Agriculture – Debating Development Research

11/08/2026

Beyond Innovation: Exnovation as a Catalyst for Post-Growth Transitions

By Sabrina Chakori

Post-growth entrepreneurship: the need for non-extractivist models

There is growing recognition that responding to the socio-ecological crisis requires more than technological fixes. There is a need to shift away from palliative interventions, which remain limited to promoting incremental or unproven technological approaches, and to embrace more radical interventions that address the structural drivers of environmental degradation and social inequality. This has led to an interest in degrowth and post-growth economies as a way to catalyse transformational change. Degrowth (or post-growth) can be defined as aiming at an equitable downscaling of production and consumption that increases human well-being and enhances ecological conditions at the local and global level, in the short and long-term.

21/04/202621/04/2026

Reversing Agrarian Change and Restoring Hope in Ghana’s Mining‑Affected Communities

By Gyinadu Abubakar and Evans Odoom / Shaping Sustainable Futures conference series

From Cocoa to Gold: What’s at Stake

When classical agrarian theory points to rising food prices as the driver of land value, it assumes a single, agricultural use for land. David Ricardo’s rent model is a good example: more demand for corn raises the returns to fertile land and—because the soil’s productive capacity is essentially fixed—landowners capture higher rents. But in many contemporary rural landscapes this model misses a crucial detail: land is multi‑functional. Productive cocoa farms in Ghana—particularly in the Western North, Ashanti, Bono, and Eastern regions—sit atop significant gold deposits, creating a conflict between agriculture and mining.

16/12/202516/12/2025

What Would it Take to Build a Post-Extractivist Agriculture?

By Will LaFleur

What is the relationship between extractivism, agriculture, and a sustainable future? As I started the fieldwork for my doctoral studies, this question sat at the heart of my inquiry. Developing a critical response started with renewing an analytical and theoretical conception of extractivism before I even began the fieldwork. That meant, first of all, framing extractivism historically.

11/02/202502/12/2025

Learning and Unlearning: Sowing the Seeds of a Decolonising Mindset

By Peter Taylor / part of our “Share your Decolonising Story” project

Beginnings

I grew up in an industrial town in the North of the United Kingdom, and as a child my experience of agriculture was visiting the countryside, rather than working on farms. Along the way, I became very interested in farming and food production, and my first job was working on a dairy farm. I went on to study agricultural science at University. After that, I continued working for several years in different areas of agriculture and horticulture, enjoying the practical side of things, even when spending much of my time in wet, windy and cold conditions.

29/10/202429/10/2024

Cocoa Prices Triple, But Do Farmers Feel the Gains?

By Bernhard Tröster, Felix Maile, Cornelia Staritz and Sophie van Huellen

In 2021, Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire introduced a $400/tonnes Living Income Differential (LID) on cocoa bean exports, widely regarded as a key mechanism to improve the livelihoods of cocoa farmers. However, this premium was dwarfed by recent price surges at the global derivative markets, which serve as a benchmark for the sales of West African cocoa beans. Yet, farmers have seen a relatively minor increase in the price they receive.