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Extending the horizons of agricultural research and extension: Methodological challenges

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Abstract

The recent enthusiasm for “participation” in agricultural development has fueled the development of new approaches to research and extension. The rhetoric of “participation” extends the horizons of agricultural research and extension beyond technical problem-solving. Yet in practice few of the personal, political, and experiential aspects of this process are addressed. This paper aims to draw attention to these elements of practice and to locate research and extension within wider social processes. Through a critique of conventional methodological strategies, this paper considers the possibilities offered by “participatory” alternatives. Considering the scope and objectives of agricultural development raises a series of methodological questions: What counts as knowledge? Who defines and represents this knowledge? Whose knowledge counts? Knowledge for what? Knowledge for whom?

The paper goes on to assess a number of these “new” methodologies, within and beyond agricultural development. Through a consideration of their strengths and weaknesses, a series of further issues are highlighted for future methodological development. It is argued that for agricultural research and extension to acknowledge process, closer attention needs to be paid to context. The activities of research and extension need to be set in time. Strategies are needed to explore and address diversity and difference in communities. Situating the actors and agencies involved in development within relations of power involves addressing—and redressing—the nature of interactions between these actors. These changes require not an ever increasing array of methods, it is argued, but new approaches to learning.

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  1. Andrea Cornwall
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Andrea Cornwall is a social anthropologist based at the School of Oriental and African Studies, London. She is currently engaged in research on relations of conflict and cooperation among Yoruba women of SW Nigeria, focusing on stress and coping strategies in response to economic adversity. She has worked in Africa and Latin America in anthropological research and as a trainer in PRA.

Irene Guijt is a Research Associate with the Sustainable Agriculture Programme at the International Institute for Environment and Development, London. Trained as an irrigation engineer, she has worked in PRA training in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Her current projects include the production of audio visual training material on PRA, gender, and environment.

Alice Welbourn is a social development consultant, with extensive experience of working with NGOs and donor agencies in the field of health and community development in Africa and Asia. She has a background in social science involving fieldwork in rural Kenya for her doctoral thesis. She is currently working on a training video concerning AIDS and community action in Africa.

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Cornwall, A., Guijt, I. & Welbourn, A. Extending the horizons of agricultural research and extension: Methodological challenges. Agric Hum Values 11, 38–57 (1994). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01530445

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