Selected policy papers on extension - From the CTA and S&T - Knowledge for Development Newsletter - April 2014

[Andrea Bohn]

From CTA and S&T - Knowledge for Development Newsletter -  April 2014

"Extension is a key service in supporting developing countries to address the challenge of food insecurity, to build resilience in agricultural systems under a changing climate and to improve prosperity in the agricultural and rural sectors. As this is the international year of family farming, we feature selected policy papers authored by H.B. Corrêa da Silva, Brazil; V. Hoffmann, Germany; N. Roling and D. Hounkonnou, The Netherlands and Benin and O.I. Oladele, Nigeria, that were published on the recently released Extension CD-ROM Proceedings. These papers provide useful insights for charting future extension policy in developing countries."

direct links:

http://extension.cta.int/pages/Documents/Keynote%20Papers/CTA129%20Keynote%20Papers_Correa%20da%20Silva%20KN_04.pdf?utm_source=K4DNewsletterEN&utm_medium=Link&utm_campaign=K4D_EN_Apr2014

http://extension.cta.int/pages/Documents/Keynote%20Papers/CTA129%20Keynote%20Papers_Hoffmann%20KN_05.pdf?utm_source=K4DNewsletterEN&utm_medium=Link&utm_campaign=K4D_EN_Apr2014

http://extension.cta.int/pages/Documents/Policy%20Papers/1.New%20Paradigms/CTA129%20New%20Paradigms_Oladele_04.pdf?utm_source=K4DNewsletterEN&utm_medium=Link&utm_campaign=K4D_EN_Apr2014

http://extension.cta.int/pages/Documents/Policy%20Papers/1.New%20Paradigms/CTA129%20New%20Paradigms_Roling_04.pdf?utm_source=K4DNewsletterEN&utm_medium=Link&utm_campaign=K4D_EN_Apr2014

[A. van den Ban]

Dear Andrea

The following note may be of interest to members of your group:

 

INTELLIGENCE OF FARMERS

A major factor in the success of the development of Dutch agriculture has  been the use that has been made of the intelligence of Dutch farmers. Let me give some exemples:

1. For my Ph.D. thesis I noticed  that Dutch Village Extension workers do not have the time to talk with all farmers. Let they therefore talk with the opinion leaders and in this way reach most of the farmers. Who are these opinion leaders? Perhaps intelligent farmers? So  have given the farmers in my study an intelligence test and found that this was indeed the case. Later I have given the same test to advance students at Wageningen University and found that in each village I studied some farmers where tested higher on this test than the average of the students. My experience in developing countries convinces me that many farmers there have a low level of education, but not a low level of intelligence. Can we make more effective use of their intelligence? Some exemples of how this has been done:

2. In 1974 a Dutch dairy farmer P.B. de Boer in Stiens was granted by Wageningen University a honorary doctors degree. Researchers had shown that a major increase in grassland production was possible by using N fertilizers, but this required major changes in the grassland and dairy management system. That made it possible to keep more cows and increase farm income, but this farmer had made more contributions to discovere which kind of changes where required than the researchers who earned a Ph.D. on this research. Many people, including me, had much confidence in his intelligence of this farmer.

Another exemple is the development of dairy farming systems in a poor part of the Netherlands, where between 1960 and 1985 the average number of cows per farm increased from 7 to 45. This requires a major change in labour management.  A farmer studied how this could change and as a result he got the German Justus von Liebig Prize for this major contribution to agricultural development.

3. An extension managers on greenhouse horticulture wrote a Ph.D. thesis on how the horticultural industry in the Netherlands was influenced by scientific research (A.J. Vijverberg, Wageningen 1968), One of his conclusions was: We have in greenhouse horticulure one research station and 10000 experimental gardens on which 35000 creative people work.

These intelligent people have made major contributions to the development of new farming systems and of farmers organizations in the Netherlands and in this way in the ability of the Netherlands to compete in the world market.

Who sees possibilities to make more effective use of intelligence of farmers  in developing countries and their wives?

 

Anne van den Ban, Wageningen

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[Ann Waters-Bayer]

Indeed, this is the premise on which Prolinnova is based: www.prolinnova.net – see also attachment.

 

Cheers,

Ann

 

International Farmer Innovation Day 29 November !!

Ann Waters-Bayer
Prolinnova International Support Team
ETC Foundation Netherlands
E: ann.wate...@etcnl.nl
W: www.prolinnova.net
S: ann-waters