Sustainable intensification: increasing productivity in African food and agricultural systems

Posted on 5 Apr 2011 by Peter Ballantyne (ILRI) • Leave a comment

The February 2011 issue of the journal International Journal of Agricultural Sustainability contains a series of case studies from Africa on ‘sustainable agricultural intensification’ -“defined as producing more output from the same area of land while reducing the negative environmental impacts and at the same time increasing contributions to natural capital and the flow of environmental … Continue reading →

Africa / Agriculture / Cattle / Dairying / Livelihoods / Malawi / Pro-Poor Livestock / Southern Africa / Women

A woman and her cow: Of bovine bank loans and entrepreneurship

Posted on 1 Apr 2011 by Susan MacMillan • Leave a comment

In Khulungira Village, in central Malawi, farmer Jinny Lemson, 32, started acquiring livestock with her husband ten years ago as an investment. Neither grew up with animals. First they bought chickens, then goats, then pigs, sheep, and cows. They also have ducks, cats and dogs. They grow all the feed on their farm. ‘Our life … Continue reading →

Africa / Asia / BecA / CGIAR / Directorate / Film and video / Latin America / Research

CGIAR ‘Voices for Change’ short film inspires visions of the future

Posted on 31 Mar 2011 by Susan MacMillan • Leave a comment

A short (4:25-minute) film, ‘Voices for Change’, produced by the Fund Office of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), was launched at the CGIAR 2009 Business Meeting in Washington DC. This video aims to inspire CGIAR stakeholders to shape a future that they want to see through the work of the CGIAR and … Continue reading →

Africa / Asia / Latin America

New aid argument shakes up gloomy consensus around development

Posted on 31 Mar 2011 by Susan MacMillan • Leave a comment

In the Guardian‘s Poverty Matters Blog this week, Madeleine Bunting discusses ‘Charles Kenny’s cheerful polemic counters the current development pessimism on aid. ‘After plenty of aid pessimism, here is a relentlessly cheerful polemic, Getting Better, which is delighting development experts in the US and the UK. Charles Kenny’s book celebrates an era of unprecedented human … Continue reading →

Africa / Agriculture / Asia / CCAFS / Drylands / DRYLANDSCRP / ILRI / Impact Assessment / Latin America / LIVESTOCKFISH / Research

40 impacts of 40 years of CGIAR Research: 1971–2011–and an update

Posted on 30 Mar 2011 by Susan MacMillan • Leave a comment

The Fund Office of the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) recently produced two publications summing up past and current accomplishments in the CGIAR. What the CGIAR has accomplished in 4 decades First is a brochure celebrating, and listing, 40 impacts of 40 years of CGIAR Research: 1971–2011, which provides the following assessment. ‘The … Continue reading →

Africa / Agriculture / Asia / CGIAR / CRPs / Latin America / Research

Leaner, more efficient, international agricultural research–CGIAR

Posted on 29 Mar 2011 by Susan MacMillan • Leave a comment

A new brochure, ‘Changing agricultural research in a changing world,’ in long and short versions, has been produced by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) on why the CGIAR has reformed and how the world will benefit. The following is a transcript of the short version. ‘Agriculture in the developing world faces unprecedented … Continue reading →

Africa / Animal Production / Drought / ILRI / Pastoralism

Killing the ‘crisis narrative’ in African pastoralism

Posted on 28 Mar 2011 by Susan MacMillan • Leave a comment

Dan Murphy, a food-industry journalist and commentator, picked up the story we recently ran on a Future of Pastoralism in Africa Conference, held at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and says the following in Drovers CattleNetwork. ‘Dry, dusty, deserted. ‘Those would be apt descriptions of the photos and descriptions most … Continue reading →

Africa / Agriculture / BecA / Biotechnology / Burundi / Capacity Strengthening / Directorate / East Africa / Ethiopia / ILRI / Kenya / Rwanda / Tanzania / Uganda

‘Bio-Innovate Program is opportunity for Kenya and the region’–Shaukat Abdul Razak (NCST)

Posted on 28 Mar 2011 by Susan MacMillan • Leave a comment

Shaukat Abdul Razak and Björn Häggmark cut a cake to celebrate the launch the Bio-Innovate Program on 16 March 2011; looking on is ILRI director general Carlos Seré (right) and other invited guests (photo credit: ILRI/Mungai). The Africa Science News Service reports on a recently launched Bio-Innovate Program at the InternationalLivestock Research Institute (ILRI). ‘. … Continue reading →

Africa / Agriculture / BecA / Biotechnology / Burundi / Central Africa / East Africa / Ethiopia / ILRI / Kenya / Rwanda / Tanzania / Uganda

Swedish-funded Bio-Innovate Program tackling 6 ‘orphan’ food crops of East Africa

Posted on 23 Mar 2011 by Susan MacMillan • Leave a comment

Portrait of Joyce Ledson, a farmer growing four ‘orphan’ food crops of the poor—beans, cassava, potato and sweet potato—as well as the ubiquitous maize, in Malawi (photo credit: ILRI/Mann). ‘. . . Six orphan crops chosen for a five-year programme called Bio-resources Innovation Network for Eastern Africa Development (Bio Innovate) are sorghum, millet, cassava, sweet … Continue reading →

Africa / Animal Production / East Africa / Livestock / Livestock Systems / Pro-Poor Livestock

Focus of livestock policies in Horn of Africa can be sharpened

Posted on 20 Mar 2011 by Peter Ballantyne (ILRI) • Leave a comment

The IGAD Livestock Policy Initiative just published a working paper on “Livestock and Livelihoods in the IGAD Region: A Policy and Institutional Analysis.” The paper recommends that first and foremost, the dominant ‘production and market access’ narrative should be enhanced by a development paradigm that also appreciates the many livelihoods services provided by livestock, including … Continue reading →