The Effectiveness of Communities of Practice for Sustainable Agricultural Development

THE EFFECTIVENESS OF COMMUNITIES OF PRACTICE FOR SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT Introduction: Nowadays increasingly high importance is given to agricultural activities. The need of the effectiveness and sustainability of the agri-food sector is becoming more and more crucial issue as it is facing the global challenges. Precisely, issues such as depletion of natural resources, limited usability of land, environmental and climate changes, constant increment of world population in need of nourishment and required improvement of the quality products that can simultaneously reduce the harmful impact on the environment. Therefore, sustainability keeps to be one of the principles of agricultural practices (Fischer, et al., 2012). Agriculture is one of the fastest growing sectors. So, movement towards sustainable development requires strong knowledge bases that will be constantly updated. Lubell, et al. (2011) underlines the role of farmers’ knowledge in successful decision-making process that leads to economic, environmental and social benefits simultaneously. Farmers need to be aware of different practices. The necessary information and correct analysis, the cases and experience of other farms are the key factors of right decisions. Similarly, Šūmane, et al. (2018) demonstrates the crucial importance of farmers’ education level and learning methods in order to reach the sustainable development of agriculture and its resilience. Aim: This tendency poses a question about the ways of knowledge sharing. There are many different methods on how to exchange information and knowledge. Current advances in technologies makes this process easier. In the modern word, Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) reduce the information gap between people and have a remarkable effect on agricultural activities as well. According to Patii, et al. (2018), transparent peer-to-peer system for information sharing strengthens the networks of all farmers and experts and help them to exchange knowledge in their field. The outcome of the system will be increased efficiency, productivity and sustainability of processes. Methodology: In this paper, we introduce the Community of Practice (CoP) as a useful tool to share knowledge, experience and to work together in order to develop new ways for solving different problems and achieving a common goal. It is a group of people with similar interest who meet regularly, share a concern or passion for tasks they work about and learn new ways to do their business better by interacting with each other continuously. In addition, we describe the model of Community of Practice created on base of best practices collected under the project SKIN (Short Supply Chain Knowledge and Innovation Network), and propose additional feature of the application to control progress and results of the community. Results: After studying different models of CoPs, it is obvious that the models based on the using of ICTs should be more efficient. ICTs make the opportunity to construct the Communities of practice virtually (Herrera, et al., 2017) that simplify the planning of meetings, communication, sharing participants practices and get informed about results as well (Haagensen, et al., 2018). To be complete, CoP should have the part of education. In virtual CoP it is possible to include e-learning courses on the related topics. It will deepen participants’ knowledge and provide them with theoretical background, together with practical cases. Lastly, the feature for controlling the progress and results of CoP shows the outcome and makes easier to identify weaknesses in the process and to resolve them as soon as possible. Therefore, considering these all, by the figure 1 we propose new model of CoP created on the basis of Bertone et al.’s (2013) model. Conclusion: To summarize, nowadays the sustainability of agricultural processes is the most important issue. On its side, its main goal is to foster the farmers to adopt best practices for economic, environmental and social wellbeing that will be reached if farmers make right decisions about innovation and cooperation (Lubell, et al., 2011). In this context the importance of information is increasing gradually in today’s agricultural activities (Miller et al., 2018). The multiple information and knowledge sharing, together with good rural infrastructure and networks, can play a remarkable role in sustainable intensification practices (SIPs) and increase farmers’ income as well (Kotu et al. 2017). So, we are in the era where knowledge is power, and sharing it is the basis of success (Liu & Chen, 2018). For this process, creating the communities of practice is very helpful tool. Moreover, CoPs are much more effective if there is a support of ICTs that give the opportunity to collect, share, and analyse the data easier, faster and effectively.