Supporting local innovation in Nepal

For poor and vulnerable rural communities, innovating through local experimentation and adaptation in farming and other practices is an important means of survival. How can local innovation be fostered and valued alongside the wider development of high technology, which is commonly associated with globalisation?

Advanced technologies are often not readily accepted in rural settings because they do not match communities' actual needs. Problems with ownership, user-friendliness and affordability can hinder adoption. If local innovations are tried and tested by community members they are more likely to be taken up and valued.

Krishna Bahadur Tamang is a 56-year old farmer in Nepal whose main source of livelihood is agriculture. Krishna developed a bee hive using local material after learning about a bee hive suitable for more commercial bees. He knew that his village had the potential to keep bees as nectar trees are found in local forests, but the community had not yet been able to take advantage of this opportunity. Krishna now owns four hives that he made himself and has sold a few outside the village.

Krishna has used his local knowledge and available local resources and has made something that is easy to use, repair and maintain. His case shows how adapting simple technologies can provide alternative means of income generation in rural areas.

Krishna's innovation has prompted the community to try bee keeping and honey production as an alternative means of income generation. PROLINNOVA will help train Krishna and a few interested community members to initiate this. Krishna will also be able to meet bee keeping experts to test his bee hives, which could be replicated and promoted.

Krishna's experience is an example of the 'Participatory Innovation Development' (PID) approach, which aims to support and realise the potential for local farmer innovation.

PROLINNOVA is a global partnership programme promoting local innovation and PID, committed to helping farmers play a decisive role in agricultural research and development worldwide. In Nepal, Practical Action works with LI-BIRD, the ECOS CENTRE, the Institute of Agriculture and Animal Sciences, and the Department of Agriculture.

The emerging benefits of the PID approach include:

• improved local and specialised knowledge due to joint experimentation combined with external expertise
• self-development of local innovators, who can provide benefits from local resources
• new avenues that link knowledge and skills for income generating activities across villages and communities
• better farmer-to-farmer information and communication systems that benefit innovators and their communities.

Experiences of PID suggest that projects should:

• recognise and celebrate the creativity of farmers and local people
• allow farmers and local people to set the agenda for research and development
• support farmers and local people to gain confidence and a voice
• facilitate pro-poor agricultural research and development
• facilitate food-secure farming communities which can sustain their livelihoods whilst safeguarding the environment.

Sharad Rai
Practical Action Nepal, Pandol Marga, Lazimpat, P O Box 15135, Kathmandu, Nepal
T +977 1 444 6015
F +977 1 444 5995
sharad.rai@practicalaction.org.np

See also

Guidelines to Participatory Innovation Development, PROLINNOVA Nepal Programme, by Sharad Rai and Pratap K. Shrestha, 2006
www.prolinnova.net/Nepal/PID_guideline_design.pdf

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