Futures approaches in ICT for agriculture policy development in South Africa: Using value chain frameworks to enhance validity

Futures methodology is a structured means of visioning and presenting possible futures, and is used to inform policy development and decision making. The Futures approach is inherently participatory, allows multi disciplinarity and demands critical thinking. However, the quality of policy that is developed, based on Futures approaches, is unclear. The value chain approach could provide a more comprehensive, systemic view and could serve to structure the Futures approach and direct its output towards value creation, with the overall goal of rural economic development. This article describes a process to develop policy for the role of ICT in agriculture in the context of various drivers of rural economic development in South Africa. This is accomplished through the examination of the outputs of a Futures workshop with government role players and mapping thereof against a value chain framework.