Agro-innovation centres in horticulture

Kovács, Teréz

Keywords: agricultural employment, development of the economy, horticulture, cooperation, POs

In the three settlements being described, transformation of the agriculture to market economy started off from different positions and therefore agricultural innovation took different, but successful paths. In Soltvadkert, success was mainly won through individual strategies, primarily because entrepreneurship started off not at the time of the reorganisation of the country’s political system, but earlier.
In the case of both Kisvejke and Mórahalom, developments were initiated by one or two external individuals, and local initiatives gained momentum after trust and cooperation strengthened. It is very important that the external person intending to bring developments should not only be professionally qualified but also unselfish, likeable and reliable to the locals.
Prosperous undertakings based on labour intensive agriculture were created in the small village of Kisvejke, in the area of Mórahalom, which has a high number of scattered rural households, as well as in the small urbanised city of Soltvadkert. Wherever these branches of agriculture are growing, there is plenty of (day-labour) work for the poor, uneducated, unskilled layers of society, and wherever such opportunities are present, no large numbers of impoverished families are typically found. Providing jobs for the poorer unemployed layers of society has become the most important issue for the development of settlements. This issue is addressed successfully in the three settlements presented in the paper.

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