Six water-thirsty departments in western Honduras began experimenting with the online water planning platform Agua de Honduras and its irrigation source mapping tool AGRI in 2017. These allow local water actors to plan better with a wealth of data, yet the challenges they tackle – water access, sustainability and the agricultural impacts of climate change – are not local, but
Most families in Myanmar rely on agriculture to make a living. Water is literally life for tens of millions of its people, enabling them to grow crops and put food on the table. It is vital that water is distributed equitably within and between villages, enabling each family to get their fair share and irrigate their fields, especially in times
BY ELS LECOUTERE,MARRIT VAN DEN BERG AND ALAN DE BRAUW Effective food systems innovations—defined as policies, technologies, and/or institutional innovations that trigger changes in food systems dynamics and outcomes—can help produce healthier, more sustainable outcomes, and are essential to confront our current global challenges, which are formidable. Food insecurity persists around the world, along with high rates of micronutrient malnutrition and
Climatic uncertainty means that smallholder farmers need to have more confidence in the seeds they use. Therefore, the CGIAR Research Program on Water, Land and Ecosystems (WLE) and Alliance of Bioversity International and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) lead a Seeds for Needs program targeting these farmers with a diverse range of seeds that are able to thrive
Dr. Michael Baum, ICARDA’s Acting Deputy Director General for Research, Research Team Leader of Breeding and Scaling Improved Varieties of dryland cereals and pulses, and Morocco Research Platform Manager sheds light on ICARDA’s innovations in breeding programs in our new video. Our breeding programs encompass staple dryland crops such as wheat, barley, chickpea, faba bean, lentils, and lathyrus. To
As the climate crisis intensifies, populations grow, disease and pest proliferate, and natural resources diminish, genetic improvement of crops within holistic breeding programs is crucial to reaching global food security. For over 40 years, ICARDA scientists, under a mandate from CGIAR, the world’s biggest agricultural research network, have developed innovative crop improvement technologies and approaches to enhance and scale-out climate-smart
Monitoring and tracking of the key drivers as well as the outcomes of food systems transformation is critical for the transformation to be sustainable and inclusive. Due to close linkages among sectors, the risk levels on both supply and consumption sides also need to be evaluated. This message was delivered during an Independent Food Systems Dialogue last week in the
Pearl millet and sorghum are the staple food crops in Sahelian countries with 80% of cultivated area and more than 49% of food consumption needs being covered by these crops. “Putting the required tools and technologies in the hands of farmers to achieve food security has already led to increased supplies of valuable goods and services, higher cash incomes and