Search

Integration of productivity, resource management, and institutional innovations is crucial across different system levels. Traditional research and extension services face challenges in disseminating innovations effectively, leading to the emergence of the agricultural innovation system (AIS) approach. AIS involves collaboration among various stakeholders to improve the technological, managerial, and institutional aspects of agriculture. Intermediary actors play a pivotal role in facilitating innovation exchange and learning processes. In Tunisia, farmer organizations (FOs) such as Groupements de Développement Agricole (GDAs) and Sociétés Mutuelles de Services Agricoles (SMSAs) are key intermediaries. However, there is a lack of comprehensive assessments of FOs' innovation roles, which this study aims to address using the social network analysis (SNA) method. The findings aim to shed light on FOs' effectiveness as innovation intermediaries and identify potential challenges and benefits associated with their roles in innovation processes through the comparison of three farmers' groups divided by their membership status to detect the effect of FO presence or absence on innovation facilitation and actor's configuration. The studied sample involves 592 farmers from the Kef and Siliana governorates in northwestern Tunisia. The results show that FOs are playing a crucial role in facilitating collaboration and knowledge exchange among farmers and other agricultural actors. However, their effectiveness varies depending on membership status and is always contextually influenced. While FOs contribute to reshaping sales channels and optimizing access to services, they face limitations in promoting inclusivity and equitable knowledge sharing. The recommendations include strengthening FOs' social dimension, addressing trust barriers, and investing in reinforcement measures, especially in human capital, to enhance their functionality. Strengthening measures can take many forms, such as facilitating regulation and investing in capacity building. Long-term strategies should re-evaluate the effectiveness of collective action and focus on fostering a culture of shared learning and local empowerment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Tunisia, modernization and liberalization policies implemented since Independence contributed to significant changes in the conditions of farming practices. These policies induced changes in traditional oasis systems. New adaptation strategies appear, such as local tourism, crop specialization, quality approaches. These strategies renew the functions of the territory. In a national context of political upheaval, contradictory dynamics appear: land fragmentation and emergence of producer groups aiming to renew current management models, promotion of local territory and increasing integration to global logics. The analysis of these dynamics highlights the lack of articulation between the current development projects, especially between local initiatives and State- and donor-led projects. Based on surveys among farmers inTozeurandGabès, this article analyzes the transformationof forms of territorial management and valorization, as answers of the local oasis territory to the global crisis. In spite of anapparent disqualification indiscourses andrepresentations, the sustainability of oasesdoesnot relate somuch to conservation or development projects as to the strength of diversified local dynamics, responding to the pluralistic functions of the territory.This paper also highlights the socially differentiated linksbetween practices of territory and sustainability of the oasis, beyond a mere safeguarding of the environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]