Glen Filson

The multifaceted nature of agricultural innovation makes it evident that technological, industrial, human and economic factors define and redefine agricultural innovation within new cultural and technological contexts. Juxtaposing the African condition to the earlier understanding of the cross-cultural dimensions of agricultural innovation, this paper proposes that technological insufficiencies in Africa shall necessitate the creation of an enabling environment which utilises an indigenous approach to agricultural innovation. Agricultural innovation ought to use intellectual capital based on human potential and indigenous approaches to enhance long term economic growth in the African context especially in the area of trade liberalisation and agricultural exports both within the region and outside the continent of Africa.

Utilizing data from a survey of key informants from U.S. counties at the rural-urban interface (RUI) with substantial agricultural production, this paper explores the relationship between the existence of formal organizations focused on agricultural economic development or food policy and the existence of other types of farm business or local food-system development programs. The research draws on concepts associated with traditional community-development theory and tests whether there is a relationship between the existence of social organizational capacity and various activities and outcomes. The analysis includes descriptive, bivariate, and multivariate analyses of data from over 500 U.S. counties located at the RUI. We find that counties that have formally organized, such as through the formation of a committee to support agricultural economic development or the formation of a food policy council, also have more agricultural business and local food-system development programs and policies. We also find that the counties with greater formal organizational development in support of agriculture are counties with larger populations, greater rural population densities, and larger numbers of farms compared to counties with less organizational development. We also find that the existence of these organizations is associated with greater optimism about the future of local agriculture among county key informants. The results suggest that local community development policy in support of agriculture at the RUI is warranted and the findings suggest opportunities for further research.

An increasing volume of literature deals with different meanings of the term ‘extension’ due to the many different agricultural extension systems (AESs) in use. Acknowledging the diversity of AESs, the authors recognize that there is usually a bias towards some specific aspect of these interventions that indicates a need to consider a systemic framework for comparative studies. The main purpose of this contribution is therefore to identify such a systemic view, which could be applied to comparative studies of AESs. Three levels of analysis should be scrutinized for considering a systemic view: micro (institutional), meso (national) and macro (international). At the most basic level, all AESs are involved in both intra-actions and interactions of the extension institution. For this reason, the aim of many studies has been to evaluate the institutional functions of extension practices. The functions at this lowest level are used to predict not only how extension professionals think and act, but how they react to their different target groups. The main question at the micro level is therefore to understand how a country can reach its agri-rural development goals through extension institutions and what institutional arrangements and funding trends help to achieve those goals. At the meso level, the most important considerations are national expectations, which lead to governmental support for or restrictions on the extension institution. Socioeconomic conditions and their consequences largely determine what the extension tasks should be. The main question at this level is why a country needs extension services, which define the different missions for them in different countries. Finally, at the macro level of analysis, it is important first to consider international components and their impact on the level of socioeconomic development of particular countries and, then, the extension missions. The main issue at this level is therefore to understand what international forces and considerations affect the present situation of a country and hence create new expectations of the extension system.

This paper presents an analysis of 481 landowners' self-administered questionnaires from recent surveys in five southern Ontario watersheds. Farmers opposed “excessive” regulation but wanted government financial support for implementing environmental practices voluntarily. Logistic regression models for adoption rate and gross sales helped identify the variables that predicted the Adoption Rate Index (ARI) and Gross Farm Sales (GFS). Farm size, the adoption rate of best management practices, age and education predicted gross farm sales for combined data sets. Minimum regulations, financial incentives, outreach and technical support for voluntary programs geared to different farm types and sizes are needed for effective environmental management.