Purpose: Networks and partnerships are commonly-used tools to foster knowledge sharing between actors and organisations in the Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation System (AKIS), but in Europe the policy emphasis on including users, such as farmers and foresters, is relatively recent. This paper assesses user involvement in a diverse set of European Union (EU)-funded and non-EU (formal and informal) multi-actor partnerships. Design/methodology/approach: A review of 200 projects and other partnerships including farmers and foresters, drawn from an integrated database of several thousand such examples, assessed the types of innovation challenges tackled, solutions proposed, innovation supported, parameters of actor participation and the expectations of success in each example. Findings: All the reviewed policy instruments, not just those funded in the frame of the EIP-AGRI, can be used to involve users in co-innovation in agriculture, forestry and related value chains. Practical implications: The EIP-AGRI is just one part of a complex matrix of multi-actor co-innovation activities involving farmers and foresters in Europe. Interlinking of innovation programmes and more effective targeting of these programmes at groups of actors, especially users, who are currently not sufficiently engaged are worthy aspirations. Theoretical implications: Any analysis of co-innovation involving users must recognise the existence of a multiplicity (projects, nonproject activities, formal and informal) of multi-actor approaches. Originality/value: This research used a common methodology to review several forms of multi-actor partnerships involving users and other actors. Our data suggest that many of these are effective methods of supporting co-innovation and are, therefore, 'sharing the space' within the AKIS.
Innovation rests not only on discovery but also on cooperation and interactive learning. In agriculture, forestry and related sectors, multi-actor partnerships for 'co-innovation' occur in many forms, from international projects to informal 'actor configurations'. Common attributes are that they include actors with 'complementary forms of knowledge' who collaborate in an innovation process, engage with a 'larger periphery' of stakeholders in the Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation System (AKIS) and are shaped by institutions. Using desk research and interviews, we reviewed, according to the Organisational Innovation Systems framework, the performance of 200 co-innovation partnerships from across Europe, selected for their involvement of various actors 'all along the process'. Many of the reviewed partnerships were composed of actors that had previously worked together and most interviewees believed that no relevant actors had been excluded. In almost all cases, project targets and objectives were co-designed to a great or some extent, and the mechanisms applied to foster knowledge sharing between partners were considered to be very effective. Great importance was attached to communication beyond the partnership, not simply for dissemination but also for dialogue, and most interviewees evaluated the communication/outreach performance of their partnership very highly. Most partnerships received external funding, most did not use innovation brokers during the proposal writing process and two thirds had access to information they needed. We discuss the implications of these findings and question whether the AKIS concept as currently interpreted by many policy makers can adequately account for the regional differences encountered by co-innovation partnerships across Europe.
Cognitive flexibility is the innate ability of the brain to change mental processes and to modify behavioral responses according to an ever-changing environment. As our brain has a limited capacity to process the information of our surroundings in any given moment, it uses sets as a strategy to aid neural processing systems. With assessing the capability of shifting between task sets, it is possible to test cognitive flexibility and executive functions. The most widely used neuropsychological task for the evaluation of these functions in humans is the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST), which requires the subject to alter response strategies and use previously irrelevant information to solve a problem. The test has proven clinical relevance, as poor performance has been reported in multiple neuropsychiatric conditions. Although, similar tasks have been used in pre-clinical rodent research, many are limited because of their manual-based testing procedures and their hardware attenuates neuronal recordings. We developed a two-choice rule-switch task whereby head-fixed C57BL/6 mice had to choose correctly one of the two virtual objects presented to retrieve a small water reward. The animals learnt to discriminate the visual cues and they successfully switched their strategies according to the related rules. We show that reaching successful performance after the rule changes required more trials in this task and that animals took more time to execute decisions when the two rules were in conflict. We used optogenetics to inhibit temporarily the medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) during reward delivery and consumption, which significantly increased the number of trials needed to perform the second rule successfully (i.e., succeed in switching between rules), compared to control experiments. Furthermore, by assessing two types of error animals made after the rule switch, we show that interfering with the positive feedback integration, but leaving the negative feedback processing intact, does not influence the initial disengagement from the first rule, but impedes the maintenance of the newly acquired response set. These findings support the role of prefrontal networks in mice for cognitive flexibility, which is impaired during numerous neuropsychiatric diseases, such as schizophrenia and depression.
The collaboration that has led to the publication of this book can be traced back to April 2013, when the Research Institute of Agricultural and Food Economics (VÚEPP) in Bratislava, Slovak Republic, approached the Research Institute of Agricultural Economics (AKI) in Budapest, Hungary, with a view to establishing a programme of bilateral cooperation. The approach was very positively received by AKI, and the idea rapidly developed into a plan for a series of trilateral cooperation activities that also included the Institute of Agricultural Economics and Information (IAEI) in Praha, Czech Republic. Representatives of the three institutes met in Budapest at the end of May, 2013 and agreed to work together to enhance mutual research collaboration in the field of agricultural economics, share information and discuss issues related to agricultural economics in the three countries, and establish a coordination group composed by members of the three research institutes. The cooperation was formalised through the signing, in December 2013, of a trilateral Agreement covering the period 2014-2016 covering the following topics: (a) publication of individual or common papers in the institutes' journals or other journals, and exchange of journals between institutes; (b) exchange of experience via trilateral meetings of specialists; (c) cooperation with other scientific entities and support for affiliation to international networks or construction of a specific network in the institutes' common field of research interest; (d) applications and participation in common international projects; and (e) participation at international meetings with common research/papers and cooperation in organisation of different international meetings. The three institutes agreed that this would be an excellent way to better disseminate, nationally and internationally, the results of their research work and to open new perspectives to future mutual cooperation. The centrepiece of the programme of cooperation was a trilateral research project entitled "The CAP Impact on the Effectiveness of Use of Agricultural Production Factors and the Economic Efficiency of Agricultural Production and Product Sectors in the Slovak Republic, the Czech Republic and Hungary". The general objective of this project has been: research on rural areas and the agrifood sector by sectoral analysis, country comparisons, identification of positive and negative influences on the rural and agricultural economy, dissemination of research results, and proposals for future policies in the field. Initially intended to cover four topics (implementation of the new Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), agricultural land ownership and related issues, competitiveness and profitability of crop and animal production, and the efficiency of food industry production), further discussion led to eight topics of joint research being agreed. This book represents the tangible output of the trilateral research project. Each chapter in the book is the product of enthusiastic cooperation between the re...
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