Many wonder if plant breeding can achieve much in the African drylands because the growing conditions there are so harsh. Historically, most breeding successes have occurred where water is ample, as for irrigated wheat and rice.

But too many lives are at stake to shun the challenge. In 1972 the CGIAR created the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), which has since worked closely with national partners across the developing world to improve and disseminate the dryland cereal crops sorghum and millet and the legume crops chickpea, groundnut (also called peanut) and pigeonpea.

As a result, farmers now grow improved varieties on about a million hectares across Africa. Particularly remarkable are the adoption rates across southern Africa for improved millet (34%) and sorghum (23%). Also with high adoption rates are sorghum in southern Chad and adjacent parts of Cameroon (30%), millet in Namibia and Zimbabwe (50% or more), and pigeonpea in the Babati district of Tanzania (35% or more).

Seasonal hunger, as occurred in Niger in 2005, is a perennial plague of the drylands, which have only one short cropping season per year. Plant breeding has helped ease the hungry period by developing varieties that mature weeks or even months sooner than traditional varieties. Not only does this put food in hungry bellies, but farmers of early maturing varieties benefit by getting the year’s highest prices. Another crucial advantage of early maturity is that it reduces farmers’ risk in years when rains end early.

The millet variety Okashana 1 in Namibia, selected largely by farmers themselves, matures 4-6 weeks earlier than previous varieties. It was so popular that it spread in just a few years in the late 1990s to cover half of the country’s millet-growing area. The sorghum variety Macia is currently spreading across East Africa for the same reason.

Some of the largest dryland breeding gains have come from developing resistance to devastating diseases. The wilt-resistant pigeonpea variety Mali is now saving the livelihoods of East African dryland farmers, and resistance to groundnut rosette virus, a scourge that the native Hausa people of Nigeria tellingly call “groundnut leprosy,” is raising hopes for a revival of this huge income-earning crop.

Studies of return on investment suggest that the effort has been well worth it. The $3 million effort to create and disseminate Okashana 1, for example, is returning net annual benefits worth 50% of the investment year after year. This rate of return that far outstrips what can be earned from bank deposits or the stock market, while directly helping society’s poorest. Of course, cash value is only one measure of success, dwarfed by the priceless good of alleviating human suffering.