The United Nations Food Systems Summit marked 2021 with a brand-new international policy process pooling resources and efforts towards the sustainability of food systems.
Innovation has been recognized as a lever of change for food systems transformation. Farmers stood in the middle of this process to say loudly that they are crucial agents in this game and embrace innovation in all its forms. Still, too often, farmers are not involved in planning innovation strategies. Too often, they are not even consulted.
At the World Farmers’ Organisation (WFO), representing farmers across the globe, we promote a farmer-driven approach to innovation in agriculture and food systems. We want to make sure that any investment in research and innovation is effective and responds to the farmers’ needs and expectations. It is time to shift from a farmer-responsive to a farmer-driven approach and hear from the farmers what they consider necessary for their activity to innovate.
Towards a farmer-driven approach to innovation
With the aim of ensuring a farmer-driven, science-based and pragmatic approach to innovation for an improved sustainability of farming and food systems, the World Farmers’ Organisation (WFO), the International Seed Federation (ISF) with the technical expertise of the Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants (UPOV) carried out a joint collaborative work to explore the needs, expectations, and constraints of farmers in the New Improved Plant Varieties’ domain.
As a first step, WFO conducted a consultation among our members’ community asking directly to the farmers if they currently use New Improved Plant Varieties in their daily production and no matter the answer to this inquiry, they have been asked which are the constraints they are encountering in accessing that innovation and what they would like to see improved.
The results were then discussed in a technical workshop between farmers, seed producers, breeders, and the Plant Protection sector and a Dialogue among a broader basin of stakeholders, including policymakers, private sector, research and academia.
Farmers’ needs and expectations at the centre
Arianna Giuliodori
The real strength of WFO lies in its member-driven bottom-up approach, which allows the development of balanced and consensual policy papers, first of all, but most importantly allows the organisation to advocate for what farmers really need and expect in those policy and innovation fields that are relevant for their daily work.
That is why we often consult our members on several topics to be sure we reach the last mile and represent the voice of the farmers inclusively.
Seeds is a crucial sector for farmers: farming starts from seeds and soil, and we must ensure that innovation in this field responds to the fast-changing environment in which our producers are meant to work (with a growing world population; with the impacts of climate change etc) and enable farmers to cope up with the pace of these changes.
Read More About Innovation in the Seed Industry:
Seed Speaks: Innovations in Seed Treatments
Independent Activate Ag Labs Launches to Improve Global Access to Seed Coating Innovations
