Institutional Learning and Change Initiative

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Abstract:

Innovation is the successful introduction of new knowledge and technology in social and productive processes. Conventional approaches to fostering innovation in agriculture and the food industry in developing countries have often emphasized the transfer of technology and knowledge from researchers to extensionists and then to producers. However, the recognition that there are also other agents, such as neighboring producers, family members, agricultural input providers, buyers, local governments, development projects and many other agents contributing to the same process of developing and using an innovation has recently opened up a new set of opportunities for development interventions. For example partnerships in which a wider set of agents exchange information about important properties of the innovation, contribute to the generation and diffusion of new knowledge and technologies, and jointly participate in processes of collective learning have sprung up in many developing countries and are supported by governments and development agencies. This report analyzes partnerships among small farmers and other agents aiming at innovation in Bolivia's agricultural and food sector. 16 partnerships were studied within three subsectors - highland cereals, leguminous crops, and fish culture - with regard to a) the political and institutional context in which they emerged, b) the way they function distribute benefits among the partners and generate synergy in learning and technology development, c) their performance with regard to the relation between costs and benefits, and d) their evolution over time. The information was gathered through structured interviews with representatives of the partners and promoting agencies involved in each of the partnerships. This information was complemented through individual and group visits to 60 producers and/or representatives of producer organizations. Study findings show that partnerships are a recent phenomenon in Bolivia. They occur across all agro-ecological zones in Bolivia and involve producer organization, development agencies and NGOs, government and parastatal funding bodies as well as public and private knowledge and technology providers including universities, semi-private research centers and producer associations. With the exception of three partnership cases all of the partnerships studied were funded by the government or international donors, in addition to some minor inputs from producers, knowledge providers and buyers. Among those partners that were supposed to obtain mayor benefits from the partnership, the small producers, average contribution was less than 1% of its total value. Innovation partnerships occur in basic food staple subsectors where they deal particularly with improved varieties as well as in cash crop subsectors, such as highland cereals (quinoa) for export or fish culture production, where they deal with issues of reducing production costs, food quality, processing and marketing.

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http://www.ifpri.org/spanish/pubs/dp/IFPRIDP00773sp.pdf