The Commission on Sustainable Agriculture Intensification (CoSAI) and the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) jointly commissioned a gap study to determine how far away innovation investment is from helping agri-food systems achieve zero hunger goals and the Paris Agreement while reducing impacts on water resources in the Global South. The results show that the world can come much closer with some well-placed investments.
These toolkit aims to enhance stakeholders' understanding of the need to integrate gender in an Innovation Platform, the rationale for doing so and how to do. This toolkit is a guide for mainstreaming gender issues and develop and innovative platform in order to discuss and overcome this issues in an agricultural context.
In Malawi, FARA involved the Department of Agricultural Research Services (DARS) that engaged an external consultant to undertake the following studies: 1. A situation analysis of agricultural innovations; 2 Programme for Accompanying Research in Innovations (PARI); 2. A scoping study of existing agricultural innovation platforms; 3. A study on National and international investment initiatives on innovation for agricultural development and food and nutrition security.
This Final report identifies best-fit practices, and makes recommendations on how to target women advisory service providers in capacity development programmes.
Considering the new opportunities that ICT innovations bring to improve performance of financial and extension services, this study looks at the potential contribution of financial and extension services to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The approach used extends the standard Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) model to include longer-term management goals and find a solution that balances the efficient use of innovation investments and the achievement of policy goals, making this approach well suited for the analysis of the SDGs.
The evidence base on agri-food systems is growing exponentially. The CoSAI-commissioned study, Mining the Gaps, applied artificial intelligence to mine more than 1.2 million publications for data, creating a clearer picture of what research has been conducted on small-scale farming and post-production systems from 2000 to the present, and where evidence gaps exist.
A range of approaches and financial instruments have been used to stimulate and support innovation in agriculture and resolve interlocking constraints for uptake at scale. These include innovation platforms, results-based payments, value chain approaches, grants and prizes, incubators, participatory work with farmer networks, and many more.
Innovation for sustainable agricultural intensification (SAI) is challenging. Changing agricultural systems at scale normally means working with partners at different levels to make changes in policies and social institutions, along with technical practices. This study extracts lessons for practitioners and investors in innovation in SAI, based on concrete examples, to guide future investment.