Step 3: Describing and characterizing innovative systems This involves describing the practices and the context in which they are implemented, then analyzing how consistent they are with the farmer’s satisfaction criteria. The survey begins with a presentation to the farmer of our objectives, explaining that we propose to shed light on his practices, so that others farmers can take inspiration from them. The very large majority of farmers accept the principle of the study: they consider that the sharing of experience between farmers is not only normal, but desirable. After a rapid collection of general information about the farm, the survey concentrates on the cropping system that has been identified as innovative. Initially, we endeavor to record practices (crop successions, intercrops, varieties, dates of intervention, inputs, equipment used …); we are interested not only in the usual practices, but also in alternatives associated with particular events. Then we ask the farmer about his satisfaction criteria, that is to say the results he expects from the implementation of his practices. We use the producer’s satisfaction criteria to clarify the agronomic logic of the cropping system: which satisfaction criteria explain which practice? According to the farmer, what practices are determining for the satisfaction of a criterion? Step 4: Assessing innovative systems The interest an innovative system will have for other producers depends on its performance: what criteria will this performance be judged on? The scientific literature offers us many sets of indicators exploring the economic, ecological and social dimensions of sustainability. But these sets of indicators generally don’t integrate important producers’ satisfaction criteria. There is a special question on the assessment using farmers’ personal criteria: How to communicate the result of the assessment to other farmers? On the basis of different examples, we show how to create indicators with farmers’ satisfaction criteria. Step 5: Specifying the conditions for the success of innovative systems We call “conditions for success” the agronomic, economic and social conditions, which must be combined for the desired performances to be achieved. Analysis of the conditions for success is essential to use the result of tracking in other farms: what could be remobilized? Where? The analysis of the conditions for success is based on the agronomic logic of the cropping systems and their assessment (previous steps). The expression of the conditions for success can refer to characteristics of the soil or climate, or to characteristics of the farm. It would appear essential to compare the systems of several producers to consolidate the characterization of the conditions for success: Convergence between several producers satisfied with the same innovation is an interesting sign of the robustness of this innovation. Conversely, differences in cropping system for similar satisfaction criteria, or differences in satisfaction for the same cropping system, help to perceive the limits of an innovative system. Conclusion The results of the tracking are of different kinds, and are aimed not only at the farmers, but at their advisors and researchers too: (i) Innovative and effective cropping systems, which can be a source of inspiration for farmers; (ii) Confirmation of the interest of a principle for reasoning cropping systems; (iii) Innovative practices, analyzed within a systemic framework, which can serve as bricks for the design of new systems; (iv) Questions to be looked into more thoroughly by experimentation Compared to traditional approaches in agronomy, tracking innovative cropping systems provides a double break:
(i) (ii)
break with a top-down approach, where agricultural R & D is regarded as the only source of innovation: by mobilizing the innovative capacities of farmers, tracking increases our collective capacity to invent new practices or new cropping systems, by using not only technical and scientific knowledge, but also the empirical knowledge, that is so rich in agriculture; break with the primacy given to experimentation, as a source for the production of knowledge and the assessment of innovations.
Some references Feike T, Chen Q, Graeff-Hönninger S, Pfenning J, Claupein W (2010) Farmer-developed vegetable intercropping systems in southern Hebei, China. Renewable Agric Food Syst 25:272–280. Petit MS, Reau R, Dumas M, Moraine M, Omon B, Josse S (2012) Mise au point de systèmes de culture innovants par un réseau d’agriculteurs et production de ressources pour le conseil. Innovations Agronomiques 20 : 79–100 http:// www6.inra.fr/ciag/ Revue/Volumes-publies-en-2012/Volume-20-Juillet-2012 Salembier C., Elverdin JH., Meynard JM. 2015. Tracking on-farm innovations to unearth alternatives to the dominant soybean-based system in the Argentinean Pampa. Agron. Sust. Dev. DOI 10.1007/s13593-015-0343-9
3