The role of learning in farmer-led innovation

CONTEXT: Farmer-led innovation brings farmers together with other stakeholders in a collaborative endeavour that recognises multiple forms of expertise. Critical engagement with mainstream models of agricultural science and technology (AST) development has drawn attention to the isolation of farmers as technology adopters within a compartmentalised model of AST development and dissemination. Academic, government and non-governmental actors and organisations are increasingly supporting facilitated processes in which farmers, scientists and engineers develop new knowledge, learning together about the nature of the problems being faced and the potential of different solution pathways. OBJECTIVE: Despite the centrality of learning to farmer-led innovation, its role has yet to be systematically explored. In response, this paper looks to understand the forms of learning and their contribution to farmer-led innovation during a three-year action-research project involving two groups of farmers from northern England and the Scottish Borders in the UK. METHODS: A researcher-facilitator convened a structured process of twenty meetings that together created opportunities for interaction, deliberation and re-framing of problems and solutions among groups of farmers, a university-based engineer, and wider stakeholders. Multiple qualitative methods were used to build understanding of the different farming contexts and to explore the issues the farmers wanted to work on. Meeting transcripts and fieldnotes were subject to thematic analysis, informed by the analytical framework of cognitive, normative and relational learning derived from the social learning literature. RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS: Cognitive, normative and relational learning were found to be mutually interdependent and equally significant, building iteratively rather than linearly: the farmers and engineer assessed new information and reappraised existing situations; they did so informed by and informing a shift in understanding of their goals for new technology; and in so doing they relied on and developed the trust and confidence needed to acknowledge or challenge each other's perspectives. By orientating the group engagement process around the space to explore and challenge histories and contexts of AST, and by drawing on social learning principles to facilitate interaction between the different expertise of farmers and between farmers and engineers, learning emerged that interleaved technology co-design with incremental refinement of the shared norms and values embedded in the process itself. SIGNIFICANCE: A focus on learning helps deepen understanding of key mechanisms and processes that define and deliver innovation, and the findings suggest that priorities for farmer-led innovation process design should focus on modalities that open up spaces to negotiate both the purpose and products of innovation

Innovating in context: social learning and agricultural innovation

Recognition of the complexity of challenges rooted in human-environment interactions has led to increased interest in methods that enable diverse stakeholders, from within and beyond the scientific establishment, to work together. Increasingly, agricultural innovation is understood in these terms, with calls for group learning processes that bring science and engineering stakeholders into contact with farmers and farmer knowledge. This perspective relates closely to social learning (SL) as a theory and approach in which cycles of knowledge sharing and joint action lead to the co-creation of knowledge, new or changed relationships, and changes in practice. While SL theory has been widely considered in literature concerned with natural resource management, the body of papers that link SL and agricultural innovation is surprisingly sparse. The papers included in the literature search presented here, identify a number of potential drivers and barriers to agricultural innovation emerging from SL processes. In particular, we identify the significance of: issue framing and agreement between actors about the role of the innovation; skills and capacity to do with learning as well as the use of the technologies; compatibility between existing practices and innovations; trust in innovations and other actors; and the facilitation of the process. Our paper shows there is a fundamental significance of SL to agricultural innovation, which can be operationalized by framing agricultural innovation as changes in understanding, practices and relationships. The use of SL as a design framework supports the emergence of agricultural innovations that bring equitable benefits, are sustainable and are innovated in context

Health and wellbeing in cities : Cultural contributions from urban form in the Global South context

Publisher Copyright: © 2021Urban public spaces, both natural and built, contribute to the liveability of urban spaces. Evidence shows that natural urban spaces can improve both physical and psychological wellbeing through providing cultural ecosystem services (CES), but there is a lack of evidence from Low and Middle Income Countries (LMIC). Recognising the pressures that public spaces are under in rapidly changing cities of the Global South, it is critical that research is done to strengthen the argument to maintain the availability and accessibility of these assets. This is particularly the case in secondary cities where pressures to redevelop are high due to rapidly growing populations, whilst governance and planning systems typically prioritise growth. This paper presents participatory geographic information system survey findings for two contrasting LMIC secondary cities (Nakuru, Kenya, and Udon Thani, Thailand). We explore the interlinkages between urban public spaces, CES, and residents’ wellbeing. Our findings show that both natural and built areas in these two very different ecosystems are important for promoting wellbeing. Key factors that enabled or prevented the use of public spaces were convenience: proximity, affordability, and usability. The results also highlight the effects of the inequitable distribution of inviting public realm spaces across the cities and consider the impacts on spatial justice. These findings strengthen the need to promote wellbeing considerations through urban planning in rapidly changing cities to ensure their future liveability.Peer reviewe

Transforming urban planning processes and outcomes through creative methods

Inclusively delivering the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) remains challenging, particularly in urban areas, where some of the most pressing concerns exist. To achieve the transformative SDGs agenda, new methods are required to overcome current deficits in engagement around inclusion and equitable outcomes. Evaluating against theories of governance and inclusion, we test a mixture of digital and physical creative methods abilities to deliver co-designed solutions that influence mobility and road safety planning outcomes in East African cities. Greater inclusion led to improved interactions of citizens with decision-makers, and the identification of novel, practical solutions, delivering some elements of transformation. Risks include creative methods being used to co-opt communities to official agendas, and institutional planning norms needing to adapt to respond to a wider range of stakeholders. Overall, where risks are mitigated, we recommend that using Creative Methods could localise SDG delivery, ensuring more equitable and effective outcomes from infrastructure development investments

Systemic design in food security and resilience: Building a holon

The situation of concern in this paper is that of Food Security. In a previous paper [Darzentas et al., 2017], the I KNOW FOOD (IKF) project and its com- position and objectives were introduced. As its name suggests, an overall aim is to integrate knowledge about food systems. Also, the project examinesthese systems in the light of food system resilience. The project defines foodsystem resilience as “the ability to learn, adapt and transform to cope with external and internal stresses and shocks in order to maintain stable levels of nutritious food supply”1. The word ‘systems’ is used in food studies very frequently, as the food re- search literature recognises the interconnectivity of various elements andtalks about “the food system”, but it is easier to find research that deals withparts of systems independently. This has been changing, with more rese-archers trying to find ways to study food systems more holistically. Suchresearch (Ericksen, 2008; Bland and Bell, 2017; Horton, 2017) on food secu- rity is working to draw in sources of multiple interactions, to identify key processes, drivers, multiple feedbacks and outcomes. This then leads to some thought-provoking perspectives on how components are interlinked and could potentially lead to “actionable improvements”. This wider, more holi- stic, agenda for food security research may include many different factorsnot apparently directly influencing food security, such as over-consump- tion of ‘bad’ food and obesity, to be studied along with more traditional foci such as increasing food production and improving food value chains. The IKF project belongs to this newer tradition of taking a wider, more holistic, perspective, and has a main objective to integrate many different types of knowledge about food. Our approach is grounded in Systems Thinking and Design to capture, learn about and develop deep and shared understandings of the problem space of Food Security. Such understandings are necessary to move towards appro- priate and robust design interventions. An initial step in this approach is to build a holon (Darzentas et al., 2017). We adopt the meaning of the Greek word ‘ὅλον’ which means ‘whole’ or ‘everything’, in relation to the problem space. The holon is not a systemic view of a complex problem, in our case that of food security. It consists of emerging stakeholders’ issues with the components and links considered relevant. To build a holon, design methods such as those informed by ethnographic as well as participatory activitiescan be used. In this process, a holon may be refined many times, as the lear- ning and understandings deepen. The holon when ‘translated’ into a syste- mic language makes use of known tenets and principles of systems thinking. In this way, notions such as resilience can be examined using the Holon to situate them in the problem space. IKF proposes the use of the lens of resilience to examine food security. Resi- lience has been conceptualised in at least three ways; as absorbing shocks, as preventing shocks, or as adapting to shocks whether in socio-ecological sy- stems (Béné et al., 2016) or socio-technical systems (Taysom and Crilly, 2017), and in some cases more than one of these forms of resilience are apparent.For instance, an aid agency may provide first aid to help absorb the shockfrom an emergency, but also try to put in place preventive measures to resist unwanted changes, or even a development project to transform the current food production/consumption processes so that they are not vulnerable in the future to the type of shock caused by the emergency. Furthermore, de- spite the pervasiveness of the term resilience, it is generally considered, in current discourse, as a ‘good thing’. But resistance to change can mean that undesirable states of systems remain (e.g. resistance to changing known ‘bad’ dietary habits). Finally, there is the problem to understand what impacts creating resilience in one part of the system may have on other parts of a system. This paper presents ongoing work initially bringing researchers togetherinto a shared space to develop understandings of the IKF objectives. A first step was to move from the ‘given’ system definitions (e.g. ‘supply chain sy-stem’, ‘healthcare system’, as well as ‘stock’ definitions of actors and roles (e.g.farmer produces food) to develop fresh understandings and reveal emergent properties. Although these researchers are just one group amongst the sta- keholders engaged in IKF project, they are each working in partnership with the main groups of stakeholders. For example, researchers working with food producers meet with farmers’ groups whose motivation is exchange of information between themselves, and the researchers engage in social lear- ning to immerse themselves in their world. In doing so, they bring a richer understanding of the motivations and values, the limitations and outside constraints that come into play in the farmers’ spheres of activity. Bringing these richer understandings to the building of a holon allows for differen- tiated emphases from the more commonly accepted ‘food systems’ actors allowing possible re-orientations. Already, some very promising preliminary observations emerged that de- monstrate the usefulness of the systemic design approach, for the groun- ding of resilience in the project: • A description of the situation of concern elaborated during the workshopsshows interesting differentiations when contrasted with the official defini- tion of Food Insecurity from the Food Alliance Organisation. Their careful-ly crafted definition, which is periodically reviewed, states that Food Secu- rity is: “A situation that exists when all people, at all times, have physical, socialand economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food that meetstheir dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life (FAO-2001)” In contrast, the workshop elaboration paid attention to human self-suffi- ciency, introducing the concepts of means, agency and knowledge as ne- cessary to access food, in contrast to the ‘physical social and economic’ ofthe official definition. It qualifies food as being ethical, as well as nutritious, and affordable, and finally, they introduced the notions of care for the envi- ronment as well as the cultural acceptability of food, that do not exist in theFAO definition. Their final elaboration was: “Enabling people to have the means, agency and knowledge to access ethical, adequate, nutritious, affordable, culturally and environmentally acceptable food” • Acknowledgement of the influential role played by the stakeholder grouptermed ‘communicators’. This group includes people such as food journalists. Although the academic world recognises the importance of communicators, with whole journals dedicated to research, (e.g. the Journal of Environmen- tal Communication), within the food security literature they do not seem to feature as a stakeholder group. Yet, evidence of their activity abounds,whether it is exerting influence on consumers via advertising; or their keyrole in informing and educating consumers about safe and nutritious foodpractices; or as conduits to filter and popularise scientific results to consu- mers with practical recommendations regarding dietary information. Of course, as everywhere, the role of information and communication as apowerful and influential tool is well recognised, but when dispersed intomakers and writers of documentaries, newspaper articles, and commissio- ned reports, they are not easily recognisable as stakeholder group. • The importance of the 3rd Sector: those with ‘on-the-ground’ knowledge, are those who can be said to be actively engaged in implementing resilience(whether trying to absorb shocks carrying out first aid in emergencies, orwhether engaged, perhaps after a disaster, in trying to build resistance or to transform). • The nature of the potential of stakeholders. Notwithstanding the many inequalities that are present, each stakeholder appears to have some mecha-nisms, to influence, affect, change, or even disrupt flows of material and of information within the holon. Further refinement may help to understandthe nature of this potential. The richness of a holon such as the one in Figure 1 offers an opportunity to identify some of the effects that an external stress/shock, for instance, mi- ght have within the captured holon. This may also then allow for some use- ful speculation on the type of resilience required to face up to those stresses. Of course, it must be said again that any capturing and understanding of theproblem space is evolving iteratively, so that the holon may be refined againand again. By stressing or ‘prodding’ the system, it is possible to see where the potential ‘shockwaves’ hit. For example, in Figure 2 above, the awareness campaign aimed at consumers, may also affect others, such as retailers, and this may have a knock-on effect to the link between retailers and producers. The ho- lons allow for creating understandings of what types of resilience are needed by the various stakeholders both to resist being affected by the shockwaves, or to have mechanisms in place to adapt to the shockwave. Identifying such pathways allows for understanding the possible forms that resilience, if required, could take. Translating into systems language provi- des a platform to move towards creating interventions where tried and te- sted design methods can be used. Again, it is emphasised that a very impor-tant benefit of the systemic design approach is that, because of the way the‘paths’ to emerging subsystems are generated, the stakeholders involved in each one of those, can ‘meet’ again, when necessary, back at the ‘system’ (or translated holon), or even at the holon itself. That may be necessary because of the iterative nature of the evolving understanding and learning, as well as the dynamic nature of systems’ characteristics such as borders and envi- ronment which change continuously. Thus, the holon offers stakeholders and designers a common platform of re-ference when needed to clarify and redefine evolving issues. Our work hasshown that building a holon can be an important part of the process to reachnot only deeper understandings of the problem space, but also to refine tho- se understandings, to be able to illuminate them with the lens of systemic design, and to speculate on what design interventions towards what kinds of resilience within the system can be designed so as to minimise disrup- tions, and improve the nature of esistance where required

Water security in times of climate change and intractability : Reconciling conflict by transforming security concerns into equity concerns

This paper considers how to achieve equitable water governance and the flow-on effects it has in terms of supporting sustainable development, drawing on case studies from the international climate change adaptation and governance project (CADWAGO). Water governance, like many other global issues, is becoming increasingly intractable (wicked) with climate change and is, by the international community, being linked to instances of threats to human security, thewar in the Sudanese Darfur and more recently the acts of terrorism perpetuated by ISIS. In this paper, we ask the question: how can situations characterized by water controversy (exacerbated by the uncertainties posed by climate change) be reconciled? The main argument is based on a critique of the way the water security discourse appropriates expert (normal) claims about human-biophysical relationships. When water challenges become increasingly securitized by the climate change discourse it becomes permissible to enact processes that legitimately transgress normative positions through post-normal actions. In contrast, the water equity discourse offers an alternative reading of wicked and post-normal water governance situations. We contend that by infusing norm critical considerations into the process of securitization, new sub-national constellations of agents will be empowered to enact changes; thereby bypassing vicious cycles of power brokering that characterize contemporary processes intended to address controversies

Global Water Governance and Climate Change: Identifying Innovative Arrangements for Adaptive Transformation

A convoluted network of different water governance systems exists around the world. Collectively, these systems provide insight into how to build sustainable regimes of water use and management. We argue that the challenge is not tomake the systemless convoluted, but rather to support positive and promising trends in governance, creating a vision for future environmental outcomes. In this paper, we analyse nine water case studies from around the world to help identify potential ‘innovative arrangements’ for addressing existing dilemmas. We argue that such arrangements can be used as a catalyst for crafting new global water governance futures. The nine case studies were selected for their diversity in terms of location, scale and water dilemma, and through an examination of their contexts, structures and processes we identify key themes to consider in the milieu of adaptive transformation. These themes include the importance of acknowledging socio-ecological entanglements, understanding the political dimensions of environmental dilemmas, the recognition of different constructions of the dillema, and the importance of democratized processes.The research for this paper is a part of the “CADWAGO: Climate change adaptation and water governance—reconciling food security, renewable energy and the provision of multiple ecosystem services” project funded as part of the “Europe and Global Challenges programme” by Compagnia di San Paolo, VolkswagenStiftung and Riksbankens Jubileumsfond.https://www.mdpi.com/2073-4441/10/1/2

Learning for Transformation of Water Governance: Reflections on Design from the Climate Change Adaptation and Water Governance (CADWAGO) Project

This paper considers how learning for transformation of water governance in the context of climate change adaptation can be designed for and supported, drawing examples from the international climate change adaptation and water governance project (CADWAGO). The project explicitly set out to design for governance learning in the sense of developing elements of social infrastructure such as workshops, performances and online media to bring stakeholders together and to facilitate co-learning of relevance to governance. CADWAGO drew on a variety of international cases from past and ongoing work of the project partners. It created a forum for dialogue among actors from different contexts working at different levels and scales. The range of opportunities and constraints encountered are discussed, including the principles and practicalities of working with distributed processes of design and leadership of events. A range of concepts, tools and techniques were used to consider and facilitate individual and collective learning processes and outcomes associated with water governance in the context of climate adaptation. Questions were addressed about how elements of past, present and future water governance thinking and practice are connected and how multi-level systemic change in governance can take place. Some reflections onthe effectiveness of the design for learning process are included. The nature of the contribution that projects such as CADWAGO can make in learning for transformation of water governance practices is also critically considered

Promoting the transfer of pro-environmental behaviours between home and workplaces

Promoting individual lifestyle changes towards pro-environmental behaviours (PEBs) has been one of the key strategies for tackling the climate crisis adopted by governments. Messaging to promote PEBs has been used in different contexts – most notably home and workplace settings; however, the message phrasing, opportunities, and motivations for adopting these behaviours can differ between locations. In this study, from a sample of working people, we investigate the sources and themes of PEB messages they remember. We then classify these based on their underlying motivations (egoistic, altruistic or biospheric). We compare these messaging prompts to those PEBs actually tried by participants and the factors leading to their successful or failed adoptions related to institutional or societal norms. Finally we explore what motivates and supports the transfer of adopted contextual PEBs between home and work. Our results highlight that messaging triggering a diversity of motivations may lead to the greatest adoption rates. For transfer of actions to be successful between contexts, both infrastructure and behavioural norms need to receive support for PEB changes to become habitual and ubiquitous

Attending to nature: understanding care and caring relations in forest management in the UK

Increasing threats from pests and diseases fundamentally question what forest management is and must do in the 21st century. The sociological concept of ‘care’ offers new understandings of forest management as intimate and emotional relationships between people and trees. In this paper, we examine the empirical realities of conservation forest management at a UK publicly owned site to reveal the social, economic, and institutional contexts of care and caring relations and their role in management decisions. This in-depth qualitative case study uses walking interviews with staff from all levels of the organisation and participatory data testing to show how care underpins the work of forest management, that forests are made and sustained through caring practices, and that management decisions are influenced by caring relations. Through the care framework we highlight the complexities of real-life decision-making and offer implications for forestry policy and practice. Applying the well-established components of care in a new setting, wherein the caring relations involve nonhumans, we extend care theory and demonstrate the potential of the single case study for deeply contextual forest and conservation research