Adoption, Diffusion, and Scaling of Agricultural Technologies in Developing Countries

Abstract

Many organizations struggle to develop plans to achieve levels of scaling for agricultural technologies that demonstrate population-level impacts in developing countries. Scaling is a complex process, involving many disparate actors. There is no consensus model to follow; different models are needed at different stages. Practice for sound development activity planning generally involves analysis of feasibility in key areas, such as economic, financial, environmental, social, institutional, and technical. Attention to these should guarantee suitable, scalable, and sustainable technologies. This paper provides an introduction to the topics of the adoption, diffusion and scaling, with examples from agriculture.

Relevant methods from the literature are reviewed to provide the reader with a general understanding of scaling and their application. Roger’s model of the adoption and diffusion of technologies is presented and explained in context of agriculture in the developing world. Diffusion is a social process, and five qualities are necessary for an innovation to spread. The way to engage the five groups of adopters – innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority and laggards – in the adoption process are discussed. Peer to peer communication is critical in the spread of an innovation. A model of scaling up and a set of key questions to frame an organization’s scaling activities are critical to successful diffusion. Public-private partnerships are required for a technology or intervention to cross the “valley of death” between public funding of the research phase and private support of the market phase so it will be sustainable. The spread of orange flesh sweet potato, tractors and cows for power, and axial flow pumps for irrigation demonstrate how the diffusion model applies to actual products. Organizations must be open to innovation and change for scaling to succeed. As a result, they must involve different types of partners with knowledge of the social contexts and the types of adopters of the stages of scaling. The Asian Green Revolution is an example of the complexity of the process of the diffusion of multiple technologies required for success of this world-changing event. Government funding was critical in supporting the research that developed the agricultural technologies. An enabling economic environment consisting of incentives, policies, and subsidies, as well as land tenure reform, was necessary so that farmers and the private sector would participate in and drive the spread of the technologies and make the revolution succeed. This investment and support must be sustained in the long term, as the spread of technologies can take a decade or more, as did the Asian Green Revolution, which one can argue is still occurring. Agriculture revolutions must be pro-poor and environmentally sustainable or else they will fail in the long term.