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Influence of technology adoption on farmers’ well-being: Systematic literature review and bibliometric analysis

Mariani Abdul-Majid, Siti Aisyah Zahari, Norfaizah Othman, Suhaila Nadzri

Publication date: 30/01/2024

This study aimed at determining the effects of technology adoption on farmers’ well-being. Specifically, we analysed and extended the current understanding of the topic by focusing on the concepts of technology adoption and well-being. Most papers indicated that technology adoption improved farmers’ well-being which was basically measured using productivity and income. The measure however lacked farmers’ value judgments, such as happiness. Agricultural technology could have a mixed effect on farmers’ well-being, depending on the type of technology adopted and the compatibility of farmers with technology in their agricultural practices.

Resource type: article: Web Page

FarmingScience & TechnologySustainability

Remote Control and Peasant Intelligence – On Automating Decisions, Suppressing Knowledges and Transforming Ways of Knowing

FIAN International, Friends of the Earth Europe and Coventry University's Centre for Agroecology, Water and Resilience,

Publication date: 14/11/2023

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Digital technologies are often touted as a silver bullet to respond to the interconnected crises of food, climate and biodiversity. Although they are presented by their promoters in governments and corporations as a necessary tool for innovation and for making food systems more efficient and sustainable, the reality is much more complex.

This report examines the implications of digital technologies taking hold in European agriculture. It focuses particularly on frictions between new digital technologies and peasant autonomy, agroecology and food sovereignty.

Technologies are not mute objects. Their development, distribution and use are inextricably linked to economic and political interests, cultural meanings, different types of knowledge as well as social and ecological relationships. In a context where money, technological know-how and power are highly concentrated in the hands of a few large companies and countries, the digitalization of food and agriculture is set to reinforce inequalities and discrimination.

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FarmingScience & Technology

Measuring agroecology: Introducing a methodological framework and a community of practice approach

Nina Isabella Moeller, Matthias Geck, Colin Anderson, Carlos Barahona, Caroline Broudic, Remi Cluset, Gisele Henriques, Fabio Leippert, Dave Mills, Ameen Minhaj, Anja Mueting-van Loon, Stephanie Piers de Raveschoot, Emile Frison

Publication date: 03/11/2023

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. In this article, we report on a process of collaboratively developing a methodological framework, using the High Level Panel of Experts of the Committee on World Food Security 13 principles of agroecology as foundation. This framework overcomes some limitations of previous methodologies for evaluating degrees of agroecological integration (including those using Gliessman’s 5 levels of food system change) and facilitates a robust qualitative assessment of projects, programs, and project portfolios with respect to their “agroecologicalness.” The framework conceives of agroecology as paradigm-shifting rather than as incremental improvements to existing food systems. It enables global comparability as well as local contextualization of each principle. While the need for this framework arose from the desire to monitor—and increase—financial support for an urgently needed transformation toward agroecology, the framework can equally contribute to the design of projects and programs, which aim to radically transform food and farming systems. It also has value as an educational tool, in specifying through statements of value and concrete examples, what agroecological work aims at.

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FarmingScience & TechnologySustainability

Genetic modification can improve crop yields — but stop overselling it

Merritt Khaipho-Burch, et al.

Publication date: 20/09/2023

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With a changing climate and a growing population, the world increasingly needs more-productive and resilient crops. But improving them requires a knowledge of what actually works in the field.

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FarmingPlant & Animal BreedingScience & TechnologySustainability

Genetic modification can improve crop yields — but stop overselling it

Merritt Khaipho-Burch, Mark Cooper, Jose Crossa, Natalia de Leon, James Holland, Ramsey Lewis, Susan McCouch, Seth C. Murray, Ismail Rabbi, Pamela Ronald, Jeffrey Ross-Ibarra, Detlef Weigel & Edward S. Buckler

Publication date: 20/09/2023

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Over the past two decades, many journals have published papers describing how modifying one or a few genes can result in substantial increases in crop yields. The reported increases range from 10% to 68%, and the crops analysed include rice, maize (corn), tobacco and soya bean.

These studies have contributed important insights in molecular biology and gene discovery. But many are the results of tests conducted in greenhouses or in small-scale field trials — the latter typically involving plants grown in small plots. Few, if any, have used the experimental designs needed to evaluate crop performance in real-world environments. And hardly any findings have translated into yield increases on actual farms.

Especially in the context of climate change and a growing human population, the growth of misleading claims around yields has become a cause of concern to us.

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FarmingLegislation & RegulationSustainability

The EU legislative framework for a sustainable food system: How can it effectively deliver for the environment and people?

Client Earth

Publication date: 08/09/2023

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In its Farm to Fork Strategy, the European Commission announced that it will present a legislative framework for a sustainable food system, an initiative expected for the third quarter of 2023.

The vision reflected in the law proposal will have a critical impact on the EU’s capacity to build its resilience against the worsening climate and biodiversity crises while guaranteeing long-term accessibility to healthy food.

The briefing presents solutions in the form of actionable tools that can best ensure the swift implementation of a sustainable EU food system on the ground. The European Commission must go ahead with its proposal and publish it in September 2023; there is no better time.

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FarmingLegislation & RegulationScience & Technology

Beyond the Genome: Genetically Modified Crops in Africa and the Implications for Genome Editing

Joeva Sean Rock, Matthew A. Schnurr, Ann Kingiri, Dominic Glover, Glenn Davis Stone, Adrian Ely, Klara Fischer

Publication date: 01/01/2023

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This article makes two interventions. First, it identifies the discursive continuity linking genome editing and the earlier technology of genetic modification. Second, it offers a suite of recommendations regarding how lessons learned from GM crops might be integrated into future breeding programmes focused on genome editing. Ultimately, the authors argue that donors, policymakers and scientists should move beyond the genome towards systems-level thinking by prioritizing the co-development of technologies with farmers; using plant material that is unencumbered by intellectual property restrictions and therefore accessible to resource-poor farmers; and acknowledging that seeds are components of complex and dynamic agroecological production systems. If these lessons are not heeded, genome-editing projects are in danger of repeating mistakes of the past

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FarmingScience & TechnologySustainability

Time for the end of GM/GE herbicide tolerant crops?

GeneWatch UK

Publication date: 01/08/2022

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The aim of this report is to look at the economic, environmental and social impacts of growing RoundUp Ready (RR) crops and newer HT crops. This report reviews more than 25 years of experience with this technology. We conclude that the cultivation of GM HT crops may be regarded as a temporary aberration, rather than the revolution originally proclaimed by the proponents of these crops. The growing failure of RoundUp Ready crops, due to the spread of glyphosate resistant (GR) weeds, provides an opportunity to phase out the use of RR crops and adopt new methods and technologies. The priority should be to reduce and replace the use of herbicides: not to replace RR crops with other herbicide-tolerant crops, whether or not these are GM crops or produced by different methods.

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FarmingFood systemsScience & TechnologySustainability

Digital technology and agroecology: opportunities to explore, challenges to overcome

Véronique Bellon-Maurel, Pascal Bonnet, Isabelle Piot-Lepetit, Ludovic Brossard, Pierre Labarthe, Pierre Maurel, Jean-Yves Courtonne.

Publication date: 01/06/2022

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This chapter will focus on the opportunities and challenges presented by digital technology for agroecology in its broadest sense, i.e. sustainable food systems.

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FarmingFood systems

Why are agri-food systems resistant to new directions of change? A systematic review

Costanza Conti, Giacomo Zanello, Andy Hall

Publication date: 01/12/2021

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A central concern about achieving global food security is reconfiguring agri-food systems towards sustainability. However, historically-informed trajectories of agri-food system development remain resistant to a change in direction. Through a systematic literature review, we identify three research domains exploring this phenomenon and six explanations of resistance: embedded nature of technologies, misaligned institutional settings, individual attitudes, political economy factors, infrastructural rigidities, research and innovation priorities. We find ambiguities in the use of the terms lock-in and path-dependency, which often weaken the analysis. We suggest a framing that deals with interdependencies and temporal dynamics of causes of resistance. Finally, we discuss implications for framing innovation for transformational change and other research gaps.

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