The war in Ukraine was barely a month old when Augusto Bassanini, chief executive of United Grain Corp., received an unusual signal from the global wheat market. The Washington-based grain exporter, owned by Japanese trading company Mitsui & Co., normally routes its products across the Pacific Ocean to Asia. In March, though, an Egyptian importer that hadn’t done business
The war in Ukraine has pushed prices of agricultural products to historically high levels, and concerns about global food security occupy headlines and world leaders’ minds, as demonstrated by recent IMF and World Bank meetings. So far, much of the attention has focused on grains, particularly wheat—because of its importance in diets, and the predicament of countries where wheat accounts for
Representatives of the Government of Mexico, the Embassy of India, the National Agricultural Council, the CGIAR and the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) at the Sanjaya Rajaram Experimental Station in Toluca, State of Mexico. (Photo: Alfonso Arredondo Cortés/CIMMYT) Collaboration between food security institutions and research organizations has contributed to improvements in global grain production that have benefitted millions
Breeders and breeding operations staff across Africa are amping up their skills and solving shared problems with colleagues across crops and countries. It’s all part of a series of CGIAR Excellence in Breeding (EiB) workshops, in partnership with the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA). The workshops titled “Breeding Scheme Design Using Quantitiative Genetics” and “Africa Breeding Operations” have run twice, targeting crop breeders
With an estimated annual research portfolio of more than USD 900 million, CGIAR aims to reduce rural poverty, improve food security, human health and nutrition, and improve the sustainable management of natural resources. Undergoing an ambitious structural reform, a reformulated One CGIAR will address new challenges in international agricultural research while keeping up with emerging crises. Under this ambit, monitoring, evaluation
The rapid evolution of global food safety systems in response to population growth, urbanization, climate change and other socio-economic factors poses many food safety challenges. Globally, unsafe food causes an estimated 600 million illnesses and 420,000 deaths annually, with Africa disproportionately bearing the highest burden of foodborne diseases. To effectively tackle the challenge of foodborne diseases in Africa, a team
IITA and Tanzania Agricultural Research Institute (TARI), through the Muhogo Bora (Better Cassava) program, recently organized an intensive training for extension officers, district agricultural officers, and regional agricultural advisors working in the Western Zone of Tanzania. The training is part of efforts to support the development and expansion of seed systems in the cassava subsector. The five-day-long training was held from 14 to 18 March
Scientists and communication specialists from various Kenyan organizations participated in a four-day training workshop to improve gene editing communication. Thirty-five participants graduated from the workshop and received certificates. Participants, all of whom are from Kenya, included scientists conducting gene editing research, science writers, representatives from academia, MSc and PhD students in biotechnology and breeding, and a representative of a farmers’ consortium. The