This chapter documents the learning process within the framework of innovation of soil fertility management practices that emerged from the implementation of Participatory Extension Approach (PEA) as part of service delivery reorientation within the Limpopo Department of Agriculture in South Africa.The chapter gives a narrative description of what transpired during the interaction between researchers, extension officers and farmers, the processes involved, the lessons and the conclusion.
Food security is predicted toface considerable challenges in the upcoming period. This couldbe more profound in developing countries due to rapid societal change and ecological pressure in theseregions. Concerted efforts to deal with these challenges areof great importance, including accelerating th euse of improved agricultural input technology (IAIT) such as high yield varieties of seeds and improved fertilizer formulas. This type of innovation is more suitable to being introduced amongst developing countries farmers in order to increase their productivity.
This research aims to add to the literature new insights about the interaction processes, which are implemented in different interactive extension approaches, by analysing how farmers attending different extension events shape a network of indirect interactions
The horticultural sector in Jordan is undergoing a crisis, due to a decline in export. Innovation can improve the performance of the sector. To this end, the government of Jordan should pursue an innovation policy with the Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation System (AKIS) as object of the governance. Based on a review of the AKIS in Jordan it is proposed that a Living Lab setting be used to gain experience with the management of a number of innovation projects and capacity building projects.
The main purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between trainers’ qualification and learning success and satisfaction of small-scale farmers during training activities in Bihar, India. Moderated mediation analysis is utilized to measure the direct and indirect effects of trainers’ qualification on learning success and satisfaction. Therefore, the psychological constructs of attitude and perceived control from the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB) operate as mediators, subjective norms act as moderator, and gender and age serve as covariates
We look at the trade-off between smallholder cocoa intensification and the ecosystem in Indonesia and investigate the determinants of environmental efficiency in cocoa production. In our analysis, we apply a distance output function that includes cocoa production and the abundance of native rainforest plants as outputs. Our data set, based on a household and environment survey conducted in 2015, allows us to analyze 208 cocoa producers with both measured and self-reported data. We find that the intensification of cocoa farms results in higher ecosystem degradation.
Classical innovation adoption models implicitly assume homogenous information flow across farmers, which is often not realistic. As a result, selection bias in adoption parameters may occur. We focus on tissue culture (TC) banana technology that was introduced in Kenya more than 10 years ago. Up till now, adoption rates have remained relatively low.
Most micro-level studies on the impact of agricultural technologies build on cross-section data, which can lead to unreliable impact estimates. Here, we use panel data covering two time periods to estimate the impact of tissue culture (TC) banana technology in the Kenyan small farm sector. TC banana is an interesting case, because previous impact studies showed mixed results. We combine propensity score matching with a difference-in-difference estimator to control for selection bias and account for temporal impact variability.
Rising demand for agricultural commodities coupled with population growth, climate change, declining soil fertility, environmental degradation and rural poverty in the developing world call for strategies to sustainably intensify agricultural production. Sustainable intensification refers to increasing production from the same area of land while reducing its negative environmental consequences.
This paper argues that Dutch-funded capacity development projects in developing countries for tertiary agricultural education organisations as they are currently carried out are not able to successfully achieve the sustained changes required. That is, changes in how an organisation functions, its cultural norms and rules, and also in how it interacts within wider networks. Rather, long-term institutional change is needed.