Farmer-led research has long been a key concept for development organisations and farm groups in the global south, but in recent years the idea that farmers themselves are best placed to identify areas for research has spread to new areas.

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The roll-out of the 'field lab' concept into new regions, including the UK, though it has been relatively slow, has gained much support from agriculturalists and academics alike – a recent article in scientific journal Nature by field-lab proponents held that "sustainable supply of food hinges on agricultural innovation, but current investments neglect a key area for improving yields," and that farmer-led research is the key to unlocking this innovation.

The approach has met with great success in South America where it was pioneered. Over the course of his research into mob grazing two years ago, Nuffield scholar Tom Chapman met with members of field labs and discussion groups in Argentina and witnessed the effects these have had in terms of sustainability and productivity.

Olivier de Schutter, the UN's special rapporteur on the right to food, who delivered his final report to the Human Rights Council in March, also called on governments and civil society groups to back democratic avenues of research, arguing that this is the only way to ensure environmentally and socially sustainable farming practices flourish. De Schutter, an advocate of agroecology, said such knowledge-intensive approaches require "Public policies supporting agricultural research and participative extension services [as] Private companies will not invest time and money in practices that cannot be rewarded by patents and which don't open markets for chemical products or improved seeds."

The current reliance on private sector funding is flawed in that – as De Schutter warned – a privately-funded research industry will largely deliver solutions that benefit companies themselves, rather than those on the receiving end of research – i.e. farmers. Sustainable agriculture advocates, such as the Garden Organic-backed Centre for Agroecology and Food Security (CAFS) at Coventry University took these concerns to Parliament last year, appealing to MPs to change the way in which public research funding is allocated, in order to drive a research regime change.

Farmers' unsung role in R&D

In the UK, the Soil Association has positioned itself as a leading advocate of farmer-led research. The organic farming charity has coordinated a series of field-labs to improve livestock and crop management, in ways which benefit farmers directly and at very little cost.

In their recent Nature article, Soil Association Director of Innovation Tom MacMillan and Leeds University Professor Tim Benton, who also works with the UK's Global Food Security programme, suggested that the current trend of small-scale agricultural innovation could be fundamental in pioneering truly sustainable innovations that food and farming policy-makers and scientists agree we need.

The authors pointed out, in line with the CAFS researchers before them, that advances from existing research are slowing: "yields have plateaued in some of the world's most important food-producing regions, including east Asia (for rice) and northwest Europe (for wheat). In some countries, yields have declined."

The next wave of innovation, they maintain, "must be at smaller scales", and go on to state that "Enhancing farmers' own R&D could reap big rewards for minimal extra cost".

Benton and Macmillan said, "Farm­ers everywhere are practical experimen­talists who understand the idiosyncrasies of their land [and yet] such essential contributions are rarely recognized in official assessments of agri­cultural R&D." This is in spite of the fact that, as the UK Food Group – a constellation of food and farming NGOs – has already pointed out, the overwhelming majority of R&D funding in global agriculture comes from farmers themselves.

Farmers' contributions are valued at an estimated $4 trillion (£2.4tr) – based not on the estimate that farmers invest around 3–11 percent of their revenue in R&D, but assuming that globally farmers' inno­vations were valued at just 0.5% of farm­ing production.

Field labs in Britain

UK field labs, supported by the Soil Association and Organic Research Centre, have joined together groups of like-minded farmers to investigate producing healthier food in ways that are better for the environment, wider society and farm animals. So far 450 farmers have taken part in field labs in Britain, covering 20 topics. There are 30 more planned for 2014.

The farms involved range from under a hectare to more than a thou­sand. Field labs have tested ways to control black grass (a persistent weed that is developing resistance to modern herbicides), assessed the economics of keep­ing hens alive to lay eggs for a second season, and evaluated ways to reduce use of drugs that control liver fluke in sheep.

Benton and Macmillan ended their appeal emphatically in April. They said, "We believe that field labs could boost farmers’ productivity by supporting low-cost innovations that fly below the radars of large research institutions. When farmers produce knowledge, they are more likely to adopt new practices, and their insights are more likely to be relevant to local conditions…..The time has come to decentralise, diversify, and enrich agricultural R&D. Farmers – not scientists, outreach workers or salespeople – are the essen­tial players in any agricultural innovation system. Helping them will put food on the world’s tables."

Listen to the podcast featuring field lab participant and farmer John Pawsey, of Shimpling Park Farm here.