Innovation and learning in agriculture

Abstract

Innovation is a complex process, based on interactive network learning and processes of trial and error on the shop floor. Small companies, such as in agriculture, are depending on external knowledge infrastructures for effective innovation. Within small companies, the entrepreneur has a pivotal role in the innovative process: the entrepreneur is the professional learner. Learning and innovation as major parts of entrepreneurship are central to this contribution. How do farmers learn and innovate within a market‐led, high‐tech agricultural sector and what should governmental policy look like to support and facilitate innovation, avoiding the pitfall of protectionism? Two case studies are presented: one on linear innovation policy and one on learning processes of farmers. Innovative learning is balancing between the chaos of uncertainty and the old grooves of experience. Knowing how to escape this paradox forms the core competence of innovative entrepreneurship.

Extension services and multifunctional agriculture. Lessons learnt from the French and Dutch contexts and approaches

“…This could lead to a decrease of the knowledge generated, especially as far as MFA issues are concerned. Thus, several authors argue that increased competition has resulted in the withholding of knowledge generated and exchanged in agricultural R&D systems (Leeuwis, 2000;Nieuwenhuis, 2002). The Dutch system of public provision of agricultural R&D was previously characterised by open exchanges of information, and by procedures for the co-production of knowledge for support to innovations.…”

How Dynamics of Learning are Linked to Innovation Support Services: Insights from a Smallholder Commercialization Project in Kenya

“…It is seen to include building capacities for producers to be more strategic about their enterprises, strengthening farmer organizations and more broadly streamlining actor linkages in agricultural value chains (Chowa et al 2013;Christoplos 2010;Swanson and Rajalahti 2010). Thus, supporting innovation entails providing both technical and generic business (entrepreneurial) support services, which has been recognized already in the context of developed countries (Nieuwenhuis 2002;Phillipson et al 2004). Furthermore, innovation support services are not always tied to support of private demands of specific actors but also to demands related to public or societal interests such as those related to sustainability issues.…”

Strengthening agricultural innovation capacity: are innovation brokers the answer?

“…The OVO-triptych embodied the corporatist Dutch agri-business culture in which there were well-developed institutionalized linkages and feedback mechanisms, and continuous alignment between farmers, agri-industry, research and extension establishments, and government (Wielinga, 2001). Having its origin in post-World War II policy on food security, OVO's main objective was the modernization of Dutch agriculture, with a focus on homogenous development paths emphasizing productivity increase and efficiency gains (Nieuwenhuis, 2002). The OVO approach was seen to work well until the mid 1970s (Wielinga, 2001).…”

“…Growing public concern about health issues, production surpluses, increasing environmental awareness in European society, combined with serious food production scandals (BSE, swine fever, and foot-and-mouth disease), led to reduced support for the "industrial" productivity increase paradigm that was dominant in the OVOtriptych (Nieuwenhuis, 2002). In general, the need was seen for a major re-think of how agricultural production in the Netherlands should be given shape to deal with new societal, economic, and ecological demands, and how the knowledge infrastructure should support that.…”