Agri-Food Business, Resilience and Transformation

25/01/2022

Highly recommended and fully online Food Sustainability summer school at Università di Parma (3rd edition) for university students at multiple levels and junior professionals worldwide. Applications open here until February 11th:

13/12/2021

New brief: "Farmer Business Schools (FBS) in local communities: How do they stimulate farmers’ learning and social capital?"

Recently FBS trainings have been recognised as a promising way to bridge farmers', community leaders', local trainers', food technology owners' and value chain actors' capacities in rural landscapes. We investigated just one community case in the rural Philippines to understand how business and social processes unfold just 10 months after the end of FBS trainings.

The figure here below provides a 'hopefully digestible' synthesis of what we learned. We articulate three points of reflections on: 1) narratives of entrepreneurial “success”; 2) FBS participant selection and grouping criteria; and 3) establishing early rules on community-business group relationships. These points should matter to: staff and community leaders implementing FBS trainings & facilitation; local authorities, policy advisors and non-governmental organisations designing FBS; and fellow academics studying them.

Download the full-text brief here: https://lnkd.in/d_RndVAF

This is an output of our ELIA (Entrepreneurial Learning in Inclusive Agribusiness) project, funded by NWO - Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek WOTRO. Much credit to our respondents participating to the FBS, to TAKA People's Organization and to the BFAR and Fishcoral staff for their participation and support; and to co-authors Arjen Brak (Wageningen University & Research), who engaged with the community and spent several months reflecting on these empirical insights, and Diego Naziri (International Potato Center), who connected us to the local community and the FBS trainers and facilitators, and gave us a historical perspective over the history and development of FBS approaches in CGIAR Roots, Tubers and Bananas (CGIAR) and beyond.

06/12/2021

Pour trouver des solutions collectives aux enjeux climatiques, Dr Domenico Dentoni et Dr Helen Etchanchu, les deux co-titulaires de la Chaire COAST, multiplient les ateliers pour former les étudiants, les chercheurs et les acteurs de l’économie à la cartographie des systèmes et ainsi identifie...

19/10/2021

13 new full-time, multiple-rank academic positions just opened at Montpellier Business School! In particular, two positions are dedicated to scholars interested in social entrepreneurship, social innovation, social inclusion, sustainability and innovation ecosystems. Please share wide through your networks. Details of application are here: https://extranet.montpellier-bs.com/MBSCandidature/JobsListe.aspx?cat=ACAPOS

19/10/2021

"Partnering for Resilience & Transformation"
8th Cross-Sector Social Interactions (CSSI2022) Symposium | Call for Research and/or Practice contributions!
Online and at Wageningen University & Research, June 22-24, 2022.
More than 15 thematic tracks to engage with!
Check out the full call here:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/355379144_8th_Cross-Sector_Social_Interactions_CSSI2022_Symposium_Call_for_Papers_on_Partnering_for_Resilience_and_Transformation?fbclid=IwAR3boRXQImb4ng4dsAuZ5QZ-TgLlBlbjZ42eG0uG4hQ3dk33HTfkeHDKEbg

13/09/2021

First PhD paper out by Robert Ochago from his experience & rich data in Uganda: how coffee farmers experientially (& socially) learn to deal with market and socio-ecological challenges through participation in local Innovation Platforms? The starting point of this study is that we know *very* little about how farmers learn & adapt to market & socio-ecological challenges. Describing and theorising this process of learning helps to better tailor local & regional training farmers' schools and training programs. Feedback, suggestions & ideas welcome!

12/05/2021

If you plan to attend for the Academy of Management 2021 online conference, please join us at the following Professional Development Workshop titled "Changing Socio-Ecological Systems at the Theory-Practice Nexus": https://www.researchgate.net/publication/351513555_Open_invitation_to_the_Academy_of_Management_AoM_Professional_Development_Workshop_PDW_Changing_Socio-Ecological_Systems_at_the_Theory-Practice_Nexus

07/05/2021

Open access! Value chain partnerships and farmer entrepreneurship as balancing socio-ecological trade-offs: Implications for agri-food systems resilience; led by Timothy Manyise.

The paper’s 5 points in a nutshell:
1. Food systems resilience requires balancing socio-economic and ecological trade-offs.
2. Smallholder farmer entrepreneurship supports the balancing of these trade-offs.
3. Farmer entrepreneurship entails innovatively redeploying resources in/around farms.
4. Value chain partnership organization shapes smallholder farmer entrepreneurship.
5. Policy incentives can shape value chain partnerships toward food systems resilience.

This paper stems from and , funded by NWO (Dutch Scientific Organization)/WOTRO (Science for Global Development) and CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security and with support by Food & Business Knowledge Platform - F&BKP.

Both in the European Union (EU) and worldwide, the resilience of agri-food systems depends on the human ability to balance between socio-economic and …

15/04/2021

New paper just accepted with title "Does Farmers’ Trust towards Buyers drive their Entrepreneurial Orientation? Evidence from the Albanian dairy sector" with colleagues and friends Orjon Xhoxhi, Drini Imami and Engjell Skreli at Agricultural University of Tirana and Olta Sokoli at University of Hohenheim:

Request PDF | Does Farmers’ Trust towards Buyers drive their Entrepreneurial Orientation? Evidence from the Albanian dairy sector | In contexts of transition economies generally characterized by weak formal institutions, a rich literature remarks the important role of informal... | Find, read and ...

14/04/2021

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/systemic-change-workshops-farmers-stakeholders-malawi-dentoni/?trackingId=%2FiXFpeKvQNuURW7syPjaHQ%3D%3D

Published: April 14, 2021. We performed six systemic change workshops with 150 dairy and seed farmers and their stakeholders in Malawi and Zimbabwe. These workshops supported the representatives of 13,900 smallholders to collectively make sense of their systemic issues, including climate change adap...