These are the key takeaways from the webinar. Do you agree with them? Would you like to add your own and you views ont he matter? Click on the links below and take part to the discussion.
Project structure and scaling strategies
The structure of agricultural innovation projects needs to be designed and have the capacity to adjust to constraints (time and resources) to maximize their performance and outcomes, this requires functional skillsets to ensure adaptability and embeddedness.
Time and resources constraints – inherent to project – limit the possibility of reaching massive enough tipping points. These may include policy changes which often take time.
Given these constraints, and with a view to maximize effects and possibly go to scale, projects develop strategies that seek to involve various stakeholders through different approaches or setups (Innovation Platforms, training, discussion, and dialogue (including policy)) to ensure optimal contribution to longer term innovation trajectories.
Scaling strategies often combine scaling up and out and build on partnerships with various players. They include and sometimes blend :
- Scaling innovations in value chains through professional bodies and public-private partnerships;
- Scaling farming technologies through the public research-extension system;
- Scaling through a disruptive Coalition of Actors;
- Scaling through end-users (consumers).
Key drivers for scaling
Dissemination of information and knowledge allows for communities outside the project – and sometimes even in other countries – to understand what the innovations are and express their interests in replicating them or pushing them forward, thus providing opportunities for scaling out.
The commercial potential of innovations, and the availability of business networks to ensure market access is a strong vector of scaling.
Public organizations can support these networks to reinforce their capacities (including functional), to provide information and help then apprehend the results of Research. By doing so, not only do these public organizations act as translators or science results to businesspeople but they also contribute to building a conducive business environment.
Governments are a key partner for scaling. This is particularly the case when action and results, stemming from implementing Research Action in DeSIRA projects, feed into agendas endorsed by governments, to meet their national or international commitments to addressing grand challenges such as Climate Change, the SDGs or the UN Food Systems Summit.
As a direct example, policy makers have an enforcement effect on some transformative changes by setting by laws or adopting outcomes as standards.
Donors have a similar effect. Their design and allocation of resources to initiatives such as DeSIRA asserts their own commitments to these broader challenges and agendas and legitimizes projects and outcomes.
The recordings and presentations of the Webinar are available on the dedicated page.
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