“We cannot innovate alone. Innovation is by itself collaborative, the facilitator has to be a “connector of stakeholders” who accompanies the partnership towards a common goal”

Hello, who are you?

I am Marc Gnoumou. I am an agricultural adviser. I have a background in sociology and as a livestock technician with experience in providing advice to producers and their organizations. I am specialized in in sociological and socio-economic studies, andragogie, monitoring and evaluation, animal health and animal production. I heard about CDAIS when the project was looking for facilitator, and the project interested me with its different approach to innovation. Instead of strengthening technical capacities as with any other project, CDAIS focuses on coaching and strengthening functional capacities of stakeholders to support innovation in agricultural systems, to enable both growth and to answer producer and consumer needs.

What are your roles and responsibilities as National Innovation Facilitator?

I am facilitator for the ‘Modernisation of Farmers’ organization advising through the ‘New technologies of information and communication’ (NTIC) partnership. My role is to accompany management of the Family Farm Council network to be more innovative and efficient in providing agricultural services and advice to their members. I help them think about the best ideas amongst the network while strengthening relationships, mutual trust and their ability to work together to achieve modernization through new technologies of information and communication to reach a larger number of producers.

What has CDAIS changed for you?

I have been trained on key concepts of this innovation project, the coaching process, expected roles of facilitators, capacity needs assessment methodology, monitoring and evaluation of the niche and of the innovation in agricultural systems. I have attended training focused on soft skills and learnt how to bring out and secure sustainable engagement from stakeholders in decision making processes, and the principle of win-win negotiation. Thanks to CDAIS, I am much more experienced in leading capacity needs assessment and coaching a multi stakeholder process. My implication in CDAIS changed my views on agricultural innovation. It is a process with a beginning and an end, it is not continuous. It is a collaborative process and not individual, or we would talk about an invention and not an innovation. Innovation is integrating an invention into a social and economic process to provide an answer to an identified problem.