>From: A R Pastakia
Doctoral Student
Indian Institute of Management
Ahmedabad, INDIA
Honeybee@iimahd.ernet.in
In my thesis work I have been studying the heuristics used by
grassroots innovators for arriving at innovative solutions in
the area of sustainable pest management in agriculture. It is
clear from the data that these heuristics are influenced by both
internal variables (world-view, beliefs, value system, knowledge
base) as well as external variables (ecological, economic and
social context of the innovator). I am listing two points which
came up during discussions and on which i would request comments.
1) We have found compartmentalisation of life-spaces, to be a
common phenomenon when it comes to decisions related to resource
use and choice of technology. For instance the decisions related
to crop pests, to animal health and health of own children may
not invoke the same criteria/values. The question therefore is
whether consistency across life spaces is a necessary condition
for innovation and adoption of technology with high potential for
sustainable outcomes?
2) It is generally believed that chemical intensive farming is
non-sustainable on account of the externalities on soils, water
and other natural resources. The longitudinal data from
Rothemstead Research Station (over 125 years) in the U.K. seems
to indicate that there is no drop in productivity despite use of
chemical inputs over extended period of time. Is there
information available on the long term impact on soil
microbiology profile, soil fertility, stability and resilience of
the agro-ecology on the Rothemstead Station ?