Category Archives: Regions

Award / Dairying / ILRI / ILRIComms / India / Markets / Pro-Poor Livestock / South Asia / Women

‘Milk: Symbol of a free India’–16-year-old wins award in Commonwealth Society essay competition

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Nirja Bhatt, a silver medal winner in the 2013 Royal Commonwealth Society Essay Competition (photo credit: Purvi Mehta-Bhatt). Nirja Bhatt, a 16-year-old student at Navrachana International School Vadodara, in Gujurat, India, has won a Silver Award in the ‘senior’ category of this year’s Royal Commonwealth Society Essay Competition. This year’s topic, ‘Opportunity through Enterprise’, received more … Continue reading →

Agriculture / Animal Production / Asia / Buffalo / Crop residues / Crop-Livestock / Farming Systems / Humid Tropics / HUMIDTROPICS / Livelihoods / PIL / Southeast Asia / Vietnam

Is there an integrative role for livestock in agricultural systems? Positive insights from Vietnam

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I have just come back from Sapa, Vietnam, where I helped facilitate the launch meeting for the situational analysis of the CGIAR Humidtropics Research Program in northwest Vietnam. After the meeting, and to get a better idea of the situation of the farming systems we will be studying with our local research and development partners, I … Continue reading →

Agri-Health / Animal Diseases / Animal Health / Disease Control / East Africa / Ethiopia / Food Security / ILRIComms / Insurance / Kenya / Pastoralism / Presentation / Scaling

Scaling up quality agro-vet livestock services with SIDAI. ‘Livestock live talk’ at ILRI, 5 September 2013

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Livestock farmers in Africa struggle to access good quality inputs, effective knowledge and fair markets. Regulation of the livestock input sector is very weak in Kenya, allowing unqualified people to open shops selling veterinary pharmaceuticals; many of which are counterfeit or under-strength. This leads to extensive misuse of drugs through poor diagnosis and administration of products. … Continue reading →

Agriculture / Animal Production / CGIAR / Environment / Farming Systems / Gender / Humid Tropics / HUMIDTROPICS / Innovation Systems / Livelihoods / PIL / Southeast Asia / Vietnam

Northwest Vietnam situational analysis shapes up for CGIAR Humidtropics Research Program

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On 15 and 16 August 2013 the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) organized the launch meeting for situational analysis work in northwest Vietnam of the CGIAR Humidtropics research program. Jo Cadilhon represented the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) in the meeting and helped facilitate the process. He reports on the outcomes. Humidtropics aims to help poor farm families, … Continue reading →

Animal Diseases / Animal Production / ASF / CBPP / Epidemiology / Livestock / Nigeria / PIM / PPR / Trypanosomiasis / West Africa

Estimating the financial costs of animal disease burden, morbidity and mortality in Nigeria

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Nigeria’s agriculture sector generates one-third of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and employs two-thirds of the workforce. Its recent growth dominates Nigerian non-oil economic growth. Small-scale, semi-commercial farms, settled agricultural households and transhumant pastoralists dominate production. Livestock is the second largest agricultural subsector and features 16.43 million cattle, 34.69 million sheep, 55.15 million goats, 7.18 … Continue reading →

Cattle / Forages / Goats / ILRIComms / India / Intensification / Pro-Poor Livestock / South Asia / Vulnerability

Nepal’s livestock sector: In demand and in decline?

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Livestock fodder on road between Chitwan District and Pokhara, Nepal. An ILRI-CSISA (Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia) project on the Indo-Gangetic Plains of Chitwan District, in south-central Nepal, began in Sep 2010. Project staff are introducing residue-based feeding strategies supplemented with green fodder and concentrates to increase cattle and buffalo milk production (photo credit: ILRI/Susan … Continue reading →

Agriculture / Article / Dairying / Europe / ILRIComms / Nutrition / Pastoralism

Europe’s ‘milk revolution’: First Neolithic cheese-making, then a genetic mutation allowing lactose persistence

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Oscypek, a ‘must taste’ when visiting Polish mountains, is the most famous cheese in Poland today; it is made from salted sheep milk, smoked and formed in traditional wooden forms (photo credit: Tom Karas/PolishFoodInfo.com). In 2011, Mélanie Roffet-Salque, a geochemist at the University of Bristol, UK, found signatures of abundant milk fats — evidence that early farmers, … Continue reading →

Africa / Agriculture / Event / Food Security / Gender / Presentation / Research / Women

African women feeding Africa

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Below are some highlighted remarks made by Vicki Wilde, director of African Women in Agricultural Research and Development (AWARD), based in Nairobi, Kenya, at a presentation she made at the sixth Africa Agriculture Science Week (AASW6), organized by the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA), in Accra, Ghana, 15-20 July 2013. A full transcript of … Continue reading →

Drought / Drylands / East Africa / Geodata / ILRI / Insurance / Kenya / Pastoralism / PIL / Vulnerability

Livestock keepers in Kenya’s northern Isiolo District to get livestock-drought insurance for first time

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Livestock farmers and herders in Kenya’s northern Isiolo District will soon be able to insure their animals against drought using an index-based insurance product (photo credit:  Raimond Duijsens/NLRC). Three institutions have agreed to a Sh1.15-billion deal to reduce the effects of drought on pastoralists in Isiolo, in northern Kenya, where livestock farmers and herders have … Continue reading →

Central Africa / East Africa / Event report / Geodata / ILRI / PIL

New web portal ‘AgInvest’ to track agricultural investments in Africa

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Graphic recording of securing sustainable funding session at the ILRI Annual Program Meeting (APM 2013) 15–17 May 2013, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (credit: ILRI). ‘AgInvest, a new web portal that will track resource allocation to the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) by governments, development partners and other stakeholders is set to be released in 2013. … Continue reading →