ASSP / HUMIDTROPICS / ILRI / Innovation Systems / PIL / Policy / Report / Research

Innovation platforms to shape national policies in agriculture

Innovation platforms are widely used in agricultural research to connect different stakeholders to achieve common goals. This second brief explains and illustrates ways that innovation platforms contribute to the development, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of policies. Continue reading

Africa / Animal Diseases / Biotechnology / Directorate / Disease Control / ECF / ILRI / ILRIComms / ILVAC / LIVESTOCKFISH / Opinion piece / USA / Vaccines

Vaccine cliff-hanger (‘parasite page-turner’) on Gates’ blog

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation blog, Impatient Optimists, is running a piece about ‘an unusual story . . . unfolding in Africa, where the battle against a cattle-killing disease called East Coast fever is quickly becoming a cliff-hanger.’ The article is written by Jimmy Smith, director general of the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), … Continue reading

Africa / Animal Diseases / Cattle / Disease Control / ECF / ILRI / ILRIComms / ILVAC / Kenya / LIVESTOCKFISH / Vaccines

New battle starts up against the ‘cancer/malaria’ of cattle in Africa

‘The International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) has launched the project funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in the fight against the disease that the agency says kills an animal every 30 seconds in East and Central Africa. Continue reading

Africa / Animal Production / Article / Cattle / Dairying / Kenya / Livelihoods / Markets / Pastoralism / PIL / Value Chains

East Africa Dairy Development Project featured in Kenya Airways’ February 2014 Msafiri in-flight magazine

I was travelling on a short flight from Nairobi to Mombasa yesterday and was glad to read about the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) and its partners of the East Africa Dairy Development (EADD) Project in the Kenya Airways in-flight magazine in the seat pocket in front of me. A four-page full-feature article (see pages 100-104) … Continue reading

Agriculture / Asia / Crop-Livestock / Event / Farming Systems / Humid Tropics / HUMIDTROPICS / PIL / Research / Vietnam

Condensing lots of information into a situational analysis report: think about key messages

As promised six months ago, the Humidtropics situational analysis being conducted in the Northwest Vietnam action site is now ready to share its first lessons. This preliminary research activity of the Humidtropics CGIAR research program has been coordinated by Steve Staal, Regional Representative for Southeast Asia of the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI). It has … Continue reading

Africa / Animal Feeding / Biodiversity / Crop residues / East Africa / Ethiopia / Event / Feeds / Forages / Genebank

ILRI upgrades its nutrition analysis laboratories in Addis Ababa

On 10 January, the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) inaugurated new nutrition laboratories at its Addis Ababa campus. Feed quality is in good hands again. The importance of feed quality Feed quality reflects the ability of a given feed to meet the daily nutrient needs of animals consuming the feed. Tremendous variation exists in nutrient … Continue reading

Agriculture / Article / Biotechnology / Climate Change / Disease Control / Genetics / ILRIComms

The holy grail in agricultural genetics is within sight: But will it make a difference to feeding the hungry?

Work in the genetic resources program at the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (photo on Flickr by CIAT/Neil Palmer). Are promising genetically modified food crops doomed to stay in greenhouses? What about crops whose bits (of bits) of their genomes have been ‘precision edited’ with the help of new genome engineering tools (Talens and Crispr) … Continue reading