Phase 3 or above) or equivalent in 55 countries/territories, driven by persistent conflict, pre-existing and COVID-19-related economic shocks, and weather extremes. The number identified in the 2021 edition is the highest in the report’s five-year existence. The report is produced by the Global Network against Food Crises (which includes WFP), an international alliance working to address the root causes of extreme hunger.