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Good practice Imported

Embrapa's Technology-Transfer & Impact-Assessment Programme — Brazil's Public Agricultural R&D Pipeline

Brazil · Brasília · See the Brazil profile · See the Brasília profile

Evidence: Descriptive / self-reported Top 39% 71/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

Brazil's Embrapa runs a formal four-phase technology-transfer and impact-assessment pipeline for its agricultural research. Its 2021 evaluation of 152 projects found R$18 of economic return for every R$1 invested in 2020 — R$61.85 billion in social profit and about 41,000 jobs.

18 BRL return per BRL 1 invested
Economic return per unit of public investment (2020)
61.85 BRL billion
Aggregate social profit generated (2020)
~41,000 jobs
Jobs generated in Brazilian agriculture (2020)
6 %
Private-sector co-financing share of Embrapa projects (2018)
20 %
Private-sector co-financing share of Embrapa projects (2021)

Details

Maturity
Established
Promoter
Embrapa (Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuária)
Period
Ongoing since 1973; figures reported for 2020 (published 2021)
Keywords
agriculture, public R&D, technology transfer, extension services

Context

Embrapa (Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuária), Brazil's federal agricultural research corporation headquartered in Brasília, operates a dedicated technology-transfer function that moves research through four phases: identifying technological demand, developing and executing projects, disseminating and transferring the resulting technology, and formally evaluating its economic, social and environmental impact.

Activities

Embrapa applies this four-phase pipeline and impact-assessment methodology on a recurring annual basis across its research portfolio, with its president reporting that private-sector co-financing of Embrapa projects rose from 6% in 2018 to 20% in 2021, against an internal target of 40% by 2023.

Results

An evaluation covering 152 Embrapa projects, published in April 2021 for the 2020 reference year, calculated a return of R$18 for every R$1 the federal government invested in the corporation, translating into R$61.85 billion in aggregate social profit and roughly 41,000 jobs generated in Brazilian agriculture that year — a reported 4% improvement over the 2019 assessment.

Implementation
Indicative cost
High (€500k–€5M) — Reported federal public budget of roughly R$3.8 billion for the period, alongside growing private co-financing of individual projects.
Time to results
Long (> 3 years) — Operating continuously since 1973, with the four-phase transfer/impact-assessment methodology applied on an annual cycle.
Staffing & skills
Embrapa research and technology-transfer teams, Dedicated impact-assessment methodology unit

Conditions for success

  • Formal four-phase pipeline (demand identification, project execution, dissemination/transfer, impact evaluation)
  • Recurring annual impact-assessment cycle enabling year-on-year comparison
  • Rising private co-financing (6% to 20%) diversifying away from sole public funding

Common failure modes

  • Continued heavy dependence on the roughly R$3.8 billion public budget reported for the period if the 40%-by-2023 private co-financing target is not met
  • Impact figures are self-assessed by Embrapa rather than independently audited

Where it fits

Governance type
Federal public agricultural research corporation
Scale
National
Income level
Upper-middle-income (Brazil)

Commonly funded by

National / regional programmes

Indicative funding routes for practices of this type — always check each programme's current calls and eligibility rules.

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Data sources

Where this practice's information was retrieved from, and when.

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