The global food system is challenged by population growth, climate change and environmental degradation, leading to global increase in demand and local decrease in supply. Millions of smallholders in West Africa are responsible for 70% of the global cocoa supply from monoculture and agroforestry systems, which provides them food and income essential to their food security. However, current yields average 400 kg/ha while potential production exceeds 5000 kg/ha. A large proportion of the plantations are old and/or neglected and insufficient use of farm inputs further reduces productivity. This project aims for science-based, sustainable intensification of cocoa production assuring high and stable production now and under future climate change and policy scenarios. We provide integrated crop-, field- and farm-level research exploring technical and socio-economically feasible options. Next to delivering soil-, crop- and farm decision support models, we deliver models to support effective service delivery at scale by public and private partners.

Food security depends on farming and on how food materials become available for processing and marketing. The practice of collecting food materials, or bulking, links farmers, traders and processors. The research aims to understand how and why such a multifaceted practice, involving coordination between actors, becomes institutionally viable. Case-studies of bulking advance an interdisciplinary understanding of governance. A comparative approach unravels how bulking is embedded in social networks and institutions. A longitudinal perspective reveals how bulking practices stay intact despite external pressures. The institutional perspective has relevance for development practice and policy targeting interventions to collective marketing and value chains.

The System of Rice Intensification (SRI) is an approach to rice cultivation that is claimed to be more productive and more sustainable than conventional methods. Although these claims have been questioned or dismissed by many rice scientists, SRI has spread rapidly among farmers. Its spread could be seen as surprising, since efforts to promote scientifically validated technologies and recommended practices often have limited impacts on farmers? behaviour. Yet, the adoption of new rice cultivation practices by small and marginal farmers may have important implications for food security, poverty and livelihoods. This proposed integrated programme seeks to understand the social processes, institutional mechanisms, economic factors and technical considerations that have led to SRI?s apparent success in social, institutional and technical terms. The programme thus aims to generate new insights into processes of grassroots innovation and technical change in developing-country agriculture, leading to lessons for agricultural policy, scientific research and extension practice.

This research identifies and analyses institutional conditions for scaling low-emission development dairy interventions in an inclusive manner. The formulation and implementation of inclusive low-emission intervention strategies is complicated by asymmetric power relations between actors, conflicting interests, misalignment of incentive structures, discrepancies between short-term achievements and long-term strategies, and disconnected formal and informal sectors. Moreover, the urgency to respond to climate change may induce a search for simple and transferable solutions with high emission reduction potential. This may hinder investment in the development of context-sensitive strategies that simultaneously maximize societal co-benefits. By systematically valorising multiple pathways and capturing diverse priorities, interests and management styles, this project adopts a socially responsive approach to scenario development. Facilitating interactions among representatives from private and public sectors in research-driven dialogues stimulates and catalyses intervention strategies that can be inclusive of a wider range of actors and therefore enhance the scalability potential of low-emission intervention strategies.