The Agricultural Knowledge and
Innovation System in the Netherlands a report for the SCAR cwg AKIS
Krijn J. Poppe
Draft April 24
1 Charateristics of the agri-food system in the Netherlands
The agri-food system in the Netherlands is much influenced by its geography and natural
conditions. The Netherlands is a fertile delta with a favourable cilimate. The delta's water
also provides excellent transport facilities. Rotterdam is the mainport that connects
Western Europe with the rest of the world. These circumstances has lead to important
city development already in the 15th and 16th century. This means that demanding
customers are close by - in the Netherlands, and now also in the triangle London - Paris Berlin.
Against this background agriculture in the Netherlands has for many centuries been very
much integrated in world markets. Imports and exports are relatively high. Partly this
reflects the import of tropical products through its ports. But is also reflects
specialisation: part of the feed stuffs are imported from outside the EU, and turned into
milk, (pig) meat and eggs in the Netherlands. Horticulture (vegetables and flowers) are
another important sector. In the agri-food industries a number of large cooperatives
dominate processing. In general the Netherlands is known for its mass products at
reasonable prices, as well as high quality breeding material. It lacks high value niche
products based on traditional recipes and terroir.
Figure 1 shows the size of the agri-food sector in the Netherlands, based on input-output
analysis. It shows that nearly 10% of the economy (including fertilizer industries, cacaoindustry, agro-logistics etc) can be linked to the agri-food complex.
Figure 1 Size of the Agri-food sector
Compared to other countries, farms in the Netherlands are rather large (figure 2) in
terms of economic size. This is especially the case in horticulture and intensive livestock,
where land is a relatively small percentage of the cost of production and used very
intensively. But also in other sectors there is an important increase in the average size of
the farm, which goes hand in hand with a decline in the number of farms, as small farms
disappear at the moment a farmer retires (figure 3). Farms in the Netherlands are
knowledge and capital intensive. Farmers are relatively high educated. They work with
rather low margins and quite some outside funding (loans).
Figure 2 Size of Dutch farms compared to other EU countries
Figure 3 Trends in number of farms
The integration in world markets with intensive production (close to water) and high land
values near big cities with affluent consumers has in the last 30 years not been without
problems. There are severe negative externalities regarding environmental issues
(nitrate, phosphate, crop protection, CO2), health (ammonia, antibiotics) and animal
welfare. Sustainability is an important issue in government policy. NGO's and increasingly
retail and food processors play an important role in taking up these challenges.
Compared to other sectors in the economy this makes agriculture policy-intensive:
European policies on CAP and Food Safety as well as European and national policies on
environmental issues.
2 Historic development over time in AKIS
Innovation plays an important role in the Dutch Agri-food sector. This goes back to the
agrarian crisis in the 1880's, when Europe was flooded with cheap grains from the
American Midwest and from Russia / Ukraine, based on new transport technology
(railways and steam boats). In Europe this crisis typically created three types of
reactions: the UK had just abolished its corn laws, relied on its Dominions with their cost
leadership and choose a non-intervention policy of open trade. The German states, who
where creating their chemical industries, choose a protectionist view. Agricultural
countries like Denmark and the Netherlands (where the industrialising South had
separated to become Belgium), could not afford both and went for a third way:
innovation. Education was strengthened, cooperatives were formed.
These developments were strenghtened after 1945. The second world war had brought a
'hunger winter' at the end of the war in the big cities in the West, large parts of the
country were ruined and there was an acute dollar shortage for imports. The agri-food
sector was modernized to help to solve national problems. Education and research were
strengthened, partly with the support of the Marshall Aid. Land reallotment programmes
were carried out. Commodity Boards were established and they raised product standards,
started collective marketing and raised funds for research.
It was probably in this period that a 'Systems of Innovation' approach to innovation
policy was developed (figure 4). In this approach government does not act from the
rationale of market failure, but takes systemic problems as a point of departure. After the
second world war these problems were linked to a lack of know how to unlock new
technologies at farm level (tractors, chemicals) and to increase labour productivity (new
farm buildings in animal production, development of glass house horticulture and
specialized pigs and poultry farming). In fact this was the modernisation program of
agriculture in a productivist paradigm. Later this shifted to environmental issues and
consumer concerns: in the last twenty years research is used by policy makers to foster
innovation that links societal concerns with business strategies in the agri-food sector.
Figure 4 Two complementary views on innovation policy
Source: Smits, Kuhlmann and Shapira, 2010
3 Description of the current AKIS
The Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation System can be described with its major
components Research, Extension, Education and Support (figure 5). In this chapter we
describe the system for the Netherlands including recent developments. This AKIS
framework is biased towards the farm level. It gives less attention to innovation in the
food chain and the role of retail and ngo's.
The research component of the AKIS is dominated by Wageningen Urniversity and
Research Centre. This organisation was formed in the 1990s by a merger of Wageningen
University and the Foundation DLO that bundled the applied research institutes. These
former state institutes were merged and bundled in this independent agency and shifted
from input to output finance about 20 years ago. The research institutes in animal
husbandry and plant science include some experimental stations.
Wageningen UR can be seen as an extended public-private cooperation tot promote and
fund dynamism and innovation. Rabbinge and Slingerland (2009) claim that the
reformulated mission, the role the university plays in education, research and last but not
least utilisation of that knowledge, has contributed to an abolishment of the hierarchical
structure that characterised the medieval and Humboldt type university by a network
structure where excellence and authority prevail. The orientation is on science for
impact, determined by internal coherence as a result of the mission, flexibility and
willingness to work with partners from very varied backgrounds.
In addition to Wageningen UR there are a number of other relevant institutes in research,
The most important one is the University Utrecht with its faculty for veterinary science.
TNO (the agency for applied research outside agriculture) is active in applied food
research.
Extension is a private business in the Netherlands. The Dutch state extension service DLV
has been privatised in the 1980s and is now a private company that charges farmers for
its advice. It has several competitors. It is also in competition with input suppliers and
food processors; the agri-business (a large part organised as a cooperative) also provides
advice to farmers. A third group are the commercial (sometimes cooperative) specialised
farm accounting offices. Farmers need those accountants as they are in the normal tax
system. Accounting offices often provide benchmark data and economic advise. The EU's
Farm Advisory System is implemented in the Netherlands as a voucher system: farmers
who search advice on cross compliance can ask the paying agency for a voucher that
they can cash with DLV or another accredited extension organisation.
The agricultural education system in the Netherlands is separate from other forms of
education, and run by the Ministry of Economic Affairs, Agriculture and Innovation.
Besides Wageningen University (for MA and PhD, see above) there are 4 schools that
offer a BA. One of them is part of Wageningen UR. In addition there are a number of
lower and secondary agricultural schools (for students in the ageclass 12 - 17 years). In
the last decades these schools have diversified into studies that are more oriented
towards non-farm work (like flower retailing, husbandry of horses and pet animals etc).
Concerning the support systems, the role of agribusiness has already been mentioned, as
providers of extension. Banks should be mentioned here too. In addition the government
itself should be mentioned. It plays a role by setting standards for food safety, organic
farming etc. It also has policy instruments to foster innovation, e.g. by fiscal regulations
or subsidies. With its Guarantee Fund that can provide surety it provides a lender of last
resort function in case of risky investments. It also supports some weather insurance
schemes. And of course there is the Common Agricultural Policy, as well as several
environmental and animal welfare policies.
The Ministry for Economic Affairs, Agriculture and Innovation has a responsibility for the
system as a whole, and the fact that it contributes to a sustainable and competitive
agricultural industry. In the 1950s and 1960s it was praised for its OVO-triptych (OVO
being the Dutch abbreviation for Research, Extension and Education). The current
government praises the 'Golden Triangle' of Agri-business, Science and Policy as an
example for other competitive sectors in the economy.
The Ministry (or more precise: the former Agricultural part of the Ministry) uses an
Innovation Systems approach (figure 4) in its thinking on innovation policy. Such
innovation systems have 7 functions (figure 6) and the Ministry tries to make sure that
these functions are well developed. There are five types of relevant stakeholders in this
respect. Besides the different levels of government itself, the scientific institutes, the
agri-business, the non-governmental organisations and intermediates (figure 7).
Intermediates without an agenda on their own have become important in processes of
innovation (Klerkx, xxx).
These stakeholders are linked on the basis of openness, proximity (e.g. the cluster idea
of Food Valley around Wageningen), synergy and absorption capacity. That last issue is
important as several innovations can be seen as spill over effects from general purpose
technologies like ICT. The Ministry organises stakeholder meetings like Knowledge
Rooms to discuss the strategic agenda setting, negotiated between policy, agri-business
and ngo's. That is developped into a Strategic Knowledge and Innovation Agenda and
public-private investment schemes (e.g. on precision farming).
The Innovation Systems approach not only looks to market (and government) failure (as
in the macro-economic approach, see figure 4) but concentrates on institutional failure:
is the cooperation and competition in the system working in an optimal (effective and
efficient) way?. In case of an institutional failure, this is sometimes also solved by new
institutional arrangements. For instance the need for more innovation and
experimentation between innovative farmers and researchers has lead to specific
system-innovation programs but also to the establishment of the organisation Innovation
Network (see the case in chapter 4) and Transforum - an organisation to experiment with
transition issues. Another example is the Green Knowledge Cooperative, that improves
linkages between research and agricultural schools by providing money for joint projects
and lectors at the professional universities (BA-level).
It should be stressed that in the view of the Ministry, the AKIS-policy is not a stand alone
policy. The education policy, basic finance for the university and some top-technological
institutes (that do pre-competitive basic research e.g. on genetics) is mainly oriented to
the competitive position of the food chain. The main public issue for the ministry is
however the societal concerns that deal with sustainability issues. One of the policy
instruments to handle that challenge is the innovation policy (figure 8). Alternatives are
subsidies, regulations etc. The choice between those instruments (that can be used in
synergy) is based on impact assessments. This implies a rather intensive process of
policy formation, also based on monitoring in statutory tasks, and research for policy
purposes (ex-ante and ex-post policy evaluations, stakeholder dialogues, foresights etc.).
Within the Ministry there is a division of tasks between the policy departments (making
this optimal mix between innovation and regulation) and a department for knowledge
and innovation (looking to content and form of efficient and effective research). An
additional money flow is the subsidy for the so called knowledge base, to maintain
instruments and methodology for research, sometimes developed in European
collaboration. Table 1 provides information on the budget for 2011 regarding the AKIS
(including nature, fisheries etc.).
Table 1. Funding of the AKIS in The Netherlands by the Ministry of Economic Affairs, Agriculture
and Innovation, 2011
R&D
Total agricultural education
Budget
(Million Euro)
155
812
Administrative expenditures
Total AKIS expenditures
11
978
The spending on agricultural education includes all
levels of education, ranging from EQF 1 to EQF 8. The
funding of the Faculty for Veterinary Medicine at the
University of Utrecht is not included in the numbers
As stated before, the institutes for applied research are financed by research programs
specified by the ministry with the help of stakeholders. This is a form of output finance.
In the case of the so called knowledge base programs, the themes are given by the
ministry, with a guiding assessment of the work program, but there is more freedom for
Wageningen UR to choose its own projects in the program. Education is mainly financed
on basis of the number of students, so schools compete with attractive study programs
to attract students. The university is mainly financed with a basic cash flow but also
attracts contract research from outside clients. The ministry is the main financing
organisation. The commodity boards have some levies to co-finance some research e.g.
on experimental stations. Due to increase in scale and heterogeneity in farming the
Commodity Boards find it more and more difficult to play this role. The EU is also an
important client for Wageningen UR.
The former Ministry of Agriculture (now: Economic Affairs, Agriculture and Innovation)
spend around 1 billion euro a year on knowledge and innovation programs. Most of this
goes to education, but also the subsidies for research and innovation are substantial.
Evaluations are done within the system. For instance the University's graduate school is
evaluated from time to time, and external international committees review the work of
the institutes every four to five years. Important decisions as the creation of Wageningen
UR have been evaluated ex-post (stakeholders approved the creation and saw important
improvements). The research and innovation programs are subject to normal policy
reviews.
That is not to say that the impact and evaluation of AKIS cannot be improved. For all big
policy issues (economic performance of the sector, environmental performance, the state
of the rural area, nature management, consumer concerns, the state of animal welfare)
there are yearly or twice yearly monitoring publications by research institutes or policy
think tanks, in close cooperation with the Ministry. These reports are used to provide
background information to parliament and stakeholders. Strangely such a report is
absent for one of the most important policy instruments.
Second there is very little economic impact analysis. Evaluations tend to take a
stakeholder approach based in public administration science. Especially in innovation
programs one could imagine a link with innovation monitoring, reporting the impact of
the program on investments, new product development and competitive position of the
companies involved.
Third there is remarkably little research on the AKIS itself, and certainly not
commissioned by the Ministry. If research is done, it is often based in the academic
groups in Wageningen University.
That these three areas of potential improvement exist has probably to do with the fact
that formal evaluation in a Systems of Innovation approach is not easy due to a lack of
indicators for analysis and policy evaluation.
Figure 5 Components of the AKIS
Figure 6 Seven functions of an Innovation System
Figure 7 Five types of stakeholders
Figure 8 Policy Instruments
4 Give a good and a bad example of AKIS in action: a policy issue (e.g.
reduce mastitis in the dairy herd) and the role of AKIS in the delivery
of information, technology transfer and innovation to the farmer and
other stakeholders
4.1 Innovatie netwerk
4.1.1 VIP
4.2 max 4 pages, 6 ppt sheets
4.3 bad examples
4.3.1 regio scholen + onderzoek
biologisch
5 Lessons for the AKIS concept
In this final chapter we discuss the outcomes of chapters 3 and 4 (above) in the context
of the Reflection paper of the SCAR Collaborative Working Group on AKIS, and try to
draw conclusion on the concepts in the reflection paper.
The main message of the Reflection paper is to invite to reflect upon AKS as an open
system or network in an inclusive way, combining system and network approach. The
broadened concept of AKIS (Agricultural Knowledge and Innovation Systems) allows to
analyse the complex relationships between AKS subsystems, their gradual
transformations, involvement of new actors, progression of new initiatives and increasing
role of LINSA (Learning and Innovation Networks for Sustainable Agriculture).
Given the coexistence of different development paradigms and forms of agriculture
(“classical”, “alternative”, “multifunctional”) and different paradigms concerning the
future developments needed ("productivist" and "sufficiency") the reflection paper argued
that we should avoid to oppose AKS, AKIS and LINSA and bare in mind that these
concepts are also influential cognitive and policy frames. Probably, AKS is more the
institutional way of looking at innovation in agriculture while AKIS is more the functional
way. LINSAs are more focused on one innovation approach and could be seen as a part
of the general AKIS. The broadened definition of AKIS should serve as tool for innovation
management in agriculture and rural areas.
The reflection paper argues that the role of a good functioning AKiS is to provide:

frameworks for establishing AKIS as functioning networks

with fully integration with educational systems

consisting of different actors or sub-systems that are well connected, collaborating
and exchanging knowledge

engaging in collaborative life long learning to deliver and support innovation in the
agri-food and rural development sector.
5.1. Reflection on the reflection paper's concepts
With the introduction of several terms (AKS, AKIS and recently LINSA) the academic
discipline has contributed to new insights, but also runs the risk to add to confusion. The
AKIS concept as a descriptor of a way of looking at innovation in agriculture makes sense
for the Dutch case. This paper on the Dutch AKIS explained the Systems of Innovation
approach that characterises the (implicit) management of the Dutch AKIS. It has been
presented elsewhere (Poppe, 2010) as DAISY - the Dutch Agricultural Innovation
System.
Given the definitions above in the reflection paper, one could argue that the Dutch way of
looking is an institutional view, and that the term AKS (Agricultural Knowledge System)
should be applied. However, that is very unattractive as it signals that knowledge is more
important as innovation. Given the current state of the European economy and the need
for innovation (it is even in the name of the Dutch ministry responsible for agriculture)
we argue that AKIS is a useful descriptor.
That means that in addition to AKIS, there seems not to be much additional value in also
using the term AKS - we propose to abandon that term and let it slide into history.
Learning networks are a clear element in the Dutch AKIS, so the concept of LINSA and
further development of this concept makes sense. However it should be used for what it
is (a method for innovation that fits well into a system of innovation view of AKIS), and
should not be seen as the next concept that replaces AKIS.
Concerning the different paradigms of agricultural systems (Classical, alternative,
multifunctional) or foresight trends (productivist, sufficiency), we recognise that these
terms have a meaning in the Netherlands. We recognise that different paradigms are also
part of a debate (or even political struggle) on the future of Dutch agriculture. And we
recognise that the different agricultural systems sometimes use different sub-systems of
the Dutch AKIS and have different views on how the AKIS should develop. This suggest
the different paradigms make sense.
However we tend to argue that the importance of such concepts for AKIS and innovation
policy should not be stressed too much. We think, based on the historic experience, that
the AKIS develops stepwise in line with the rest of the agricultural sector and its
strategies. Some actors in the AKIS should certainly contribute to the debate on the
paradigms and strategy (strategies) in agriculture and it is a role of policy to make that
possible.
But at this moment there is not an important policy mission to restructure AKIS in a
transition from one paradigm to another, or to build an alternative AKIS for an
alternative paradigm. Partly because the concepts are not clear cut. For instance
multifunctional was defined as a concept in which agriculture provides public goods that
could underpin government payments decoupled from agricultural production. In the
Netherlands it is mainly used (among others by a Taskforce installed by the Ministry) for
common-pool resources (Polman et al, 2010) where farmers diversify into new activities
that are paid via the market, but based on shared resources. On the productivism/postproductivism paradigm transition (with multi-functional agriculture as a transitional
pathway) it has been argued that this discourse is too much isolated from the long term
developments in the rest of society (like ICT or Scarcity issues) [Poppe, 2009].
There is also no need to restructure AKIS or build an alternative because the Dutch AKIS
still seems to be robust. A scenario analysis carried out in 2008 (Poppe, 2009) concluded
that the system (DAISY) seems to be robust as it is adaptive and the actors rearrange
their networks and methods of working. For instance over the last years NGO's and
retailers have an increasing role in innovation towards a sustainable agriculture. Figure 9
summarizes four scenario's that the study examined. Moving from the NW corner with a
strong CAP the researchers identified examples involving the main actors that could be
labelled as (niche) experiments in the three other scenarios. Examples are large
initiatives on e. g. precision farming or "the glasshouse as an energy source" in the NE
corner (strong central coordination with government money, innovative), but also
initiatives from NGO's, retail and slaughterhouses to end the castration of piglets in the
SW corner. Social innovation in urban agriculture or turning a farmers organisation into
an association of rural entrepreneurs is an example in the SE corner of Figure 9.
Figure 9 Scenarios for the Dutch AKiS
5.2 Further research
There are a couple of issues that could be further developed in the reflection paper or the
end report of the SCAR's collaborative working group. These are:

The link between the AKIS thinking and the methodological thinking on Systems of
Innovation (figure 4) could be strengthened

Improvements are possible on concepts for monitoring the development of AKIS with
indicators, economic evaluation and a method of social learning. In the monitoring a
link with innovation monitoring could be useful.

There is additional work to do on incentive systems within the AKIS (including
research and modelling with e.g. an agent-based model).

The AKIS system is very much focussed on farm level and education and extension.
It underestimates the role of agribusiness, retail and ngo’s. The use of standards like
GlobalGAP and sustainability programs for consumer brands have played a big role as
a knowledge provider and change agent in some sectors (in the Netherlands, but for
instance also in modernizing some food chains in new member states like Poland).

In the Netherlands agriculture is more and more seen as a normal economic sector,
or perhaps better: not more typical than the creative industry or the chemical
industry or logistics. This is reflected in the merger between the former Ministry of
Economic Affairs with the former Ministry of Agriculture, Nature and Food Quality into
the new Ministry for Foreign Affairs, Agriculture and Innovation. This raises issues on
the relation between AKIS and the other Dutch KIS. Especially because the current
government sees the successes of Dutch agri-business and its cooperation with the
AKIS and the ministry ("the golden triangle") as a lightning example for other
industries. It also raises the question if there is a need to govern the innovation
process between agriculture and other top sectors, like in the biobased economy
(agriculture with the chemical industry), or water or energy etc.
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incomplete
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