A study looking for additional sources of resistance to the deadly fungal disease of banana, black Sigatoka, has identified 11 new accessions that are potential sources of resistance to Pseudocercospora fijiensis. These accessions are from a collection of banana germplasm maintained by IITA at Sendusu, Wakiso District in Uganda. They can be used to broaden the current narrow genetic base for ongoing efforts to
Oluwadamilare Opadotun is the secretary of the Start Them Early Program (STEP) club at Vetland Senior Grammar School in Lagos. She was one of the panelists that discussed teachers’ and students’ experiences in teaching and learning agriculture during the I-Youth Connect conference, organized by the Innovative Youth in Agriculture (I-Youth) project in Lagos recently. The I-Youth project through the STEP component is
The impact of the IITA youth program Start Them Early Program (STEP) is far reaching; it goes beyond focusing on students alone and influences teachers to make the right entrepreneurial decisions to generate more income for themselves. The communities, by extension, enjoy the intervention because of the numerous benefits from the program, including the provision of pipe-borne water, solar power, bright students,
IITA-Tanzania recently hosted the Board Chair of the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), former Ethiopian Prime Minister H.E. Hailemariam Desalegn, and the former Tanzania President H.E. Jakaya Kikwete, who is also an AGRA board member and senior staff of the organization. H.E. Desalegn was in the country to familiarize himself with AGRA’s work in Tanzania and meet
CGIAR Kicks Off the CWANA Consultations Early this July, CGIAR invited over 120 delegates from government and National Agriculture Research and Extension Services (NARES) from across the Central and West Asia and North Africa (CWANA) Region to gather together for the first of a series of CGIAR online consultations about the future agricultural needs of the region. These
When drought starts to set in somewhere in South Asia or Africa, there is no time to lose. Access to real-time information on impending drought means that governments and farmers can take timely steps to prepare and put risk management plans into action. Such access has been achieved by the pioneering South Asia Drought Monitoring System (SADMS), a practical drought
Today the Board of Trustees of the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) announced leadership changes. The Board approved the appointment of Martin Kropff, current Director General of CIMMYT, as Global Director of Resilient Agrifood Systems of CGIAR. He will play a critical role in enabling an effective transition to the new structure of CGIAR and implementing the CGIAR
As climate change threatens water and food security in Africa, small solar pumps could irrigate millions of smallholder farms. But which farmers are in the right spots to benefit? The companies deploying these technologies need to navigate a complex landscape where solar irrigation must be part of a sustainable package of solutions to water scarcity, not become part of the