9 pages, In agricultural research for development adoption of new technology tends to be cast in categories: adoption, partial adoption, dis-adoption or non-adoption. While these may serve for pragmatic classification and measures for project success or impact they fail to properly acknowledge the ongoing and independent efforts of farmers (and others) in experimentation and integration of knowledge across a range of sources. This paper explores responses to practices for cattle management introduced during a research project, at project close, and five years after the project has finished. We consider the perceptions and application of new knowledge by farmers, extension staff, and policy makers. By taking a longer-term view, we demonstrate how farming households adapt and integrate knowledge from different sources into their daily practice, influenced by local institutions and changing cultural expectations, as well as external researchers. We also consider the influence of changing government priorities and incentives in steering farm-management decisions. Results suggest that a focus on measures to build capacity and empower farmers with information to adapt and respond to change, regardless of project activities, is a much more important goal and indicator of impact than measuring adoption.
Diaz-Bordenave, Juan E. (author / Inter-American Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) and Inter-American Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Format:
Conference paper
Publication Date:
1974
Published:
USA
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: Byrnes12; 31 Document Number: B03101
Notes:
Mason E. Miller Collection; Theodore Hutchcroft Collection, In: Communication strategies for rural development : proceedings of the Cornell-CIAT International Symposium; 1974 March 17-22; Cali, Colombia, S.A. Ithaca, NY : Cornell University, 1974. p. 205-217
Brown, Brendan (author), Nuberg, Ian (author), Llewellyn, Rick (author), and School of Agriculture, Food and Wine, The University of Adelaide
CSIRO Agriculture
Format:
Journal article
Publication Date:
2018
Published:
Elsevier
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 16 Document Number: D10460
10 pages., Via online journal., Conservation Agriculture (CA) is a knowledge-intensive set of practices which requires substantial access to functional agricultural extension services to enable utilisation. Despite this importance, the perspectives of those providing extension services to smallholder farmers have not been fully investigated. To address this, we qualitatively explore the perspectives of agricultural extension providers across six African countries to understand why uptake of CA has been limited, as well as the institutional changes that may be required to facilitate greater utilisation. Across the diversity of geographical, political and institutional contexts between countries, we find multiple commonalities in the constrained utilisation of CA by smallholder farmers, highlighting the difficulties non-mechanised subsistence farmers face in transitioning to market-oriented farming systems such as CA. The primary constraint relates to the economic viability of market-oriented farming where farmers remain in low input and low output systems with limited exit points. The assumed exit point used by CA programs appears to have led to a culture of financial expectancy and reflects a continuation of top-down extension approaches with inadequate modification of CA to the contextual realities of subsistence farmers. If African agricultural systems are to be sustainably intensified, we find a need for greater flexibility within extension systems in the pursuit of sustainable intensification. If extension systems are to persist with CA, it will need to be promoted through more transitional pathways that disaggregate the CA package, and with that there is a need for the provision of a mandate to, and necessary funding for, more participatory extension services.
Ullah, Raza (author), Rehman, Mariam (author), Anjum, Maria (author), Kamran, Muhammad Asif (author), Bakhsh, Khuda (author), Saboor, Abdul (author), and Lahore College for Women University, Lahore
Nuclear Institute for Agriculture and Biology, Faisalabad
COMSATS Institute of Information Technology, Vehari
PMAS Arid Agriculture University, Rawalpindi
Format:
Journal article
Publication Date:
2016
Published:
Pakistan: Asianet-Pakistan
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Document Number: D08246
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 112 Document Number: C10848
Journal Title Details:
pp. 137-148
Notes:
Chapter V in book "Impacts of Technology on U.S. Cropland and Rangeland Productivity", Congress of The United States, Office of Technology Assessment, Washington, D. C. 20510, 1982
International: Yale University Press, New Haven, Connecticut.
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Document Number: D11096
Notes:
281 pages., "By drawing on many examples from around the world, this book explains that our approach to managing water can and must be changed if we are to avoid a global water crisis. Includes a table identifying barriers to adoption of water-sharing technologies.
