Sarah Cardey

Increasing capabilities are required to develop solutions to wicked problems whilst the economic, environmental, and social contexts of farming have become more turbulent. There is a growing focus on developing systemic capabilities that enable the identification, development, and scaling of shared solutions. This requires a cohesive agricultural education and training (AET) system that identifies needs of entire food systems and delivers responsive pedagogies that combine learning sources. However, South Africa’s AET system remains in dire need of governance reform directed towards greater integration. This study investigates the performance of the AET system in the Mpumalanga Province, South Africa, utilising an agricultural innovation system (AIS) lens to identify where there are absent or poor-quality infrastructures and interactions, and cognitive, regulatory, and normative institutions that hinder AET-system performance. Evaluations of AET-supportive innovation structures were coupled with articulations of innovation functions that support transdisciplinary demand articulation, knowledge co-development, and networking. Results highlight an absence of communication and coordination mechanisms, hindering vertical and horizontal interactions between multi-actor groups. This absence contributes to a disenabling environment for AET-supportive networking, facilitation, and brokerage, leading to missed opportunities to facilitate between food system actors and AET providers to develop transdisciplinary research and pedagogies that harness diverse knowledge, resources, and networks to maximise impact. Whilst there are industry-led needs assessment structures, these operate in silos and lack public sector engagement that could enable organisations with complementary mandates, knowledge, and infrastructures to respond to common priorities.

Globally, rural conditions are in states of change. They are often highly vulnerable to climate and environmental change, extreme weather events, conflict, socio-economic changes, inequalities, and demographic changes. These changes are putting stress on rural areas, which rely upon agriculture and natural resources for their livelihoods and are often the foundation of national economies. Communication for development (C4D) has played an important role in addressing these challenges. Its thinking is broadly consistent with rural development goals—indeed, the roots of C4D come in part from rural development and agricultural extension. Communication for development (C4D) was defined by the World Congress on Communication for Development as “…a social process based on dialogue using a broad range of tools and methods. It also seeks change at different levels, including listening, building trust, sharing knowledge and skills, building policies, debating, and learning for sustained and meaningful change. It is not public relations or corporate communications”. However, after decades of action to address these interrelated rural development challenges, much remains to be done. This paper critically considers the following: What does inclusive rural development mean now, in light of environmental change, and how does this affect the conceptualisation and practice of C4D? This was done by using three countries as case studies: Malawi, Ukraine, and the Philippines. Each of these countries represented contrasting challenges and opportunities for rural development and environmental change, with lessons from their experiences shedding insight into the communication for development thinking.

In 2018, the state of Himachal Pradesh in north India launched an initiative to convert all its farmers to natural farming (NF), an agroecological approach. The aim was to address multiple challenges related to rural livelihoods, high input costs, biodiversity loss, and environmental degradation. This paper is based on a qualitative case study of the state programme to transition farmers to NF. It seeks to understand how its mechanisms support and empower small and marginal women farmers. In addition to identifying mechanisms that facilitate the effective uptake of NF, the case study sought women’s views on whether these mechanisms increased spaces for decision making and developed capabilities and autonomy. Framed within the vision of reclaiming food sovereignty, various mechanisms such as training in villages, participating in NF groups and networks, visits to model farms, and adopting leadership roles offered new pathways for women farmers to gain confidence and capabilities. Women began to participate in spaces that had been culturally and structurally denied to them. This case study demonstrates how agroecology initiatives, with a particular emphasis on gender, can offer women various opportunities for decision making, income generation, and creative expression. These initiatives also expand community agency and enable the acquisition of knowledge necessary for sustainable ecosystems.

In 2018, the state of Himachal Pradesh in north India launched an initiative to convert all its farmers to natural farming (NF), an agroecological approach. The aim was to address multiple challenges related to rural livelihoods, high input costs, biodiversity loss, and environmental degradation. This paper is based on a qualitative case study of the state programme to transition farmers to NF. It seeks to understand how its mechanisms support and empower small and marginal women farmers. In addition to identifying mechanisms that facilitate the effective uptake of NF, the case study sought women's views on whether these increased spaces for decision-making and developed capabilities and autonomy. Framed within the vision of reclaiming food sovereignty, various mechanisms such as training in villages, participating in NF groups and networks, visits to model farms and adopting leadership roles offered new pathways for women farmers to gain confidence and capabilities. Women began to participate in spaces that had been culturally and structurally denied to them. This case study illustrates how agroecology efforts with a specific focus on gender have the potential to provide women with creative outlets and a variety of decision-making and income-generating roles, spaces for community learning and knowledge needed for sustainable ecosystems.

Improving the sustainability of global food systems requires competent and impactful change agents who are tasked with disseminating knowledge to stakeholders in local communities. Agricultural Extension agents and agricultural educator, who provide mentorship and preparation of youth, are pivotal for the positive outcomes of youth livestock production programs. Digital professional development, as one intervention for both formal and nonformal educators, can be a more effective use of an educator’s time. This study examined the needs and competency levels of agents and teachers related to their capacity for training youth livestock exhibitors. Through an online course, participants completed a pre-posttest within an interactive module. The data revealed that agents and agricultural teachers were proficient in Texas, USA, youth livestock production programs. This study found that the majority of both groups scored over 90% on the curricula’s assessment. There was a significant difference; agricultural education teachers reported higher mean scores than Extension agents on the Effective Teaching assessment. Both groups reported agreement with the Time to Complete, Tool Navigation, and Effective Teaching assessments. The data indicated that participants should additionally receive training materials on ethics policy and livestock validation. Livestock production digital professional development for nonformal agents of change is essential for sustaining global food chains.

Building human capacity through education and training programs is a key component of agricultural development. This article lays out a framework for educators working in agricultural development to use local knowledges to enhance capacity building efforts. Local knowledge systems are complex social phenomena consisting of unique combinations of ontologies/epistemologies, worldviews, and cultures of the people in a particular social/ecological context. To embrace local knowledge systems, educators should: (a) understand power, positionality, and privilege; (b) understand your learners and yourselves; (c) use participatory approaches; and (d) embrace new knowledges. The framework presented provides guidance for agricultural development practitioners; agricultural development organizations; educational institutions and others who train agricultural development practitioners; and researchers and evaluators.

This is a case study-based research project investigating the status of Advisory Extension Services in southern Ethiopia. The goal was to determine whether available service provisions meet the requirements of smallholder farmers and enabled them to improve their farming practices and livelihoods. A combination of an exploratory inductive approach and mixed methods was used (e.g., questionnaire survey, focus group discussions, key informant interviews). Participants included members of farming households, and agents, experts, and providers working in the agricultural rural sector. The key findings suggested that limited access to resources and unpredictable environmental conditions were stifling smallholder farmer innovation and livelihoods. Service provisions should be better tailored to local conditions, provide greater resource access, and work more closely with farmers. The development and implementation of service provision should involve a wide range of institutions and farmers throughout the process. Local community- and farmer-based organisations are especially important, and can work alongside innovative and talented farmers to enable more effective dissemination of information. Agricultural rural development and service provision should focus greater attention on the views and perspectives of farmers from a range of areas with differing socio-demographic and agro-ecological characteristics for comparative analysis.

Public Rural Advisory Services (RAS) have adapted to different socio-economic scenarios in politically diverse countries with the help of the third sector supporting dedicated RAS programmes. The Plantwise (PW) programme, led by the Centre for Agriculture and Bioscience International (CABI) and designed to increase food security in over 30 countries, is a good example of a public/NGO partnership, although recent evaluations have questioned its impacts on gendered agricultural information access. This study aims to investigate Plantwise’s gender impacts from individual and institutional viewpoints, interviewing smallholder farmers and extension staff involved in and outside of, the Plantwise programme in Bahawalpur and Jhang district in the Punjab province of Pakistan. This serves to highlight the programme’s impacts on systemic processes which ultimately have the potential to contribute to gender-transformative change and a more efficient and sustainable RAS. Results show differences between extension workers in a PW district and a non-PW district and between plant doctors and non-plant doctors in a PW district, though none were significant from a gendered perspective. There were interesting findings highlighting the plant clinic’s capacity as an agent of change but the low turnout of women at clinics did not reinforce the clinics’ capacity for change from a female perspective. Information from systemic, male and female-specific analyses are important to consider for PW from a practical perspective, such as the importance of spiritual locations. This study into the Pakistani PW initiative also offers an opportunity to contribute to the growing body of academic literature on the individual and institutional impacts of international development programmes, helping to understand wider aspects of international development involvement in RAS. From a practical perspective, this study also enables PW and other international development initiatives to better understand and interpret stakeholders’ perceptions, highlighting the importance of design and investment in participatory approaches to enable longer term impacts, especially focused on gender. It will also help the PW programme assess and understand implementation challenges in order to attain impact on the ground and be a driver of positive change in the country.

Perception of Concept and Practice of Social Power in Development Interventions in Malawi