Agricultural Innovation and New Ventures: Assessing the Commercial Potential

Abstract

Innovation and new ventures have been part of the food production and distribution industry for decades if not centuries. In recent times, new ventures under the banner of valueadded agriculture have become the mantra for producers, politicians, and agri-businesses that are searching for better margins and higher incomes than provided by traditional commodity production and distribution. But, the commercial potential of value-added ventures and innovations is not obvious, often is not realized, and may be frequently overestimated. In fact, studies of new business start-ups in agriculture and other sectors indicate that a high proportion of those businesses fail during the first twelve months of operation, and many are not sustainable even after this most vulnerable start-up period (SBA).The objective of this paper is to provide a framework for assessing the commercial potential of innovation in agriculture. We highlight the four critical components of market analysis essential to successful innovation and new ventures, those are the assessment of customers, competitors, sustainable competitive advantage, and internal capabilities. We identify and describe where concepts of economics

Export Marketing Arrangements in Four New Zealand Agriculture Industries: An Institutional Perspective

“…However, we found some indications that deregulated marketing arrangements promote innovations to a lesser extent in established industries such as the pipfruit and meat industries. The New Zealand wine and kiwifruit industries can be seen as new industries, therefore attracting entrepreneurs promoting industry innovations (Carswell & Gunaratne, 2005;Gray, Boehlje, Amanor-Boadu, & Fulton, 2004).…”

An Exploratory Study on Technological Innovation of Agricultural Science and Technology Enterprises in China

“…In spite of the advantage of technological resources, a part of enterprises are lack of market advantage. To transform a technological advantage into a market advantage, AST enterprises should strengthen market innovation and improve marketing capability [20] [21]. In addition, R&D and marketing capabilities are also the key point of combination of technological innovation theory and marketing theory.…”

Complex Adaptive System

“…John Deere's GPS auto-steering tractor's project (Gray, Boehlje, Amanor-Boadu, and Fulton, 2004) has low market uncertainty with medium technical uncertainty ( Figure 3). A strategic efficiency analysis suggests an in-house activity or tight governance structure based on John Deere's strong capability in machinery manufacturing and commercialization and a potential for sustainable competitive advantage.…”

“…Over the last 150 years, there have been several waves of innovation related to machinery, chemistry, seed, information management (Graff et al, 2003;Gray et al, 2004).…”