How informal agricultural traders capture and preserve customer loyalty
They may not advertise their products in the formal media, but informal agricultural traders have results-driven ways of capturing customer loyalty. Most of their skills…
How much should farmers and consumers know about something?
The formal education system in many developing countries is organised in such a way that the depth and breadth of knowledge imparted determines grades and…
How to move from ordinary to best agricultural practices
‘Best practice’ is not even a mouthful but what it means in practice remains unclear to many people who use the phrase. In African agriculture,…
The power of curiosity and situational intelligence in African communities
In every African community you can find people who are naturally curious and those who lack interest in learning. Those who are curious can describe…
Many African farmers can perform like Gold Medalists
If agriculture was an Olympics competition, many African farmers would certainly be gold medalists. Zephaniah Phiri, the late world class water harvester of Zvishavane in…
Limitations of using documents and reports to share knowledge in Africa
Many well-intentioned organisations and people are being frustrated by the shortcomings of using case studies, most significant change stories and conference presentations in spreading success…
Why some approaches and technologies are not moving beyond early adopters
A lot can be learnt from remarkable ways through which African socio-cultural systems generated and shared knowledge. There were reliable conduits for sharing knowledge from…
From farmers and traders to knowledge artisans
Many developing countries are witnessing trends where indigenous knowledge systems are transforming to a commercial stage. This is exposing the myth that indigenous knowledge can…
How can we build equilibrium knowledge ecosystems in developing countries?
There are many reasons why developing countries suffer from a severe mismatch between knowledge supply and demand. Less than 20% of knowledge in African countries…
Why we must assess knowledge uptake in agriculture and rural development
While a lot of resources have gone into producing and pushing information to farmers and rural people, there has not been enough effort into understanding…