Abstract
Much like the African tradition of the guest telling his host several times that he must ‘be on his way’ before being allowed to leave, many of us have been saying it is time for us to ‘be on our way’ along the path to innovation; but a question remains: which way forward now? The ISDA symposium was an opportunity for us to address this issue, to get our bearings, before embarking on our journey.
Caminante no hay camino, se hace camino al andar
Antonio Machado
This conclusion is based on the discussions held during the ISDA symposium, in particular during the final roundtable where we gave the floor to several policymakers and civil-society representatives. The authors thus thank the facilitator, Oliver Coomes (McGill University), and the participants of this roundtable: Mohamed AitKadi (General Council of Agricultural Development, Ministry of Agriculture, Morocco), Pascal Bergeret (Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Fisheries, France), Dominique Chardon (Farmer, President of the Association Terroirs & Cultures), Khalid El Harizi (IFAD – International Fund for Agricultural Development), Judith Francis (CTA – Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation), Ann Waters-Bayer (ETC-Prolinnova) and Fabrice Dreyfus (Director of IRC – Institute for Higher Education in Tropical Agri-food Industry and Rural Development).
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- 1.
We use here the terms devised for the industrial innovation processes by: Le Masson P., Weil B. et Hatchuel A. (2008) Les processus d’innovation, conception innovante et croissance des entreprises. Hermès Lavoisier (Paris), 471 p.
- 2.
In transition management theory, “regime” designs a stable state in which the dominant practices, rules and technologies reinforce a particular socio-technical system. “Niche”is an ‘area’ in which particular conditions provide space for radical innovation and experimentation. For further development, refer to: Kemp, R; Loorbach, D and Rotmans, J (2007). “Transition management as a model for managing processes of co-evolution towards sustainable development”. The International Journal of Sustainable Development and World Ecology 14 (1): 78–91.
- 3.
The premises of social learning applied to agriculture were first discussed by Rôling & Wagemakers as a way of dealing with the unpredictability and complexity of making the shift towards an ecological knowledge system: Röling, N., Wagemakers M., 1998. Facilitating Sustainable Agriculture: Participatory Learning and adaptive management in times of environmental uncertainty. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, New York, Melbourne.
- 4.
Although many studies have used these concepts, the forefather is of course : Rogers E.M., 1962. Diffusion of Innovations, New York, Free Press.
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Hubert, B., Coudel, E., Coomes, O.T., Soulard, C.T., Faure, G., Devautour, H. (2013). Conclusion: en route…but which way?. In: Coudel, E., Devautour, H., Soulard, C.T., Faure, G., Hubert, B. (eds) Renewing innovation systems in agriculture and food. Wageningen Academic Publishers, Wageningen. https://doi.org/10.3920/978-90-8686-768-4_12
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3920/978-90-8686-768-4_12
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