Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 147 Document Number: D06673
Notes:
Online via Sullivan Higdon & Sink. 3 pages., News summary of a 2016 FoodThink study among U.S. consumers. Refers to upswing in consumer perception of the food industry since tracking began in 2012.
Hauser, Michael (author), Lindtner, Mara (author), Prehsler, Sarah (author), Probst, Lorenz (author), and University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Austria
Format:
Online journal article
Publication Date:
2016-07-30
Published:
Austria: Science Direct
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 109 Document Number: D10962
9 pages, via online journal, Farmers who engage in farmer participatory research (FPR) change their established social roles in households and communities. As such, comprehension of farmers’ role transitions is important to understand the extrinsic and intrinsic factors impeding or supporting the uptake and use of FPR by farmers. The existing FPR literature, however, does not address such role transitions. In this study, we analyzed farmers’ experiences with FPR and underlying role transitions in a commercial organic agriculture project in western Uganda. We drew on quantitative and qualitative data from interviews, group discussions, and observations involving farmers and extension workers. Our results suggest extrinsic and intrinsic factors affect farmers’ self-conception, influencing their willingness to participate in FPR. The level of alignment between the self-conception and the anticipated role determines farmers’ decision regarding participation in FPR and affects their response pattern. Farmers’ response pattern and individual set of inhibitors and facilitators lead to the experience of role insufficiency or role mastery, which is crucial for farmers’ continuation or termination of on-farm experiments. Understanding and facilitating role transitions is, therefore, essential for sustaining on-farm experiments, which complements current technical FPR training.
A version of this article appears in print on September 6, 2015, Section A, Page 1 of the New York Edition of the New York Times with the headline, "Emails reveal academic ties in a food war.", Examines lobbying activities of firms and interest groups in the debate over bioengineered foods - and involving third-party scientists "and their supposedly unbiased research." Includes examples of interactions and financial support for university scientists by commercial firms.
26 pages., via online journal., This paper employs the patent data of four major genetically modified (GM) crops, soybeans, cotton, maize and rapeseed, to illustratee how the innovation of GM crop technology diffused and distributed globally over time. Data collected from the Derwent Innovation Index, were employed to construct country patent citation networks, from 1984 to 2015, and the results revealed that developed countries were early adopters, and the primary actors in the innovation of GM crop technology. Only seven developing countries appeared in the country citation network. Most developed countries were reluctant to apply GM crop technology for commercial cultivation. Private businesses stood out in the patent citation network. The early adoption and better performance of developed countries can be explained by the activities of large established private companies.
