Analysis of the innovation system in the adoption of IR-43 (NIR) and Tinajones rice varieties by farmers of the Camaná Valley

Abstract

In the last 30 years, rice production in Peru has grown 4.88 times. Rice in the Camaná Valley of the department of Arequipa is one of the most important food crops in the regional economy with a world record in yield for paddy rice. The objective was to analyze the innovation system in the adoption of IR-43 (NIR) and Tinajones rice varieties by rice farmers in the Camaná Valley and determine the impacts on improvements in the quality of life of farmers. This study used the innovation systems framework to explore four key aspects of innovation systems: Actors, the roles they play and the activities in which they are involved, attitudes and practices of the main actors, patterns of interaction between the main actors and the enabling environment. It was determined that the adoption of IR-43 (NIR) and Tinajones varieties was facilitated by the existence of a diversity of collective intelligence mechanisms to organize interactions for innovation, government actors have been identified (INIA, SENASA, Agrarian Agencies); private companies (CORDESA Camaná, commercial houses, phytosanitary companies), media, rice producers, a sociotechnical regime that constitutes the mills, financing entities, market information and marketing agents, forming a network of social and economic actors, which interact with each other for the adoption of rice varieties. The livelihoods of producers have been favored by human, social, natural, financial and political capital. The increase in yields and a better price of the product allows them to improve their economies.