Title of document: Innovative Markets for Sustainable Agriculture. How innovations in market institutions encourage sustainable agriculture in developing countries

Authors: Loconto, A.; Poisot, A.S.; Santacoloma, P.

Ministry/Government Agency/Organisation: FAO

Year of publication: 2016

Geographic focus: Developing countries

Url original document: http://www.fao.org/publications/card/en/c/53d39282-ddd7-460c-a27f-3d5015eea7ca/

Summary: Between 2013 and 2015, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the French National Institute for Agricultural Research (INRA) undertook a survey of innovative approaches that enable markets to act as incentives in the transition towards sustainable agriculture in developing countries. Through a competitive selection process, 15 cases from around the world provide insights into how small-scale initiatives that use sustainable production practices are supported by market demand, and create innovations in the institutions that govern sustainable practices and market exchanges. The results are: (i) system innovations that allow new rules for marketing and assuring the sustainable qualities of products; (ii) new forms of organization that permit actors to play multiple roles in the food system (e.g. farmer and auditor, farmer and researcher, consumer and auditor, consumer and intermediary); (iii) new forms of market exchange, such as box schemes, university kiosks, public procurement or systems of seed exchanges; and (iv) new technologies for sustainable agriculture (e.g. effective micro-organisms, biopesticides and soil analysis techniques). The public sector plays a key role in providing legitimate political and physical spaces for multiple actors to jointly create and share sustainable agricultural knowledge, practices and products.