CABI Blogs: hand picked... and carefully sorted

Irrigation facilities to enhance all year seed supply by farmers in central Uganda

Lack of access to quality seed, particularly of traditional crops that are not well integrated into the formal sector, remains a key challenge for increased productivity of these crops in African farming systems.

CABI, working with national and regional partners, aims to strengthen seed systems in Africa through developing farmer seed enterprises and linkages to markets. Focus has been on traditional varieties that are farmer-preferred for their nutrition, food security, income and environmental sustainability. This is aimed at enhancing access to quality seed of farmer-preferred varieties locally, nationally and regionally.

CABI board member Akhter Mateen explains how CABI is delivering on SDG1: No Poverty

 

One in five people in developing regions still live on less than $1.25 a day and many of these are the 500 million smallholder farmers around the world.

But CABI is working hard to help small-scale farmers lift themselves out of poverty. We collaborate with people and organizations working across the supply chain that brings food from 'field to fork', helping farmers receive a fairer share of the value they create.

CABI board member Roger Horton explains how CABI is delivering on SDG4: Quality Education

 

Sharing scientific agricultural and environmental information helps people tackle global challenges like food security.

CABI creates resources that give access to science-based information on agriculture and the environment. Our mission is to improve people's lives worldwide by sharing knowledge. As a scientific publisher we produce materials for academics and researchers that make education easier and lifelong learning a reality.

Capitalising on Africa’s agriculture to achieve ‘zero hunger’

 

 

It’s a sobering fact that, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), nearly 233 million children, women and men in Africa went to bed each night hungry in 2014-16.

CABI Board Member and 2017 Africa Food Prize winner Professor Ruth Oniang’o has devoted her career helping farmers grow nutritious and healthy crops, to not only help reduce hunger but to achieve sustainable and profitable livelihoods.

Building a climate-smart value chain: The role of research, development and technology

This is the second of a two-part blog series following my visit to Africa supported by CABI’s development bursary

The first blog in this series described the Africa Cassava Agronomy Initiative (ACAI) and how it aims to improve cassava agronomy to increase production and productivity, as well as how ACAI partnerships could build a climate-smart cassava value chain. This second blog is about the role research, development and technology in building the resilience of the cassava value chain. It talks about how agricultural diversification can help farmers and other cassava value chain actors adapt to the uncertainties of climate change through intercropping and sustainably intensifying cassava production.

Tourism and sustainable development in Africa

People who are aware of CABI through our work in agriculture, the environment, plant protection, or invasive species management, are sometimes surprised to find that we are also engaged in tourism, primarily through publishing books and database products. With tourism in overcrowded Western cities such as Barcelona and Venice increasingly seen as a problem rather than an asset, where does tourism fit in with sustainable development and improving livelihoods? A clue is given by 2017 having been designated the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development by the United Nations, and the inclusion of tourism in Goals 8, 12 and 14 of the SDGs. And a report published this week by the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) highlights how flourishing tourism in Africa is putting millions of people to work and adding billions of dollars to national economies.

Building a climate-smart cassava value chain: The role of partnerships

This is one of a two-part blog series following my visit to Africa supported by CABI’s development bursary

In June 2017, I visited Zanzibar, Tanzania, to attend a 5-day planning meeting organised by the Africa Cassava Agronomy Initiative (ACAI). The purpose of this planning meeting was to bring together all project partners to identify project milestones and discuss scale-up strategies.  

6 lessons learned on organising a stand at an ‘international development’ event

Public events are a great opportunity to make CABI more visible and enlighten others on how our work is improving livelihoods all over the world. As a regular on the conference circuit, I know the value and challenges of organising a stand at an event. Most recently I attended the 1^st All Africa Post Harvest Congress and Exhibition in Nairobi, Kenya. Even before I finished setting up the stand, I could guarantee visitors would ask me questions like, “So what does CABI do?” and “Where is CABI based?” – I was proved right, but came prepared for organising a stand at an event. Here are 6 lessons learned I want to share with you.

CABI’s Good Seed Initiative contributes to seed policy dialogue and review in Tanzania

Photo: Agricultural extension worker of Arumeru district interacting with a seed grower contracted by Alpha seed company in Arusha. Photo credit: Kansiime, CABI

CABI’s Good Seed Initiative (GSI) aims to improve the seed systems of small-scale farmers in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.  A GSI project funded by Irish Aid has been implemented in Tanzania and Uganda (2013-2016) to increase production and consumption of African Indigenous Vegetables (AIVs) and also strengthen AIV seed system to deliver quality seed.

Intra-household survey – Tanzania

This blog piece was originally posted on the ASHC blog

Over the past few months the GALA delivery team has been trying to understand how households in Tanzania obtained and share information on farming practices. This will help us to understand the effectiveness of different communication approaches in delivering agricultural information to small-scale farmers.  It will also help us to reflect on which currently change attitude and behaviour.