The 2018 World Prize for Integrated Development has been awarded to Mrs Graça Machel for her significant social justice achievements and tireless work on behalf of women and children. Continue reading
Rural farmers in Zimbabwe and the whole of Southern Africa are set to receive a major boost in their livestock production through the expected launch of the beef value chain finance initiative this year. The initiative, whose pilot project was successfully undertaken in Swaziland, includes a loan scheme for smallholder farmers who want to take up beef fattening for the market. This came out during the on-going International Conference on Livestock Value Chain and Access to Credit being held in Ezulwini, Swaziland. Continue reading
The African Chicken Genetic Gains project is on a mission to bring ‘more productive chickens to African smallholders’. Led by ILRI, and backed by the deep pockets of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the African Chicken Genetic Gains project aims to improve the genetic makeup of African chickens. The initiative, which is initially being rolled out in Ethiopia, Nigeria and Tanzania, is part of what the Microsoft founder has called his ‘big bet’ on chickens, which also includes a promise to donate 100,000 of the birds to families and communities in the world’s poorest nations. . . . Continue reading
Maria Teresa Correa, an epidemiologist and public health professor at North Carolina State University, and Delia Grace, a veterinary epidemiologist and food safety scientist at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), have an interesting chapter on an interesting subject — Slum livestock agriculture — published in the Encyclopedia of Agriculture and Food Systems (2014). Continue reading
Authored by Jemimah Njuki and Pascal Sanginga, this book provides empirical evidence from Kenya, Tanzania and Mozambique and from different production systems of the importance of livestock as an asset to women and their participation in livestock and livestock product markets. It explores the issues of intra-household income management and economic benefits of livestock markets … Continue reading
Innovation platforms are a complex and some would say a not-so-straightforward approach. Nevertheless, ILRI, other CGIAR centers and other partners are using this approach in various projects such as the Nile Basin Development Challenge, IMGoats and the recently-completed Fodder Adoption and Fodder Innovation projects. What are innovation platforms exactly? This poster gives some ideas. … Continue reading
Residents of Barack Obama’s families village of Kogelo, Kenya, celebrate his inauguration (photo by Zoriah on Flickr). The United Nations reports that the war against poverty is progressing well in some places. ‘Some of the world’s poorest countries have made impressive gains in the fight against poverty, but the least developed countries still lag in … Continue reading
In many of the world’s dry areas, goats provide poor people with nutrition and livelihoods. An imGoats Project is working to transform the lives of goat keepers in India and Mozambique by turning their subsistence-level goat production into viable and profitable enterprises. This two-year (2011–2012) project aims to improve the performance of small ruminant value … Continue reading
Customers rush to buy bread, a staple in high demand in Mozambique, after it arrives at a bakery in the south of the country as wheat ran short and food prices rose in 2008 (photo credit: ILRI/Mann). A leader for a special report on feeding the world’s growing population, published in the Economist recently (24 February … Continue reading
Speaking at a recent meeting on the ‘Impact of U.S. Support on Farming, Poverty and Stability in Mozambique’, Florencia Cipriano, Head of Veterinary Services in Mozambique, described the country’s poultry sector transformation. This transformation included the establishment of the Mozambican Aviculture Association (AMA) that “enabled new poultry farmers to form sustainable businesses, helping them understand … Continue reading
ILRI Clippings 