This paper compares lessons learned from nine studies that explored institutional determinants of innovation towards sustainable intensification of West African agriculture. The studies investigated issues relating to crop, animal, and resources management in Benin, Ghana, and Mali
The Convergence of Sciences programme has spent the past decade exploring new pathways for agricultural innovation that focus on enabling smallholders to capture opportunity. Its approach relies on bringing together different actors who can achieve major change in an agriculture...
This report sets out the synthesis of work carried out within the framework of the Sahel and West Africa Club (SWAC) Secretariat Initiative on “The family economy and agricultural innovation: towards new partnerships”. The initiative aimed to stimulate analyses, collect...
An evaluation is a particular multi-stakeholder event during which different actors share and analyse results after several years. If the evaluation has a strong formative purpose, the evaluation team is requested to facilitate a learning process involving all key actors....
In 2008, an NGO showed videos about rice to farmers in 19 villages in Benin. A study in 2013 showed that farmers remembered the videos, even after five years had passed. In most of the villages at least some farmers...
Within the agricultural development sector, innovation has been identified as a primary pathway to achieve economic, social and environmental goals. Innovation is traditionally defined as a linear and relatively homogenous process involving the invention of a “new” technology that is...