Communities of Practice (CoPs) are groups of people in organizations who come together to share what theyknow, to learn from one another regarding some aspects of their work and to provide a social context for that work.Through our work in Value Chain Partnerships, we have found that communities of practice (CoPs) functionstrategically as:1. Catalysts for cooperation of diverse interests to create solutions for food and fiber producers andbusinesses;2. Hubs which create, capture, document, and leverage knowledge and deploy this knowledge astechnical assistance to assist value chain partners;3. Magnets to attract funding, and for leveraging, channeling, and distributing funding to researchand development efforts for differentiated food and fiber products; and4. Scouts to identify emerging value chain opportunities with high potential to deliver economicbenefit to sustainable agriculture stakeholders.
