professionals in agro-ecological sciences work together to determine how to best integrate traditional practices and new agro-ecological scientific discoveries. Efforts should also be made to partner with NGOs that support farmers, field schools, demonstration farms and other such initiatives. It is also important to support small and medium business enterprises that are involved in supplying agriculture inputs; particularly those firms that offer green agriculture products and services such as organic certification auditing and reporting.
Integrating information and communications technologies with knowledge extension Support is needed to improve farmers’ access to market information including through IT in order to enhance their knowledge of real market prices so that they can better negotiate the sale of their crops to distributors and end customers. There are also opportunities to support the construction of meteorological monitoring telemetry stations that could support national and regional weather forecasting capabilities that would help farmers determine best times for planting, fertiliser applications, harvesting and other critical weather- sensitive activities. Such networks could help support the introduction of innovative financial services such as
weather-indexed crop insurance that would help reduce risks associated with adopting new technologies and shifting to green practices and marketing methods.
Better food choices In an era where global human health is undermined by malnourishment and obesity, there is an opportunity to guide and influence people’s food consumption into a greater balance with sustainably produced and more nutritious foods. Raising awareness about better food and its availability at affordable prices can reduce and reshape food demand trends. In this regard, there is a need to invest in public education and marketing that would encourage consumers to adopt more sustainable dietary habits (OECD 2008).
Large-scale industrial farming practices, in many cases, pose enormous public health risks due to the overuse of inputs such as antibiotics, pesticides and synthetic growth hormones. There are neither policies nor any labels that transparently display the level of use and residues of these inputs. Introducing labelling schemes that can help consumers to make informed choices will dramatically shift the consumer behaviour towards safe and healthy food.