19 pages, Farmers are often overlooked and undervalued as sources of innovation, but can be powerful drivers of ingenuity and development. We evaluate historical developments in the Australian subterranean clover seed-production industry as a case study of farmer-driven innovation. Subterranean clover seed machinery patents (75% of which were patented by farmers) are analysed using conventional innovation frameworks, such as the theory of inventive problem solving (TRIZ), to extract lessons for supporting farmer-driven innovation. The small scale of this industry, compared with mainstream cereal-cropping industries and the isolation of farmers, provides analogous lessons for agriculture in developing countries. Economic drivers are important in enabling farmer innovation and the value proposition for developing new inventions must be clear to justify the time and expense. Farmers are different from firms and their on-farm knowledge and experience can form an essential part of innovation. Drivers of innovation also differ, with farmers less likely to attempt to commercialize inventions. Farmers can also be hesitant to share their inventions, instead holding them as trade secrets in competitive industries. Support and collaboration are needed from government and researchers to assist in commercialization or dissemination of useful innovations and to prevent knowledge from being confined to a localized farmer or region. Advances in agriculture require farmer input in research and development, but the benefits will be greater if farmers are enabled to be drivers of innovation.
23 pages, Cotton is the most significant natural fiber in the world and an important part of the global economy. Yet, the cotton industry faces several challenges in securing its place in the global fiber market share, reaching new consumers, and maintaining relationships with current consumers. Furthermore, the cotton industry has a unique opportunity to share evidence-based information with followers through its product marketing on social media. The study described herein used content analysis to explore Instagram content on the @discovercotton profile. Content included categories of promoted products (i.e. women, men, children, or home); comments, posts, and caption stimuli; and most frequently used word, hashtag, and retail partner stimuli. We analyzed 434 Instagram stimuli (244 single photos, 142 carousels, and 48 videos) from March 2, 2021, to March 2, 2023. Across all stimuli, there were 110,143 likes and 5,799 comments with total response (engagement: likes and comments) reaching 115,942. We found that women’s products were promoted most often followed by men, home, and children—only 8.48% of stimuli depicted cotton, a cotton plant, or the seal of cotton. We identified six major themes in caption stimuli on @discovercotton: qualities of cotton, style, sustainability, check the label, women, and cotton production. Cotton was the most frequently used word stimuli in captions, and cotton as a fabric was the most promoted theme.
19 pages, In today’s globalized world, educators and employers generally agree on the necessity for undergraduate agricultural [ag] students to develop a sound understanding of global ag issues and policy. Because of this, many U.S. universities have promoted internationalizing curriculum and increased international study abroad experiences. However, few studies have examined the impact of international experiences on students’ knowledge and attitudes about international ag issues and policies. This study bridges this gap by identifying the relationship between student knowledge and attitude toward international ag issues and U.S. ag policy, and how international experience and demographic variables play a role in that relationship. Adapted from previous literature, an online survey was developed in 2019 among 196 undergraduate students in ag and non-ag fields to measure student knowledge (global aptitude assessment) and student attitude (attitude index score) towards the importance of global agricultural issues and policy. Results concluded that undergraduate students held a low level of knowledge about global ag issues and policy; in fact, ag students held lower average knowledge scores than non-agricultural students. This emphasizes the urgency for administrators to intentionally design and reevaluate our current curriculum to meet these knowledge gaps. Additionally, study abroad experiences did not contribute to students’ knowledge nor attitudes. The authors discuss several possibilities for such results and highlight the call to similarly reevaluate our study abroad curriculum to be more intentional in impacting student knowledge in global ag food systems and acknowledge differences in policy, getting students excited and interested in the global market.
