Auf Spurensuche im Wissenssystem: Innovationen durch Lehre-Praxis-Kooperationen

Summary

Education is often weakly connected to research, extension and business within an innovation network. Nevertheless cooperation between education and farmers groups can be crucial for re-thinking and developing an innovative attitude. But how can cooperation, for example, between universities and businesses, facilitate innovativeness at the farm level? Objective of this study is to analyze if university-business cooperation can contribute to innovation processes in businesses. This can motivate all actors in the Agricultural Knowledge and Information System to participate in such cooperation. A sample of 161 student projects, which aim to address real world challenges of farms, conducted at Eberswalde University for Sustainable Development (HNEE) was analyzed. The study focused on three categories: (1) kind of innovation, (2) phase of adoption and (3) involved actors. Preliminary results show opportunities for innovation in organic farming through practice-education-cooperation.