Les entretiens

Les entretiens constituent une part importante de l’étape 1 du processus Urbal. Ils permettent de recueillir des informations directement auprès des innovateur.ice.s, des acteur.ice.s de l’innovation, des décideur.se.s politiques et des expert.e.s. Les entretiens sont l’occasion d’entendre les personnes-clés impliquées, directement ou indirectement, dans l’innovation expliquer, avec leurs propres mots, comment l’innovation contribue par ses actions à la durabilité du système alimentaire.

Quelques considérations clés à prendre en compte lors de la planification des entretiens :

  • Le choix des personnes à interroger aura une incidence sur le type d’informations que vous pourrez recueillir sur l’innovation. Dans la mesure du possible, veillez à identifier les personnes à interroger parmi quatre groupes clés : les porteur.se.s de l’innovation, les acteurs et actrices associées à l’innovation, les responsables politiques, ainsi que les expert.e.s.

  • Réalisez au moins 5 entretiens et idéalement pas plus de 20. Choisissez le nombre d’entretiens qui convient le mieux à votre contexte, en tenant compte des contraintes de temps et de ressources.

  • Soyez attentif aux dynamiques de domination à l’œuvre dans les entretiens, en particulier lorsque les personnes interrogées sont dans une position de pouvoir moins forte que les enquêteurs ou d’autres personnes impliquées dans l’innovation. Il est très important de créer un espace sûr pour faciliter le dialogue avec les personnes interrogées.

  • À la fin de chaque entretien, demandez à la personne interrogée de vous suggérer d’autres personnes à qui vous devriez parler. Vous vous assurerez ainsi d’avoir inclus tous les acteurs et actrices pertinents de l’innovation dans le processus d’entretien.

Tableau 1 : Personnes à interviewer et leur rôle

Les entretiens doivent être menés dans le respect des procédures éthiques institutionnelles/organisationnelles et de la législation locale relative à la protection de la vie privée. En Europe, les enquêteurs doivent obtenir le consentement verbal ou écrit de toutes les personnes enquêtées et fournir des informations détaillées aux participant.e.s sur la manière dont leurs propos et leurs informations personnelles seront utilisées dans le cadre du projet, et sur la manière dont toutes les informations recueillies seront conservées en toute sécurité pendant et après le projet (voir Règlement Général sur la Protection des Données (RGPD) : https://www.cnil.fr/fr/rgpd-de-quoi-parle-t-on ).

Pour obtenir ce consentement, les enquêteurs doivent faire preuve de clarté quant à leurs intentions et instaurer un climat de confiance avec les participant.e.s, afin qu’ils comprennent parfaitement le projet et leur rôle.

Les entretiens pourront explorer différentes questions ou différents sujets en fonction du rôle des personnes interrogées. Voici quelques questions recommandées pour lancer le processus :

Personnes à interviewer et leur rôle
 People who developed the initial innovation concept
 People who are involved in the innovation to date
 Actors directly or indirectly related to the innovation
 Such as consumers, clients, beneficiaries, providers, producers, employees etc.
 Interest in and capacity to enable or impede innovation through policy, programs, funding, tools and other supports
 You may also want to include sustainability experts to provide context for the innovation and draw on insights from other research to inform case description.
 They are not necessarily scientists but people with long experience and/or professional knowledge.

Tableau 2 : exemples de questions à poser

N’oubliez pas de conserver en toute sécurité les données collectées lors des entretiens car vous en aurez besoin pour l’étape 2.

Focus of questions, suggested topics:

Meeting the interviewee
Example questions:
  • Please introduce yourself

Focus of questions, suggested topics:

Interviewee’s role and link to the innovation including practices, interactions with other stakeholders
Example questions:
  • What is your role as part of the innovation initiative? What are your activities and practices related to the innovation? Who do you interact with?

Focus of questions, suggested topics:

Perceived or expected impacts/changes related to the innovation
Example questions:
  • What has changed and/or been impacted in the food system by this innovation? Have ideas and/or practices about food changed because of this innovation?What has changed for the environment, the people, health, economy, governance?
Two columns of green boxes, three on the left and two on the right, give examples of focus questions and suggested topics.
Two columns of green boxes, three on the left and two on the right, give examples of focus questions and suggested topics.

Focus of questions, suggested topics:

His/her knowledge about the innovation: background and history, main activities, actors involved and concerned
Example questions:
  • What is the primary purpose of the innovation? How has the innovation evolved and who is affected? What are the enabling and constraining factors and the challenges of achieving the innovation? What are the main activities of the innovation?

Focus of questions, suggested topics:

Their vision for the innovation and the perspectives
Example questions:
  • What do you think about the sustainability goals for the innovation? What do you see as the future for the innovation?

Don’t forget to store the data collected during the interviews, in a table for example, you will need it for step 2.

Ressources

vignet-Interview-guide-Mexico
Shared experiences and feedbacks from other users: Interview guide Mexico
vignet-Interview-guide-rabat
Interview guide SPG Agroécologie Maroc
vignet-Interview-guide-hanoi
Interview guide Hanoi
vignet-typology-of-stakeholder-analysis-methods-for-natural-resource-management
Reed, M. S., Graves, A., Dandy, N., Posthumus, H., Hubacek, K., Morris, J., ... & Stringer, L. C. (2009). Who's in and why? A typology of stakeholder analysis methods for natural resource management. Journal of environmental management, 90(5), 1933-1949.

Innovators

  • People who developed the initial innovation concept
  • People who are involved in the innovation to date

Innovation actors

  • Actors directly or indirectly related to the innovation
  • Such as consumers, clients, beneficiaries, providers, producers, employees etc.

Policy makers and/or funders as appropriate

  • Interest in and capacity to enable or impede innovation through policy, programs, funding, tools and other supports

Experts

  • You may also want to include sustainability experts to provide context for the innovation and draw on insights from other research to inform case description.
  • They are not necessarily scientists but people with long experience and/or professional knowledge.

Rainbow diagram for classifying stakeholders according to the degree they can affect or be affected by a problem or action (from: Chevalier and Buckles, 2008). dans la publi de Reed at al.

rainbow-diagram-for-classifying-stakeholders

Interest–influence matrix for Integrated Management of Floodplains RELU Project showing stakeholders with property rights.

New proposition, Urbal-specific :

Considerations

  • Roles of interviewees and the power dynamics. It is very important  to create a safe space to facilitate dialogue with interviewees.

  • Ask interviewees to suggest additional key informants.
     
  • How many? We suggest between at least 5 and ideally more than 20 interviewees. Based on the guidelines, you need to use your judgment and go with the number that makes sense in your particular situation.

Resources

Bailleurs,

Urbal peut vous aider à :

  • Comprendre les changements et les impacts d’une innovation

  • Mieux saisir les enjeux et identifier les catalyseurs d’une innovation

  • Potentiellement suivre et évaluer l’impact des innovations financées

  • Evaluer le potentiel d’une innovation en termes d’impact sur une durabilité à plus long terme.

Chercheurs et chercheuses,

Urbal peut vous aider à :

  • Mieux comprendre les innovations pour une alimentation durable, et comment elles contribuent à l’autonomisation et à la durabilité des systèmes alimentaires

  • Rassembler acteurs et actrices de ces innovations au sein de collectifs multi-acteurs, pour produire des évaluations inclusives et représentatives, fondées sur l’intelligence collective

  • Identifier les freins et les leviers des innovations

  • Développer éventuellement des indicateurs pour suivre et évaluer les progrès vers la durabilité.

Décideurs et décideuses politiques,

Urbal peut vous aider à :

  • Structurer un panorama des innovations pour une alimentation durable œuvrant dans votre territoire

  • Comprendre, intégrer et promouvoir ces innovations

  • Acquérir les connaissances dont vous avez besoin pour renforcer des politiques alimentaires durables, et surmonter les obstacles à la durabilité des systèmes alimentaires.

  • Développer et améliorer l’évaluation des innovations pour une alimentation durable

  • Utiliser les données probantes d’Urbal pour développer des programmes et politiques plus adaptés.

Acteurs et actrices des innovations
pour une alimentation durable,

Urbal peut vous aider à :

  • Comprendre et guider vos actions pour remplir des objectifs de durabilité

  • Recueillir les informations dont vous avez besoin pour prendre de meilleures décisions

  • Communiquer clairement la valeur de votre innovation aux publics concernés, et ainsi attirer davantage de financement

  • Créer un réseau au sein de votre territoire

  • Développer si vous le souhaitez des indicateurs pour suivre et évaluer vos progrès vers la durabilité.

Scale

The capacity of single initiatives to contribute to the transformation of sustainable food systems is weak if they are not likely to be replicated, imitated, networked, amplified, supported and disseminated at multiple scales (scaling capacity).


It is useful to consider different ways of scale for an innovation (Riddell and Moore, 2015):

  • “Scaling out” is impacting greater numbers. Strategies may include the replication or the spreading of projects and programs geographically and/or to greater numbers, or the dissemination of principles, knowledge, experiences, with the adaptation to new territorial contexts.
  • “Scaling up” is about impacting laws and policy (in legal terms, policy governance, commodity chain structuring, etc.),
  • “Scaling deep” is impacting cultural roots. That means spreading big cultural ideas and using stories to shift norms and beliefs, or investing in transformative learning and communities of practice.
  • “Scaling here” ? 

 

Urbal can, through the participatory method and result sharing, accompany changes of scale by strengthening the capacity of practitioners to disseminate their innovations and contribute to the transition towards more sustainable food systems.


How? It helps stakeholders to reflect on the conditions, barriers and levers to spread their innovations to other scales.

Ressources

  1. Video/pictures: scale picture (Source: Riddell and Moore, 2015, p.3) → visual
  2. Shared experiences and feedbacks from other users: n/a
  3. Urbal tools to help users : n/a
  4. In-depth insights to download: So What 14.

Social innovation

According to Bouchard, Evers & Fraisse (2015), social innovation is an “intervention initiated by social actors to respond to an aspiration, meet a need, provide a solution or take advantage of an opportunity for cultural action in order to modify social relations, transform a framework of action or propose new orientations. From this point of view […] social innovation aims to modify the institutional frameworks that shape relationships in society”.

In URBAL, we consider social innovations when found the following characteristics:

  • They want change, responding to a social or societal need or seizing an opportunity for activating minor or major changes in society (Chiffoleau 2016).

  • They Are inclusive, seeking to benefit the whole society by the sharing of the value produced (economic, social, environmental,…)

  • They include collaborative or participatory activities.

    • There is therefore an intentionality to change the situation in relation to the previous situation, to improve one or more aspects of the life of individuals.

    • Social innovations are embedded in a value system, they are not intrinsically good and what is undesirable (problems) and desirable (solutions) can change over time.

Ressources

  1. Video/pictures: rechercher l’interview de Veronica sur la définition d’innovation sociale (?) (Elodie ?)
  2. Shared experiences and feedbacks from other users:
  3. Urbal tools to help users :
  4. In-depth insights to download: Master thesis Veronica : BONOMELLI V. Building a participative tool to map the impact pathway of urban driven innovations on food systems sustainability: how to consider specific features of social innovation? : Master thesis. Montpellier Supagro, 2018, 50p, So What 14.

Urbal participatory tools

Participatory engagement is at the heart of the Urbal methodology.

  • This approach relies on experts (not necessarily scientists but people with long experience and/or professional knowledge) and practitioners to be successful and provide useful insights. This means that all knowledge and experiences are equally valuable and valid.

  • A participatory process helps people to engage with others and reinforces stakeholders’ understandings and relationships.
  • A participatory process requires skills and tools supported by Urbal.

Ressources

Shared experiences and feedbacks from other users:

How to map change?

To enter the logic of the URBAL method at this point you can ask what has changed since the implementation of the innovative activity, namely the path of change that was triggered by the activity.
In order to answer this question, you use an Urbal’s representation of an impact pathway.
Impact pathway: a graphical chart that maps how an activity can generate short-term and medium-term changes to achieve long-term changes also called impacts.
Changes : transformations/consequences induced by an innovative activity
Impact: long-term changes linked to sustainability, caused by short and medium changes.

 

Ressources

  1. Video/pictures: Pictures of the explanation of what an impact pathway is (see above) Ask Està to make it clean → Visual

  2. Shared experiences and feedback from other users: example of an impact pathway completed by the participants (MIRI) – PDF files :

  3. Urbal tools to help users : example of impact pathway map to be completed (Example of Milano Ristorazione → tool to ask Està to do in English . The columns include: innovative practice, activities, short-term changes, medium term and long term changes/impacts, sustainable dimension, factors (with drivers and barriers).

    → Miniature

  4. In-depth insights to download:

    Master Thesis – Impact pathway methodology literature review

What are sustainable food systems?

A sustainable food system “provides healthy food to meet current food needs while maintaining healthy ecosystems that can also provide food for generations to come, with minimal negative impact to the environment; encourages local production and distribution infrastructures; makes nutritious food available, accessible, and affordable to all; is humane and just, protecting farmers and other workers, consumers, and communities.

(Story et al. 2009).
(Ref: Story M, Hamm MW, Wallinga D (2009) Food systems and public health: linkages to achieve healthier diets and healthier communities. J Hunger Environ Nutr 4:219–224).

There are many different opportunities to make the world we live in more sustainable through food systems. The key Urbal dimensions of sustainability are:

  • Health : food security (access, quality, regularity…), nutrition, well-being, physical activity…
  • Governance : transparency, power dynamics, people’s participation, accountability…
  • Environment : protection of biodiversity, renewable resources, energy efficiency, climate resilience…
  • Social-cultural : equity, community building, confidence in the system, positive expression of social and cultural identity and culture…
  • Economic : equity, resilience, fair work and remuneration, local economies…
5 green circles form a pentagon to illustrate the 5 dimensions of sustainability. The Economic symbol is a shopping cart and a euro, the symbol for Health is a bowl with vegetables, the symbol for Governance is a government building, the symbol for Social-Cultural is traditional Japanese architecture, and the symbol for Environment is a hand holding a seedling.

Ressources

  1. Video/pictures: diagram of the dimensions of sustainability à voir avec Està → visual
    to research external brief explanatory pedagogical videos (Ophelie looks in the resources of the Unesco Chair and in the URBAL video) → visual
  2. Shared experiences and feedbacks from other users: n/a
  3. Urbal tools to help users : In-depth insights to download: IPES FOOD : FROM UNIFORMITY TO DIVERSITY – PDF file – A paradigm shift from industrial agriculture to diversifed agroecological systems