Participatory innovation analysis along livestock value chains: Case of swine value chain in Benin

Rural poverty in Sub-Saharan Africa remains a huge challenge despite the successive agricultural development policies, most of which have failed to involve stakeholders actively. The present rise of pork demand in Benin calls for an assessment of the swine value chain (VC) to envision its development. A participatory approach is here proposed to join this assessment to a stimulation of innovation among stakeholders. The approach is divided in four stages: i) identification of actors and direct links along the VC, ii) characterisation of innovation practices, iii) identification of bottlenecks and opportunities using innovation system framework, and iv) measurement of agreement among VC actors about constraints and value-added sharing, using proportional piling tool. A second survey, two full years after the first one, assessed the impact of actions conducted with VC actors. A typological analysis of innovation practices was conducted to define “innovation profiles” among each of the three main categories of actors: swine stockbreeders (n = 134), pork butchers (n = 45) and input suppliers (n = 25). Three innovation profiles were retained for each category, which may be understood as covering 2 distinct innovator profiles and one non-innovator profile. The profiles qualified as “innovators” accounted for 82%, 84%, and 76%, respectively in stockbreeders, pork butchers and input suppliers. The lack of professionalisation appeared to actors as the main constraint. The Kendall's coefficient of concordance (W) indicated that actors agreed to state that pork butchers gained the most part of the value-added, followed by input suppliers. The second survey showed favorable impacts of the approach and follow-up activities on exchanges and organisation within the VC. It is here advocated that the present participatory method, while characterising the value-chain in a rapid way, further sets the basis for the dialogue between actors and the stimulation of innovation along the VC, which can be further sustained through an exchange platform.