Agriculture in transition: Innovative approaches to sustainable farming

Global challenges of climate change, environmental degradation, scarcity of inputs, and increasing demand for safe food present a sharp call to agricultural practice to become more sustainable. Private, civil and public stakeholders have to cope with this change of focus in development, which is often referred to as ‘3P’: People, Planet, and Profit.

An integral redirection of current  agricultural  practices is  therefore  required to go beyond just incremental change. Innovation that addresses ecological, social, as well as economic sustainability aspects requires involvement of multiple stakeholders, going beyond a strictly technical approach.  It stresses interactive learning and exchange of knowledge between all stakeholders, including farmers and entrepreneurs. This course will use a systems dynamics approach to design sustainable systems that produce farm products in a socially and economically responsible manner. 

This course aims to offer the participants' a systems perspective on agriculture as well as tools to design innovative and sustainability farming systems. Participants will be able to analyze their own agricultural systems and propose transition paths towards improved sustainability. They will gain access to state of the art approaches and practical methods, and use their chance to refresh networks and literature.