Agriculture / Asia / Climate Change / India / Knowledge and Information / Research / South Asia

Dependence on borrowed research has cost India

Even as the Indian Network for Climate Change Assessment — dubbed “the Indian Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)” — released its first report on the impact of climate change in four regions of the country, it admitted that significant research gaps and lack of extensive databases were hampering Indian climate science. Long-term localised data … Continue reading

Africa / Asia / CCAFS / Climate Change / Research / South Asia

New scientific body to address ‘Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security’

Sahelian sheep look for food before the mosque at Djenne, in Mali (photo credit: ILRI/Mann). A new research program on ‘Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security’ (CCAFS) was launched this week. It will link much of the best climate-related agricultural research for development work going on at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) and 14 … Continue reading

Africa / Animal Feeding / Asia / Fodder / Forages / India / Innovation Systems / Insurance / Livestock Systems / Nigeria / South Asia / West Africa

Improving smallholder fodder through better knowledge as well as technologies

Busy fodder market in Hyderabad, India; farmers transport their fodder to this market, where it is bought by urban dairies (photo credit: ILRI/Mann). The magazine Farming Matters ran a feature on a Fodder Innovation Project funded by the UK Department for International Development and conducted since 2003 by the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) with … Continue reading

Africa / Agriculture

We need to change the image of agriculture in Africa–Namanga Ngongi

Namanga Ngongi, president of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa, at the World Economic Forum annual meeting, in Davos, Switzerland, 2008 (photo credit: Andy Mettler for World Economic Forum). With the right support and help, farming can transform lives of millions of people in Africa, argues Namanga Ngongi, president of the Alliance for … Continue reading

Asia / Pakistan / Pro-Poor Livestock / South Asia

Pakistanis risk their lives for their livestock

Displaced people fleeing Sindh streamed into Balochistan (photo credit: Abdul Majeed Goraya/IRIN); by 4 August 2010, Pakistan’s worst flooding in 80 years had affected 3.2 million people. A report last August 2010 from Reuters AlertNet about Pakistan’s struggles to move its flood victims out of danger highlights how important livestock are to Pakistan’s poor. Many … Continue reading

Africa / Asia / Climate Change / Latin America

UN climate chief confident Cancun will establish a ‘Green Fund’ to help developing nations cope with climate change

Christiana Figueres, the Costa Rican Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (photo credit: Adopt a Negotiator’s Photostream on flickr). Despite the fact that governments of industrialized countries are focusing on balancing their budgets in these hard fiscal times, new UN climate chief Figueres is optimistic that a deal will be struck … Continue reading

Asia / Climate Change / Environment / Pakistan / South Asia

Keep funding pots for climate change and development issues separate: both are needed–Potsdam scientist

Last month, the Ministry of Environment of Pakistan, in collaboration with One UN Joint Programme on Environment, based in Islamabad, which supports Pakistan in fulfilling its international obligations towards environmental treaties and agreements, organized an International Conference on Climate Change and Development, 21–22 October 2010, in Islamabad, Pakistan, to take stock of the unfolding effects of … Continue reading

Animal Production / Asia / CGIAR / Markets / Pigs / Southeast Asia / Trade / Vietnam

Pork pathways out of poverty in Vietnam

The UK Meat Trade News Daily reports on pork pathways out of poverty in Viet Nam. ‘Low labour costs and their ability to supply buyers with freshly slaughtered meat, a form most Vietnamese continue to prefer to the chilled or frozen meat from bigger piggeries. These are the conclusions of a three-year research project led … Continue reading

Agriculture / Asia / ILRI / South Asia / Women

IFPRI-ILRI launch gender and agriculture project

An inception workshop for the ‘Gender, Agriculture and Assets Project’ was held at the ILRI Nairobi campus from 5 – 7 November 2010. The aim of the initiative is to increase the impacts of agricultural development programmes in reducing gender inequalities, asset disparities, and improving rural livelihoods in Sub-Saharan Africa and South East Asia. Read … Continue reading

CCAFS / Climate Change / North America / Research

Climate scientists take their arguments to their skeptics

Climate scientists gather at a meeting of the Challenge Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) in Nairobi, Kenya in May 2010 (photo credit CCAFS). The Los Angeles Times reported on 8 November 2010 that climate scientists in the US are joining forces and taking their arguments to groups of global warming skeptics. … Continue reading