Workshop, 18th IFOAM Organic World Congress

Participatory Research in Practice: Challenges, Opportunities and Developing Ideas around the World

As part of the 18th IFOAM Organic World Congress in Istanbul 2014, Dr. Susanne Padel, Principal socio-economic researcher at The Organic Research Centre and Dr. Gurbir S. Bhullar, Senior Scientist Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL), Switzerland organized a workshop on participatory research in practice.

Presentations were given by Susanne Padel (ORC, UK) and Georgios Arsenos (DAP-VET, Greece) on the experience gained from the SOLID project about identification of topics for participatory research, challenges and problems on conducting on-farm research. Christian Andres (FiBL, Switzerland) and Noah Adamtey (FiBL, Switzerland) presented experience gained from on-farm participatory trials in India and Kenya under the SYSCOM (Long-term farming systems comparisons in the tropics) project. The workshop communicated essential information and knowledge on how to develop and carry out on-farm research based on experience gained in different parts of the world and generated discussion on how to overcome challenges in the various stages of participatory research, including the interaction between farmers and researchers.

Watch FiBL’s videos on participatory research in Kenya

The overall discussion was inspiring and in many ways interesting. It reflected thoughts from both farmers’ and researcher’s point of view. Key points of the Workshop are summarized below:

  • Various types of activities were presented under the projects (SOLID and SYSCOM) but it was common that the activities were led by the research team and farmers were actively engaging in the process. This prompted very interesting discussions and questions on whether participatory projects that have strong involvement from researchers can really call themselves to be truly participatory. However, participatory research is a two-way interaction and implies energetic involvement of both parts (i.e. researcher and farmer). It is obvious that on-farm research should provide practical solutions to existing production problems, but critical reflection by researchers may help farmers in identifying problems.
  • Experience from the SOLID project indicates that the success of on-farm participatory trials depends vastly on the willingness or capacity of the farmer to follow the research protocol. In this direction evidence from the SYSCOM project shows that the model of “mother” trial on station and “baby trials” as replication on farms can generate more impact than when trials are only conducted on farms. Enhanced knowledge and productivity on farms can then act as incentives for farmers to participate. Moreover, controlled (on station) experiments in addition to on-farm trials helps to understand and interpret better the results (e.g. underlying biological mechanisms) and helps to locate mistakes in the on-farm trials which might frustrate both farmers and researchers. This type of experimentation allows also for substantial exchange between those involved and helps to increase the degree of commitment from both researchers and farmers/advisors for joint efforts in a project.
  • Regarding different levels of participation colleagues from the SYSCOM project (India case) have developed a Participatory Technology Development Handbook which can be accessed here. Further information can be accessed here: “Participatory Research to foster Innovation in Agriculture”

Material from the workshop