Boost brings together partners who combine their efforts and experiences to facilitate agro-ecological transitions in the South.
The production, management and dissemination of new knowledge:
even if solutions exist, the production of technical knowledge must be pursued, in particular concerning the contributions of biodiversity (including at the soil level) and genetic improvement to the efficiency of agro-ecological systems;
the multi-criteria evaluation of the performance of the agro-ecological transition must be improved; beyond the evaluation of production, it is necessary to be able to provide indicators concerning a set of ecosystem services at the farm and territorial levels, and the social (employment generation, participation in the reduction of inequalities, etc.) and economic pillars (product valuation, labor productivity, gross margins generated) of sustainability;
in order to produce this knowledge, new ways of programming and articulating interdisciplinary research must be developed, while better associating producers and other actors of the agro-ecological transition with their specific knowledge.
This knowledge must be shared in formats that are easily accessible to the scientific community and to development actors engaged in the deployment of agro-ecological transition.
Analysis and documentation of favorable conditions for an agro-ecological transition on a significant scale:
the support processes for actors who choose to engage in this transition must be improved, in particular by sharing experiences and a reflexive study of the projects in which Boost-AE partners are involved; to this end, the intervention frameworks (innovation platform, territorial devices...), the spatial (including the contribution of the agro-ecological transition to sustainable food systems) and temporal scales of intervention and their articulations are particularly studied in Boost-AE;
the conditions for marketing agro-ecological products, the link with sectors, the weight of standards and the paths of remuneration for the ecosystem services rendered need to be adapted to facilitate the economic viability of agro-ecological systems. Boost-AE aims to define the best relations of producers in transition with markets and value chains.
the weight of public policies in the organization of debates between actors and support for agro-ecological transitions is particularly important. Boost-AE aims to define which agricultural and territorial policies are effective in agreement with the local actors concerned.
sharing methods adapted to the different types of actors, knowledge of various origins (expert, local, scientific knowledge) associated with the agro-ecological transition are developed and compared in Boost-AE (cross-training, participatory workshops, new digital tools, etc.)
Building and sharing advocacy for agro-ecological transition at all levels:
with the major players in the agricultural sector;
with international institutions, governments, foundations and civil society;
with companies and market players, particularly in the sectors.
