Category Archives: Project

Africa / Animal Breeding / Animal Production / Biodiversity / Cattle / Gambia / Goats / ILRI / Indigenous Breeds / Livestock / Project / Report / Research / Sheep / Small Ruminants / West Africa

The Gambia’s hardy native ruminant livestock surveyed in bid to improve their conservation and productivity

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Although livestock play a central role in rural development in West Africa, traditional livestock systems have high death rates, low reproductive rates and low offtake rates. Furthermore, the presence of trypanosome-infected tsetse flies in the sub-humid and humid areas hurts the potential for livestock production. The region’s endemic ruminant livestock, however, are highly adapted to … Continue reading →

Africa / Agriculture / Crop residues / Crop-Livestock / East Africa / Ethiopia / Event / HUMIDTROPICS / ILRI / Intensification / Livestock / Livestock Systems / Project / Research / South Africa / West Africa

Experts meet in Addis Ababa to design new agricultural research project for Ethiopian Highlands

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Around 60 experts are meeting at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) in Addis Ababa on 30th and 31st January to plan an exciting new research project that aims to transform agricultural systems in the Highland of Ethiopia. As in many part of Africa, farming systems in the Ethiopian Highlands are a mix of crop … Continue reading →

Africa / Agriculture / Crop-Livestock / Farming Systems / Ghana / HUMIDTROPICS / ILRI / Intensification / Mali / Project / Research / West Africa

Transforming African agricultural systems through sustainable intensification: Project design workshops

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As part of the US government’s Feed the Future initiative to address global hunger and food security issues in sub-Saharan Africa, the US Agency for International Development (USAID) is supporting three multi-stakeholder agricultural research projects to sustainably intensify key African farming systems. Based in three priority agro-ecological zones, the three projects are focused on sites … Continue reading →

Drought / Drylands / East Africa / Ethiopia / Food Security / ILRI / Insurance / Kenya / Pastoralism / Pro-Poor Livestock / Project / Vulnerability

To insure or not to insure: That is the question for Kenyan herders restocking after the great drought of 2011

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The first payouts for livestock insurance being made in Marsabit District, in northern Kenya (photo on Flickr by Jeff Haskins). From Reuters AlertNet comes this update on how the livestock herders of Kenya’s Marsabit District are faring. Some bought an innovative livestock insurance product this year that is being piloted by the International Livestock Research … Continue reading →

Africa / Animal Breeding / Animal Diseases / Disease Control / East Africa / Epidemiology / Ethiopia / ILRI / Indigenous Breeds / Livestock / Poultry / Project / Research

Tackling poultry diseases in Ethiopia

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Developing countries such as Ethiopia have many indigenous chicken varieties which are well adapted to local environments as they are excellent foragers, better able to avoid predator attacks and demonstrate better immunity to common diseases. However, due to relatively low genetic potential and poor levels of husbandry, most of these indigenous chicken breeds grow slowly … Continue reading →

Africa / Animal Feeding / Ethiopia / ILRI / Innovation Systems / Livestock / Livestock Systems / Project / Report / Research

Ten lessons on multi-stakeholder networks and innovation platforms

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For the November 2011 ‘liveSTOCK Exchange’ event at ILRI, Keith Sones and Alan Duncan prepared an issue brief with lessons on ways to establish and facilitate multi-stakeholder networks on smallholder agriculture in developing countries. … Between 2007 and 2010, the Fodder Adoption Project (FAP) – funded by the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and … Continue reading →

Drought / Drylands / DRYLANDSCRP / East Africa / Food Security / ILRI / Insurance / Kenya / Pastoralism / Project / Vulnerability

Remote Kenya livestock herders receive their first drought insurance payouts

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ILRI staff help local livestock herders in Kenya’s Marsabit District understand how they might benefit from a new ‘index-based’ livestock insurance policy scheme, which is providing 650 herders who paid for this insurance with their first payout this month, following the loss of forage due to a drought that hit Marsabit as well as much … Continue reading →

Africa / Animal Production / Canada / Capacity Strengthening / East Africa / Ethiopia / ILRI / IPMS / Livestock / Markets / Project / Value Chains

Canadian parliamentarians see how markets work for Ethiopian farmers

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Members of the Canada-Africa Parliament Association on their visit to Ethiopia (photo credit: ILRI/Zerihun Sewunet). On 10–11 October 2011, six members of the Canada-Africa Parliament Association (4 parliamentarians and 2 senators) visited Ethiopia. At the request of the Canadian Embassy, the CIDA-funded IPMS project at ILRI organized a field visit to Ada’a District—one of the project’s … Continue reading →

Africa / East Africa / Film and video / ILRI / Knowledge and Information / Livestock / Niger / PIM / Policy / Project / Research / Tanzania / Uganda / West Africa

Improving livestock data in Africa–Policy perspectives

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The ‘Livestock Data Innovation Project’ is a three-year project to pilot and develop ways to identify, collect and analyze livestock data in three countries: Uganda, Tanzania and Niger. In its second year, representatives of several partners in the organization share their video perspectives on livestock data and its management. Here Kristin Grote from the Bill … Continue reading →

Animal Production / Asia / Film and video / ILRI / India / Livestock Systems / Markets / Pigs / Project / Research / South Asia

Living livestock research: Towards policies for people and pigs in northeast India

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For the past several years, the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) has worked on a project to better livelihoods through improvement of livestock production and marketing in northeast India that is funded by the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD). In this 8-minute video, ILRI’s Pier-Paolo Ficarelli, a knowledge management specialist based in India, reports … Continue reading →