Book of Abstract (incl. addendum) - IFSA symposium 2012

Workshop 2.3 Systems thinking and practice in rural innovation: advances in concept,
methodologies and interventions
Re-orienting rural innovation
Paul Swagemakers, Ton Baars and Han Wiskerke
University Vigo, Spain
Paul.Swagemakers@uvigo.es
The modernization of agriculture is resulting in an increasing disconnection between farming, nature
and society, creating a series of social, economic and ecological crises in the food chain. Rural
innovation starts where innovative practitioners successfully adapt their farm in a step-by step
innovation process. From a radical prospect on the role and functioning of the farm it gradually unfolds
as a productive farm that matches changing societal needs. This type of systemic configurations
unfolds in different contexts but shares the common characteristic that the adaptations – conceptualized
as novelties – are guided by a re-orientation towards the local (ecological and socio-economic)
resource base. Promising farm practices can be further strengthened when scientists explore, test and
verify the interrelations between novelties whilst politicians and policy makers pursue an objectives-led
policy (instead of implementing prescriptive measures) that allows for and stimulates the exchange of
novelties between producers and promotes scientific research on promising novelties.
Toward a reflexive framework to compare collective design methods for
farming system innovation
Elsa Berthet, Julie Labatut and Nathalie Girard
Mines ParisTech, France
Elsa.Berthet@agroparistech.fr
Faced with strong environmental issues, the agricultural sector has to revise deeply its aims and
performance criteria. Theories and methods are urgently needed to foster the design of innovative
farming systems reconciling production with other ecosystem services, while taking into account
heterogeneous stakeholder viewpoints in situations of high uncertainty (Voβ et al, 2006; Leeuwis,
2004).
Numerous methods have been proposed over the past decades to facilitate collective learning for
environmental management (Reed, 2008). Most of them promote problem-solving or scenario-based
approaches to tackle issues such as common goods management, with in particular methods grounded
on Role-Playing Games (Hartig et al., 2010; Vieira Pak & Castillo Brieva, 2010). By integrating
existing knowledge and stakeholders’ perspectives, such simulation approaches have proved to be
efficient in crossing disciplinary boundaries and understanding systems’ complexity. However
scenarios and models are often based on consensus or established knowledge. Considering that the
design of innovative farming systems requires interplay between exploitation of existing knowledge
and exploration of innovative futures (March, 1991), we question the relevance of simulation
approaches to go beyond incremental innovation.
In this paper, we compare participative methods such as the Forage Rummy (Martin et al, 2011)
and the Companion Modelling approach (Etienne, 2011) with a method based on C-K theory (Hatchuel
& Weil, 2009), developed in the industrial sector to manage collective exploration for radical
innovation. As organisers and observers of design workshops using these methods, we analyse for each
of them how existing and induced knowledge is managed and gaps are identified, how conceptual
exploration is conducted, and how relations between participants are taken into account. Finally, we
discuss how these methods could be combined to foster radical innovation in the field of farming
system design.
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