FAO.org

An initiative to scale up and institutionalise farmer driven study groups in Eastern and Southern Africa, with a particular focus on commercialisation and market access

This Market Facilitator’s Guide is a product of the experiences and lessons learned while implementing agroenterprise projects in eastern and southern Africa. The Guide is based on a resource-to-consumption framework, which is the central theme of the “enabling rural innovation” (ERI) approach for rural development. This approach seeks to empower [...]

This paper presents the findings of a short qualitative study. It showed that pilot cowpea Farmer Field Schools (FFS) in Benin were a vital source of new skills and information, integrating a number of existing knowledge sharing networks of rural men and women.

An Integrated Pest Management (IPM) Farmer Field School (FFS) is a field-based activity that lasts a full cropping season. A typical FFS meets once a week and 25-30 farmers participate in an FFS. In addition to group dynamics activity and a special topic session, an FFS emphasizes scientific learning through [...]

This paper describes a case study in small producer system in the Petri-urban areas of Kunming city, Yunnan province on an approach of farmer participatory vegetable community IPM development. The vegetable community IPM development was composted of farmer education, technological development, farmers’ self organization, alliance building and policy supporting. [...]

Este estudio intenta analizar algunas experiencias relevantes de innovación con productores de pequeña escala, destacando eventuales enfoques específicos que busquen la equidad de género.

More than half of the world’s cotton is produced by Asian farmers, the majority of them small landholders with plot sizes of less than one-half hectare. Within Asia, cotton production is diverse and this diversity manifests itself among the countries participating in the FAO-EU Integrated Pest Management (IPM) Programme for [...]

El interés por la implementación de las ECAs en el altiplano boliviano y su ejecución en la cosecha de la papa.

The farmer field school (FFS) is a season long training of farmers involving participatory activities, hands-on analysis and decision making. Because it requires significant investments in time, trainers and other facilities, the approach can be an expensive way of diffusing new science-based knowledge and other information to farmers. However, if [...]