Study finds social relationships rarely documented in agricultural innovation scaling

Reports show limited visibility for social ties

Research appearing in Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems shows that collaborations are central to climate studies yet their connection to expansion is seldom recorded. The findings highlight the need to better understand how trust and collaboration strengthen the design and evaluation of scaling processes. Bringing innovations to a wider group of farmers requires both technical fixes and strong connections between all participants in these efforts.

Deissy Martínez-Barón led analysis with colleagues

Deissy Martínez-Barón from the International Center for Tropical Agriculture and Anne Gravsholt Busck from the University of Copenhagen joined Steven Dean Prager from the Gates Foundation. An examination of 273 results reports spanning 261 projects within 12 CGIAR research programs that were reported from 2018 through 2021 under the previous CCAFS program was conducted. To pinpoint 17 subjects organized within four distinct categories such as agricultural systems and climate change adaptation, the researchers employed a model called latent Dirichlet allocation.

Three pathways identified with documentation gaps

This research identifies three distinct scaling routes: expanding outward as innovations benefit more individuals, growing upward when they shape policies, and going deep when social norms change. Although reports provide examples of these pathways, scaling is generally documented as an achieved outcome without explaining how partnerships contribute to them. The scaling deep dimension remains less developed in the documents analyzed by the team.