Résumé
Developing new technologies is a necessary, but not the only required condition for increasing agricultural production in a sustainable way and improving rural livelihoods. Since the 1980's, serious questions have been raised relating to the economic, social and ecological constraints associated to Green Revolution technologies (Swanepoel and Stroebel, 1999). They refer to unsatisfactory conditions of technology transfer and to the undesirable social and environmental impact of some of these technologies. To address the challenges of rural development, a shift is therefore required to adapt research practices. After presenting the context for this type of research, this introductory note will highlight the challenge for designing and validating methods that could facilitate the planning of agricultural and rural development at Local Government level. Special attention will be paid to the need for reliable and relevant information systems and to support stakeholders' co-ordination process (part 3). The role of research in this context will finally be discussed (part 4). (Résumé d'auteur)