Organic agriculture: Controversies and global development issues in Africa

L'agriculture biologique: controverses et enjeux globaux de développement en Afrique

Ludovic Temple () and Hubert de Bon ()
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Ludovic Temple: UMR Innovation - Innovation et Développement dans l'Agriculture et l'Alimentation - Cirad - Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement - Institut Agro - Montpellier SupAgro - Institut Agro - Institut national d'enseignement supérieur pour l'agriculture, l'alimentation et l'environnement
Hubert de Bon: UPR HORTSYS - Fonctionnement agroécologique et performances des systèmes de cultures horticoles - Cirad - Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement

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Abstract: Organic agriculture offers several options for documenting technological transitions towards new production models, although there are some controversies: low yields, access to standards, effective ecological balance, increased labour... By mobilizing different situations in sub-Saharan Africa, this thematic issue of Cahiers Agricultures provides information on these controversies. The presented papers illustrate how the organic agriculture defined by the standards of industrialized countries cannot reflect the diversity of African agricultural realities. As a result, the need for new certifications and applications for local companies is emerging. However, this emergence is constrained by the lack of comparative knowledge of productive realities between organic and conventional agriculture. Methodological innovations to reduce asymmetries in knowledge about performance comparison are then proposed. The results question the need for new indicators integrating nutrition and health security issues. They show that organic agriculture may also be a mean for increasing yields when the forest rent has been destroyed by export agriculture. While shedding light on the controversies, this thematic issue makes the hypothesis that, under certain conditions, organic agriculture is a breaking opportunity for a technological paradigm that meets the development issues in Africa. It invites us not to confuse this break with the mechanisms of agro-ecology-driven incremental transition.

Keywords: Afrique au sud du Sahara; Cameroun; agriculture biologique; innovation; changement technologique; développement rural; résultat de l'exploitation agricole; rendement des cultures; Agriculture biologique; Innovation; Développement (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://hal.science/hal-05174767v1
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Published in Cahiers Agricultures, 2020, 29, pp.3. ⟨10.1051/cagri/2020002⟩

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05174767

DOI: 10.1051/cagri/2020002

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