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Convergence of Sciences, a key to agricultural innovation in West Africa

West African smallholder farmers command vast land and other resources. They are dynamic and innovative and could, if given opportunity, easily and sustainably double or treble their production. The Convergence of Sciences programme wants to improve the livelihoods of these farmers by exploring new pathways for agricultural innovation. It tries to ensure that agricultural research is designed to experiment with specific opportunities, conditions that suit the needs of these farmers. The programme tries to achieve convergence between farmers and scientists and between natural and social scientists. The program consists of two phases:

During the first phase (COS; 2001-2006) entitled "Convergence of Sciences: Inclusive Technology Innovation Processes for Better Integrated Crop and Soil Management (2001-2006) nine PhD students conducted participatory technology development experiments in Benin and Ghana with farmers on integrated pest and weed management, soil quality and crop diversity. The lessons learned were that development is constrained by institutional issues such as labour arrangements, land tenure issues, exploitive networks, cheating, and deficient contractual arrangements. read more on COS-1

During the second phase (COS-SIS; 2008-2013) entitled "Convergence of Sciences: Strengthening agricultural innovation systems in Benin, Ghana and Mali" experiments will be carried out to elaborate, apply and assess an innovation system approach to sustainable rural poverty alleviation and food security. This approach implies concerted action among relevant actors (farmers, researchers, communities, companies, policy makers etc.) to realise an opportunity, such as better access to remunerative markets, inputs, knowledge and credit, more value-added activities, security of tenure, better organization for exerting political influence, post-harvest activities to allow small farmers to jointly supply supermarkets, and effective political support to combat cheap imports.

The relationship between institutional and technological development is an explicit research concern for COS-SIS. It is a tremendous challenge to the programme to adapt and develop a methodological and theoretical approach to combine technological understanding with the creation of institutional space for change. read more on COS-SIS