Impacts of science-based research and innovation programmes: the case of farmers’ transition to organic rice in Camargue
Résumé
This paper attempts to assess impacts of science-based research and innovation programme of farmer’s transition to organic rice in Camargue (France). We demonstrate that the National Institute of Agricultural Research (INRA) contributed to change in developing innovative relevant techniques even though farmers reported that their own experimentations have played an even more important role to find adapted techniques. The role of external factors such as the economic conditions (prices, subsidies) or the access to market for other crops than rice are discussed as well.