Rewarding Innovation in African Agriculture

Cash prizes for technological breakthroughs

William Masters and colleagues are working on a novel approach to development assistance, helping donors to reward innovators in proportion to the social value of new technologies adopted by African farmers.  

The "prizes" approach relies on verifiable data from controlled experiments and farm surveys to document which new techniques work best in what areas, and help scale up their adoption to improve nutrition, reduce environmental damage, and sustain economic growth.   

This initiative is documented in:

• a one-page summary, with links to source materials and contact lists of advisors and endorsements;
• a five-page concept note plus endorsement letter for implementation through FARA, the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa.
• a short article published in AgBioForum (2004);
• a longer article published in International Journal of Biotechnology (2005);
• a set of presentation slides, from a seminar at USAID (2005);
• a detailed framework document, including an extensive history of prize awards and the lessons they offer for the design of a new program in this area;
• additional background and motivation in a paper for the Journal of International Affairs entitled "Paying for Prosperity"; and
• press coverage from ABC News.

The methods by which prizes are to be awarded is supported by an advisory board of prominent researchers, notably:

• Simeon Ehui (World Bank)
• Robert Evenson (Yale University)
• Richard Nelson (Columbia University)
• Phil Pardey (University of Minnesota)
• Carl Pray (Rutgers University)
• Jeffrey Sachs (Columbia University)
• Pedro Sanchez (Columbia University)
• Brian Wright (UC Berkeley)
• David Zilberman (UC Berkeley)

The initiative has been generously supported by a grant from the Adelson Family Foundation of New York, and builds on a decade of USAID-funded training workshops and case studies, led by Prof. Masters and his colleagues in West Africa. 

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