Co-innovation and ecological intensification and their contribution to shift a sustainability transition of Uruguayan family livestock

Doctoral thesis abstract

Abstract

The transformation of the current agri-food system towards a more sustainable one requires socio-technical strategies that can drive radical changes. Within the Uruguayan family livestock farming, based on natural grassland, an ecological intensification strategy could play a fundamental role in the transition towards more sustainable systems. In this sense, participatory research approaches have been implemented, working directly on farms and involving farmers in the identification of problems and the design of solutions, on the basis of a sequence of projects that used the co-innovation approach to promote and evaluate ecological intensification strategies during 15 years (2004-2019). In this thesis, this sequence was studied under the lens of Sustainability Transitions (ST), analyzing the process using the concept of socio-technical niche and identifying alternatives to promote its scaling and to boost a transformation process towards sustainability in the Uruguayan family livestock farming. A case study design was followed, based on the analysis of documents and semi-structured interviews, complemented with network analysis. The results obtained show a socio-technical niche and a community of practice that constitutes the potential seed of a process of transformation towards sustainability, which faces challenges in order to strengthen and advance. Working on farms in a joint modality between families and extensionists constitutes a key factor in the analyzed process. This process is in the transition between the temporary phases of stabilization and diffusion of ST, thus it needs to consolidate the diffusion and disruption so that the new ways of developing livestock farming can make their way, taking advantage of windows of opportunity in public policies at the national level and current events at the international level. Although it is not possible to predict the evolution of ST, guiding its direction is feasible based on the construction of consensus on how to reach a comprehensive vision of sustainable livestock farming associated with its ecological intensification, articulating the participation of committed territorial actors and designing and implementing aligned public policies supported with adequate resources, based on the accumulated knowledge on co-innovation and ecological intensification of livestock farming. Limitations to overcome and future lines of research that may contribute to strengthening and expanding the niche and taking advantage of windows of opportunity are identified.