Local Innovation

It refers to the dynamics of indigenous knowledge, which is the knowledge that grows within a social group, incorporating learning from own experience over generations but also knowledge that was gained at some time from other sources but has been completely internalised within the local ways of thinking and doing. Local innovation is the process through which individuals or groups discover or develop new and better ways of managing resources, building on and expanding the boundaries of their indigenous knowledge.

The innovations may be not only in the technical but also in the socio-institutional sphere. Especially in drier areas where livelihood systems are highly vulnerable to climatic risks, successful local innovations often involve new ways of gaining access to or regulating use of the natural resources, new ways of community organisation, or new ways of stakeholder interaction.

Local innovation through informal experimentation has always been taking place in all parts of the world, but it is only recently that increased attention has been given to identifying and documenting the innovation process and the innovations. It is not sufficient, however, just to record and perhaps even scientifically validate local innovations. In rural development, farmers , development agents and scientists are challenged to move beyond the existing innovations that farmers have been developing with their own resources, on the basis of their own knowledge and creativity. The challenge is to develop these ideas further, in joint experimentation, in ways that integrate also relevant information and ideas coming from outside, including formal research. This means that the agenda for research and development (R&D) grows out of the ways in which rural people are already trying to improve their livelihood systems. Their ideas and motivation drive it.

In the past, mainstream rural development efforts were focused on technical interventions aimed mainly at controlling or manipulating nature through the use of external inputs. In the South, these efforts generally failed to give poor families more secure access to food and to improve their livelihoods. While there were some successes, these were limited to specific agricultural enterprises such as coffee, tea and dairy farming in more humid areas. Most of the introduced technologies were inappropriate for poor farmers and other resource users in marginal, rainfed areas such as the drylands and mountains, which often lack the necessary conditions for the success of such technologies, such as good marketing infrastructure. In such marginal settings, the key ingredients for sustainable resource management are not external inputs but rather labour, knowledge and local management capacities that enable people to manipulate skilfully the local resources. Most rural development efforts have failed to mobilise and enhance these “internal inputs”. The dominant approach to research, extension and education for rural development still follows the pattern of “transfer-of-technology”. This is based on the assumption that knowledge is created by scientists, to be packaged and spread by extension services and to be adopted by local people. It is an approach that effectively squelches local creativity and innovation.

Recently, however, some examples of effective approaches to R&D for sustainable agriculture and NRM in marginal areas have emerged. attempts are made to capitalise on the knowledge, creativity and management capacities of local people and to combine indigenous/ local and external knowledge in joint exploration and experimentation.

The Strategic Plan document for the period 2001-06 had depicted ASE as an inward-looking institution. Accordingly, in the last five years, it was unable either to share its experience with other institutions or to learn from them. That was the reason that ASE’s involvement in networking was indicated as a new strategic direction in the plan document for the period 2001-06. Still, ASE was able to get involved in networking with many organisations. Its shining performance in this regard was, nonetheless, that it was able to play a determinant role in the creation of a national learning and advocacy platform for the promotion of farmers’ innovation in Ethiopia (PROFIEET). PROFIEET definitely is a vibrant network, and has gained recognition as such by all concerned—including donors, the Government and the international community. The networking was spearheaded by ASE’s Head Office staff. As a result, ASE is now acknowledged as an important international actor in the global movement for the promotion of local innovations in ecologically-oriented agriculture and natural resource management (Prolinnova).

Rewarding though ASE’s committed engagement (in terms of time, money, ideas, etc.) in the national and international networks for the promotion of farmers’ innovation has been, there is no denying the fact that much remains to be done at the grassroots level. For one thing, the approach has to be institutionalised; for another, it has to play an exemplary role in the identification, development and promotion of farmers’ innovativeness, besides influencing the policies and practices of woreda- and regional-level government bodies and partner institutions. ASE has, therefore, found it necessary to promote participatory innovation development and thereby empower the communities it is serving, so that they will be able to play a decisive role in the research and development initiatives that could affect their lives and their environment. To that end, it is imperative that ASE exert more effort at the grassroots level, so at to make sure that its success in the networking of the promotion of farmers’ innovativeness is not lopsided.