Abstract

This paper presents a learning process approach to farmer innovation through a case study of a collaborative, participatory research and extension project in natural resources management in central Ghana. It describes the learning process, and the institutional partnerships between research, extension and development supporting farmer innovation. The study builds on concepts in social learning theory to examine, within a particular natural resource management context, the outcomes, potentials and transaction costs in facilitating learning in the management of innovations. The discussion illuminates the potentials inherent in an extension approach that requires institutional actors not only embracing farmer centered processes of learning, but also undergoing shifts in values and normative positions relating to the roles of farmers in the innovation process.

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