ILRI recently hosted a stakeholder meeting for the HEALTHY FUTURES project that aims to assist in mitigating the risk of outbreaks and transmission of three water-related vector-borne diseases (VBDs) in eastern Africa: malaria, schistosomiasis and Rift Valley fever (RVF). Continue reading
Category Archives: A4NH
A4NH / Agri-Health / Animal Feeding / Animal Health / Animal Products / BecA / Burkina Faso / CGIAR / Dairying / Disease Control / Epidemiology / Film and video / Food Safety / FSZ / Ghana / Human Health / ILRI / ILRIComms / Kenya / Launch / Mali / Nigeria / Project / Senegal / Tanzania
Aflatoxins: New briefs disclose the threat to people and livestock and what research is doing about it
A damaged maize cob that, if harvested with clean cobs, can contaminate all the cobs with aflatoxins (photo credit: Joseph Atehnkeng/IITA). ‘The UN World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that billions of people in the developing world are chronically exposed to aflatoxin, a natural poison on food crops which causes cancer, impairs the immune system, inhibits … Continue reading
A4NH / ASSP / East Africa / Food Safety / FSZ / ILRI / ILRIComms / LIVESTOCKFISH / Pigs / Uganda / Value Chains
Uganda: Where a pig in the backyard is a piggybank for one million households–and rising
Uganda is the leading consumer of pork in sub-Saharan Africa, according to the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI). Over 2.3 million pigs are kept by one million households in Uganda for consumption, says the institute which further indicates that the majority of pigs are kept by women in smallholder households. Continue reading
A4NH / Cattle / Dairying / Disease Control / East Africa / Feeds / Food Safety / FSZ / Human Health / ILRI / ILRIComms / Kenya / Value Chains
Are aflatoxins contaminating the milk you’re drinking in Kenya? New research to find out
The International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) has commissioned research to ascertain the levels of aflatoxins in the milk consumed in Kenya. Studies say every Kenyan consumes over 145 litres annually-higher than other Africans – increasing the risk of milk-related aflatoxins. Continue reading
A4NH / Animal Production / Dairying / Nutrition / Uganda
Improved dairy cows in Uganda: Pathways to poverty alleviation and improved child nutrition
The introduction and dissemination of improved dairy cow breeds in Uganda is arguably the most significant step taken to develop a modern and commercial dairy industry in the country over the last two decades. This IFPRI study uses a nationally representative sample of Ugandan households to rigorously examine the impact of adoption of improved dairy … Continue reading
A4NH / Dairying / East Africa / Ethiopia / Nutrition
Cows, missing milk markets and nutrition in rural Ethiopia
In rural economies encumbered by significant market imperfections, farming decisions may partly be motivated by nutritional considerations, in addition to income and risk factors. These imperfections create the potential for farm assets to have direct dietary impacts on nutrition in addition to any indirect effects via income. This working paper from IFPRI tests this hypothesis for the dairy sector in rural Ethiopia, a context in which markets are very thin, own-consumption shares are very high, and milk is an important source of animal-based proteins and micronutrients for young children. Continue reading
India discusses micronutrient initiative – a silent solution to hidden hunger
On 24 January 2014, India’s National Dairy Research Institute (NDRI) organized a national-level experts’ meeting to discuss the issue of hidden hunger – a chronic lack of vitamins and minerals needed to survive, develop and live healthy and productive lives – and the ways of addressing this serious problem. Purvi Mehta, Head of International Livestock … Continue reading
A4NH / Disease Control / East Africa / Emerging Diseases / FSZ / ILRI / ILRIComms / RVF / South Sudan / Zoonotic Diseases
News media correction requested regarding recent misreport of Rift Valley fever outbreak
On 16 Oct 2013, a news release titled Outbreak of rift valley fever disease reported in RSS reported that there is an outbreak of Rift Valley fever in South Sudan. This is inaccurate. There is no outbreak of Rift Valley fever in South Sudan that we know of. Those quoted in the news release were participants … Continue reading
A4NH / Agri-Health / Dairying / East Africa / Emerging Diseases / Epidemiology / Human Health / ILRI / Kenya / Project / Zoonotic Diseases
From ‘urban cowboy’ to urban cow ban? That would be a mistake — raw vegetables can be more dangerous
A dairy cow on a smallholder farm in Ol Kalou, near Nairobi, Kenya (photo credit: ILRI/Paul Karaimu). Should farm animals share our cityscapes with us? While policies are often based on the prejudice that urban livestock keeping is unsafe, scientific evidence shows that poor people continue to benefit more than be harmed by raising livestock … Continue reading
A4NH / Agri-Health / Disease Control / East Africa / Emerging Diseases / Food Security / Human Health / ILRI / Kenya / Nutrition / Southern Africa / Zoonotic Diseases
Living with livestock, and livestock livings, in the city
Goat in Nairobi slum (photo on Flickr by The Advocacy Project). ‘. . . [L]et’s consider what it means to raise urban livestock in the developing world, where people are poorer and hungrier, and cities are much more densely populated. It’s a starkly different picture of people and animals living together, and the question of … Continue reading
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