A State of the Art of Self Help Groups in India

This paper considers the strategies of self help group for micro-enterprise development in rural areas. It seeks to answer the question of whether and under which conditions self help groups are an effective vehicle for organizing and representing local people in the development of community based micro-enterprises. Focusing particularly on examples from India in the context of food as a local resource, special attention is paid to success and failure factors of self help groups. While self help group strategies have been applied in the past as a blind replication of success models without considering the intricacies involved in group formation, success of self help groups is based on a thorough understanding of local conditions and possibilities to intervene

Exploring Possibilities to Enhance Food Sovereignty within the Cowpea Production-Consumption Network in Northern Ghana

Over the last years an important focus in the combat of hunger and malnutrition,particularly in Africa has been food security. This article explores possibilities for enhancing food sovereignty, as an alternative concept to food security and an alternative strategy for reversing hunger and malnutrition trends in developing countries. A combination of literature review, participatory appraisal and conventional survey methodologies are used to investigate the relevance of local cowpea (Vigna unguiculata) network regarding its importance vis-à-vis other crops, varietal choice, and consumption patterns in Northern Ghana from food sovereignty perspective. Findings reveal how people in poverty-stricken and hunger- hot- spot communities strive to conserve their biodiversity and production-consumption networks for posterity. Local cowpea varietal preferences are investigated for participatory breeding considerations to improve on seed access for sustainable production. Promotion of origin-based foods in the current fast growing globalised markets is recommended as a possibility to enhance food sovereignty for sustainable development in Afric

Diverse agri-food practices and their transformative potentials

There is an upheaval in reconsidering the socio-cultural dimensions of "agri-culture" as resources for creating alternative geographies of food. At the same time discourses returned to reactivate a productivity agenda stressing the need of "feeding the 9 billion in 2050" promoting technological solutions such as GMOs, reactivating the imaginary of the Green Revolution, organizing farming within global food chains and fighting against hunger based on scientific principles. Others emphasize, however, that the dominant entrepreneurial model of farming within global food chains has not been successful in reducing but rather increases the longstanding social and ecological contradictions of the capitalist models of organizing food production. It is stressed that the breakdown of local food systems caused by the globalization of food production and distribution has not only caused a food crisis that now reaches over more than 700 million people, but has also caused widespread ecological damage, a loss of peasant cultural diversity and increased poverty. New forms of agrarian resistance, exemplified by the peasant movement La Via Campesina's call for food sovereignity, create a potential to reframe and rethink agri-food futures. Reflecting on the diverse forms and trajectories of various struggles for alternative agri-food practices, four transformative potential domains can be identified through which "food geographies of care and responsibilities" may be realized. The four domains of social struggle for integrating diversity related to social movements efforts are to: re-territorialize agri-food systems (Van der Ploeg, 1991, 2008, 2013); apply the Diverse Economies Approach (Gibson-Graham, 2006, 2008) and to read rather for difference than for dominance; develop a critical-reconstructive (bio)technology approach; The case of tailor-made biotechnologies; de-couple the productive relationship of diversity from a cognitive capital-centric framing

OPEN SOURCE AND COMMONS IN DEVELOPMENT

N° ISBN - 978-2-7380-1284-5International audienceThis article discusses the interrelation between open source knowledge development and the production of research commons in four development-oriented research networks with an Indian/Dutch composition. The main objective of the article is to describe the planned research activities aimed to understand the functioning of open source and commons from the perspective of local development. The article discusses three hypotheses which will be further investigated in the coming years by the Open Source and Commons Research Group of CTC1, namely:. • The social-technical dynamics in the knowledge development of genomics and other life sciences technologies transform the private-public research setting into more open source and commons oriented research networks • The open source approach will show a trend towards a blurring of the designer-user dichotomy, as the user will also be challenged to become co-designer, which will create new opportunities and incentives for involving resource-poor client groups and farmers in the process of technology development • Commons represent a new social condition of knowledge production (to be distinguished from private and public). By describing the planned research activities the authors aim to stimulate a critical reflection and debate on the social relevance of scientific commons and the opportunities for inclusive technology development that appear to be emerging due to the changes in knowledge production and property regimes

Articulating alternatives: Biotechnology and genomics development within crititcal constructivist framework

This paper explores critical and constructivist theories of technology, and discusses the political and ideological nature of (bio)technology development. The importance of a conceptualization of technologies as value-laden `socio-technical ensembles¿ is discussed, rather than as value-neutral objects, or tools. These conceptualizations are then used to sketch a continuum of development approaches which extends from their relation to a `transfer of technology approach¿, to an `endogenous technology development approach¿. This continuum inspires a rethinking of the possibilities to reconstruct biotechnologies and to tailor them to processes of endogenous development. In doing so, the value of participatory methodologies in coming to a contextualized biotechnology development is re-evaluated

Sustainable organic plant breeding: Final report - a vision, choices, consequences and steps

In general, the characteristics of organic varieties - and by extension of organic plant breeding - differ from that of conventional breeding systems and conventional varieties. Realising an organic plant breeding system and subsequently steering it to meet changing demands is no less than a mammoth task. The many actions to be undertaken can be divided into short-term commercial and scientific activities, and longer or long-term commercial and scientific activities. Action must be taken in the short-term to ensure adequate quantities of organically propagated plants and seed. This is vital in consideration of Regulation 2092/91/EC which states that, as of 1 January 2000, all propagating material used in organic production must be of organic origin. Additional measures are needed to accelerate the development of organically propagated varieties. Within the breeding sector, variety groups should be established to streamline communication in the chain. Variety groups should have a large contingent of farmers, as well as representatives from the trade branch and breeders. Members should communicate intensively with each other, share experiences, and participate in trials and variety assessments. Questions, wishes and bottlenecks could be recorded by variety groups and passed on to other parties in the chain. The practical details of the plant health concept which is at the basis of organic breeding must be worked out (operationalised). This will require scientific research, for example on: root development and mineral absorption efficiency weed suppressive capacity in situ versus ex situ maintenance resistance breeding in combination with cultivation measures seed-transmitted diseases adaptive capacity alternatives for growth stimulants, silver nitrate and silver thiosulfate in the cultivation of cucumbers and pickles Such research should be carried out by academic institutions (such as Wageningen University and Research Centre) in collaboration with Louis Bolk Institute, Stichting Zaadgoed and private companies. A platform should be established to make an inventory of problems and priorities and to develop research proposals. Farmers could contribute their ideas to the platform through the variety groups. Conclusion A plant breeding system for organic production should be based on the organic concept of plant health and on the organic position on chain relationships. As the total land area under organic production is still relatively small, it is unlikely that commercial breeders will make large investments to develop organic breeding programmes without financial support from other parties, i.e. the government. In this early stage, it is vital that the government provides generous funding and plays an active enabling role. We hope that the action plan to stimulate organic plant breeding, as requested by Parliament, will dovetail with the activities described above

Analysis of the peasants’ livelihood strategies in the Paute basin of Ecuador

The article analyses the livelihood of peasant farmers in the rural area of three parishes in the Paute basin in Ecuador. First, the article presents the gathered empirical data of the study sites, respectively the Pichacay in the Santa Ana parish, Caldera in the Javier Loyola parish, and Llavircay in the Rivera parish. Applying the Chayanovian and van der Ploeg interpretation frames, three types of peasant households could be distinguished, based upon their specific organizational forms of producing and reproducing their livelihoods. The article concludes that a more in-depth analysis is needed in the peasant’s art of farming, particularly in their core balance of being conditioned by and linked to as well as resistant to the capitalist economy.El artículo analiza la forma de sustento de los campesinos en el área rural de tres parroquias de la cuenca del Paute en Ecuador. En primer lugar, el artículo presenta los datos empíricos recopilados de los sitios de estudio, respectivamente Pichacay en la parroquia Santa Ana, Caldera en la parroquia Javier Loyola y Llavircay en la parroquia Rivera. Aplicando el marco de interpretación de Chayanov y van der Ploeg, se podrían distinguir tres tipos de hogares campesinos, basados en sus formas organizativas específicas de producir y reproducir sus medios de vida. El artículo concluye que es necesario un análisis más profundo del arte campesino de la agricultura, particularmente en su balance central de estar condicionado y vinculado y resistir a la economía capitalista