Challenges and Prospects of Farmer innovation in Ethiopia Amanuel Assefa Agri Service Ethiopia Nov 2005

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Challenges and Prospects of Farmer innovation in
EthiopiaAmanuel Assefa Agri Service
EthiopiaNov 2005
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Introduction

• Food Security Problems North, North eastern,
  South eastern and dry areas of the South
• Since the last few decades the situation is
  getting worst
• Soil degradation and rapid population growth
• International aid and supports of the GO

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• Most of the supports externally designed and
  driven Preconceived interventions
• Ignores the local resources, innovations and
  needs
• Failed to ensure sustainable development
• Ethiopia Multi ethnic combination, Multi
  millennium history and Diverse culture

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• Home of amazing indigenous knowledge and systems
• Among the attributes of IK Domestication of
  Coffee, Teff and Enset as well as the bench
  terrace of the Konso people
• Researchers and development practitioners are
  more pre occupied with western civilization/techno
  logies, Ignoring the IK

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Whose knowledge Counts?

• Farmers are seen as recipients of development
  aids
• Do not respond adequately to local realities
• Few cases can be mentioned NGOs where the local
  knowledge is systematically and intentionally
  considered for dev
• Some researchers begun to appreciate the
  participation of farmers in Technology development

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• Millions are Running CDR agriculture
• On the other hand there are many innovative
  farmers, trying out something new and something
  fascinating
• A book known as farmer innovation in Africa, a
  product of two Dutch funded projects in Africa
  reported about the successful expansion of IK
  practices in contrast to the modern soil and
  water conservation

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• Investing Money, time etc on Farmer innovation
  is worth doing
• The Formal System is getting attention
  resources and policy Support
• Farmer innovation system is driving the
  livelihood system of millions of Ethiopian
  farmers and yet receiving little attention.
• Researchers and development practitioners know
  only very little about F/PI, not because it is
  the upper limit. Methodology and Mind set

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Searching for the missing Links

• Identification of innovative farmers is not
  however an end for it self.
• In the formal system there is good progress of
  taking participatory approaches in to account

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• But there is no conscious and systematic linkage
  between the agricultural scientists and farmer
  innovators
• The two systems, although complementary, are not
  feeding to each other consciously and
  meaningfully.
• The farmer innovation system is not adequately
  considered as a source of inspiring technologies
• farmers involve in testing technologies that are
  released by researchers, and not the other way.

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• This is one of the important missing links
  between the formal and farmer innovation systems.
• So the concern/message of this paper is how can
  we make our assistance to small holders be more
  realistic, appropriate and sustainable as a
  result of making conscious supports to farmer
  innovation systems.

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What is all about Farmer innovation

• innovative farmers refer to those wise farmers
  who have tried or trying out new value added
  practices through acting on IK or SK.
• The outcome of the farmer innovation process can
  be improving Iks and practices, appropriation of
  modern practices to fit own reality or finding
  out something new even to the world

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• They are not like the model farmers who are
  intentionally trained by extension workers on
  specific and pre-determined technologies.
• Farmers, especially resource poor farmers,
  continuously experiment, adopt and innovate

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• Nevertheless sorting out and understanding the
  innovative elements in the works of those farmers
  depends largely on the perceptions and attitudes
  of the observers/visitors.
• Farmer innovation dose not mean exactly like IK
• Ik is of course a collective name, which broadly
  encompasses the traditional knowledge and/or a
  knowledge that belongs to the present generation
  including farmer innovation, which is developed
  by the local people

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• Innovative farmers do understand IK not as a
  static knowledge body something that has to be
  learnt from ancestors and use it in a business
  as usual manner
• Business unusual rather explains the
  relationship better
• FI embraces, not only technological findings, but
  also new ways of managing livelihood in general.
• The approach is not primarily used to develop
  innovations and spread them out to other farmers
  .

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The Opportunities

• Formation of a National learning and advocacy
  platform known as PROFIEET Promotion of Farmer
  Innovation and Experimentation In Ethiopia It is
  A network of NGOs and GO Research, Extension and
  Education institutions in the country

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• Formation of a global network for the promotion
  of local innovations in ecologically oriented
  agriculture and natural resource management.
  PROLINNOVA. Ethiopia, Uganda Ghana, Sudan,
  South Africa, Niger, Tanzania, Cambodia and
  Nepal. IFAD supported the inception phase of the
  first three countries

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• Expansion of participatory approaches for
  research and development.NGOs are on the for
  front and some universities have begun to provide
  courses on this subject and the term has become
  very popular in the public research and extension
  organizations.

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Challenges/limitations

• No adequate space for farmers to decide on their
  priorities for research and development farmers
  role in Technology development is very passive
• Resources that are directed to research and
  extension programs are entirely controlled by the
  formal institutions. There is no any single
  example in the research and extension system
  where by, funds are created to support local
  innovation

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• Conceptual frame work and methodological
  approaches to support farmer innovations is not
  well develop. There are many questions coming up
  from practitioners and policy makers Like how
  can we identify IF, What type of partnership
  should their be between the scientists and FI,
  Could Farmers Innovation really help to
  meaningfully impact poverty etc

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• Smallholder farmers in Ethiopia have financial
  limitation to courageously work on their
  innovation initiatives or buy-in experts skills
  to support their works. This is again mainly
  because of the paternalistic view of outsiders,
  which consequently have failed to recognize
  farmers as researchers/innovators

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• No purposeful and systematic attempt was made by
  the formal system to develop farmer-generated
  technologies in which case, the innovative
  farmers are on the drivers seat to lead the
  innovation development process except few cases
  of NGOs working with researchers

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Prospects/Way forward

• Making Farmer Innovation Support fund available
  and accessible to farmers, This is very helpful
  to cultivate and release the potentials of
  farmers for innovation

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• Farmer Innovation Support Fund can be a blocked
  sum of money, which has to be entirely managed by
  organized groups of farmers and be used only
  for the purpose of identification, development
  and sharing of farmer innovations on the basis of
  their own priorities and decision making
  process.

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• We should be able to look how the farmer and the
  formal innovation systems are effectively linked,
  in which case the initiative for the linkage and
  collaboration should come from farmers side.
  Supporting farmers to access to innovation funds
  will help this to happen

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• We need to work for the recognition and
  implementation of relevant policies. There are
  a number of well though policies to support
  rural development process in the country in
  general. In the policy- practice continuum, there
  is however inconsistence, misinterpretation,
  misunderstanding and denying attention to some of
  the critical ones.

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• We need to support extensive academic works to
  explain some of the gray areas in the farmer and
  formal innovation systems interface also to
  improve the methodologies and working tools that
  help to identify IF and to make farmer led
  Participatory Innovation Development PID to
  happen

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Conclusion

• This paper tries to explore an alternative
  approach that should be tried out to respond more
  realistically to the needs of small holder
  farmers. It pays more attention to farmer
  innovation system, which is not so visible and
  thus not adequately recognized by policy makers,
  technocrats, researchers and international and
  national development partners, although it is
  surely driving the livelihood systems of the
  small farmers in Ethiopia.

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• PROLINNOVA, which is the global learning and
  advocacy network for the promotion of farmer
  innovation is taking care of this agenda.
  Therefore there are possibilities for
  institutions like IFAD, the World Bank, UNDP
  INGOs and others to work and share experiences
  with PROLINNOVA on farmer innovation support
  fund and thus contribute to the fulfillment of
  the millennium development goals in Ethiopia and
  other developing courtiers.