Hall, Clare (author), Toma, Luiza (author), Costa Madureira, Livia Maria (author), Barnes, Andrew (author), and Renwick, Alan (author)
Format:
Paper
Publication Date:
2012-09-18
Published:
International
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 186 Document Number: D00922
Notes:
Paper presented at the 131st EAAE (European Association of Agricultural Economists) seminar, "Innovation for agricultural competitiveness and sustainability of rural areas," Prague, Czech Republic, September 18-19, 2012. 17 pages.
12 pages., Via online journal., This article is concerned with the shaping of agricultural knowledge among farmers, in the context of the rapid changes Polish agriculture has been subject to since the time of the country's EU accession. The theoretical underpinnings of this work have been described in terms of the significant notional categories, i.e. knowledge, knowledge-cultures and sources of knowledge. The research made use of the joint interviews method. Interviews were run with representatives of different generations in 10 farming families in central Poland. The main research objective was to determine sources of farming knowledge among farmers. The use of joint interviews allowed for the identification of sources of knowledge of different kinds. These reflect a division into farmers' closer and more distant surroundings, i.e. to the family and neighbours on the one hand, and to institutions and media on the other. Knowledge acquisition among farmers is in fact found to be a complex process, reflecting socialisation in a multi-generation environment of family and neighbours, on the one hand, and the impact of the institutional and legal system, on the other. In a general sense, this corresponds to the well-known division of sources of knowledge into the tacit and the explicit, with the acquisition of tacit (i.e. informal) knowledge not meeting with any more major obstacles thanks to proximity in a sense that may be cultural (i.e. the agriculture itself), family-related (and in fact multi-generation) and spatial (physical proximity in a given locality). Microsocial conditioning thus plays a major role in the shaping of this source of knowledge. However, the most important factor distinguishing contemporary cultures as regards knowledge on farming is the capacity to adapt to conditions set by the institutions supporting the latter's development. Formal knowledge flowing into farming families from their institutional surroundings requires growing adaptability and preparation if a succession of innovations are to be taken on board. The multi-source nature of knowledge and the achievement of some kind of balance in this respect actually poses a major challenge for the future functioning of family farms as cultural microsystems.
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Document Number: D06716
Notes:
Posted on Farmsubsidy.org, a project coordinated by the Danish International Center for Analytical Reporting and EU Transparency, a non-profit organization in the UK.4 pages., Involves reporting of detailed information about payments and recipients of farm subsidies in EU member states. Authors address concerns and present benefits of transparency in this matter.
