NAIROBI, Kenya (CIMMYT) – “The focus of the CIMMYT Global Maize Program includes elements that are key to many breeding programs in Africa. It has made important strides in sub-Saharan Africa.”

These words were delivered by Rita Mumm, a member of the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) board of trustees and the coordinator of the Africa Plant Breeding Academy (AfPBA), which recently benefited from a wealth of knowledge shared by the CIMMYT Global Maize Program (GMP) team in Africa at the AfPBA training program held in June 2016 at the World Agroforestry Center.

The AfPBA is an initiative of the African Orphan Crop Consortium, a partnership of public and private organizations working together to sequence 101 crops of economic and nutritional importance to Africa. Students at AfPBA undergo a 13-month continuing education program delivered in three two-week sessions to learn about principles of plant breeding to enable use of advanced tools and technologies in breeding of crops relevant for Africa.

The CIMMYT team led by B.M Prasanna, director of CGIAR Research Program MAIZE and CIMMYT-GMP interacted with the trainees of the most recent session of the academy. The session was attended by 29 Ph.D. and master’s level scientists – including seven women – from 17 countries across Africa. The focus of the interactive session was to share knowledge on maize breeding work in sub-Saharan Africa and highlight the progress made in addressing various biotic and abiotic stresses affecting smallholders’ maize productivity in Africa.

The scientists learned about maize breeding work to develop improved maize varieties with farmer-preferred traits.  In particular, drought tolerance, nitrogen-use efficiency, nutritional enhancement, and disease resistance. In addition, presentation focused on the use of such modern technologies to increase efficiency and enhance genetic gains in tropical maize as molecular marker-assisted breeding and doubled haploid technology for maize improvement.

Collaborative efforts to strengthen the maize seed system for African farmers to access the improved new varieties was explained, as was the progress made with partners to increase farmer adoption as well as to replace the old varieties with the new climate resilient maize varieties.

“This is just one example of CIMMYT’s capacity development efforts that gives tremendous satisfaction. These breeding stories and highlights from Africa could have potential positive impact on the young scientists, as they are the key to further developing and deploying products that can make a difference in the livelihoods of the resource-poor smallholders in Africa,” said Prasanna.

The highlight of the training for many of the participants was the  tour to the Maize Lethal Necrosis (MLN) Screening Facility at Naivasha established jointly by CIMMYT and the Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organisation (KALRO) to screen germplasm against MLN (under artificial inoculation), including germplasm from several private and public institutions. The participants received hands-on training to identify symptoms of MLN-causing viruses and how to score MLN disease severity by screening germplasm at the site. In addition, a demonstration was conducted on screening for MLN through artificial inoculation.

“Our global and regional mandate gives us the opportunity to support scientists across Africa to build their capacity in plant breeding work as well as in socioeconomics and sustainable intensification practices. Scienstists get the opportunity to learn, share their experiences and grow further. Through such  trainings, we  see improvements in  technology uptake and use in various countries and regions across Africa,” said Stephen Mugo, CIMMYT regional representative for Africa.

In addition to the CIMMYT team, instructors included Lago Hale from the University of New Hampshire, Bruce Walsh from the University of Arizona, Allen Van Deynze from the University of California–Davis, and Rita Mumm from the University of Illinois.

NAIROBI, Kenya (CIMMYT) – Drought-related challenges in Africa call for proactive interventions rather than reactive ones. Every so often a drought hits, jolting the development community into action, and leading to the delivery of food aid to millions of people facing starvation — beneficial efforts in the short term, but futile for achieving lasting change.

The need for sustainable strategies that guarantee households remain food secure even when natural disasters strike is widely recognized throughout the international agriculture-for-development community and supported by the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals.

CIMMYT plays a significant role in supporting these efforts in Africa by developing drought-tolerant (DT) maize and wheat seeds that give smallholder farmers long-term solutions to recurring drought. Drought-tolerant maize varieties are scaled out through the Drought Tolerant Maize for Africa Seed Scaling (DTMASS) project.

The drought that has gripped much of southern Africa during the 2015/2016 agricultural season due to a disruptive El Niño went on record as the worst in 50 years, affecting an estimated 40 million people. While Malawi, Mozambique and Zimbabwe declared the drought a national disaster, Zambia managed to meet its national maize production average, thanks largely to smallholder farmers, who plant roughly 51% of the total cultivated land in the country.

As in most countries in sub-Saharan Africa, in Zambia rain performance determines crop performance; however, despite the late and erratic rains in 2015-2016, smallholder farmers have reason to smile. This good fortune is evident in Petauke district in Zambia’s Eastern Province, roughly 400 kilometers (250 miles) from the capital Lusaka, where granaries are packed to the brim thanks to the bountiful maize harvest.

At the recommendation of a fellow farmer, 36-year-old Miriam Piri, a mother of six, started planting a DT maize variety in 2013 under the Drought Tolerant Maize for Africa project. Realizing she was getting a bigger yield from the DT variety than a local one, Miriam continued to plant it.

“I grow DT maize variety PAN53 on roughly two hectares of land, and for the last three years my yields have been impressive,” said Piri. “I was a little anxious about my harvest because of poor rains, but I got the highest yield ever in three years!”

For its ability to thrive in both dry and wet conditions, and in low- to mid-altitude regions, PAN 53 is easily one of the most popular DT varieties in Zambia. In addition to its impressive yields, farmers enjoy the hybrid’s flint-type grain, which makes for easier and quicker pounding, and its densely packed cobs, which add up to more grain. PAN 53 is also resistant to leaf blight, gray leaf spot and ear rot.

Every season Piri plants 40 kilograms (90 pounds) of PAN 53, from which she harvested 45 50-kg bags in 2013. This was followed by yields of 35, 50 and 70 bags in 2014, 2015 and 2016, respectively.

PAN 53 is produced and distributed by Pannar, the largest independent seed group in South Africa, and one of the largest seed suppliers in sub-Saharan Africa. Pannar has the third largest market share in Zambia.

According to the Famine Early Warning Systems Network, Zambia is expected to substantially exceed national requirements this consumption year given its maize production of 2.87 million metric tons (MT) in 2016, combined with an estimated maize carryover stock of approximately 667,500 MT.

A few doors down from Piri is 66-year-old Piri Mwanza, who also plants DT maize. For Mwanza, planting a DT maize hybrid at the onset of this year’s drought was a risk he was willing to take. Throughout 44 years as a farmer, he knew only the local maize variety until an agro-dealer convinced him to try something new. He invested $37 to buy 20 kilograms of DT maize seed and fertilizer for his one-hectare farm. Despite poor rains, he harvested 55 bags of maize compared to 40 bags the previous year with the local variety.

“I’m impressed with my harvest, and will continue investing in DT maize even when the season gets better and the rains normalize,” said Mwanza.

Planting drought-tolerant varieties has proven to be a sustainable strategy for improving food security. Continuous efforts by CIMMYT’s DTMASS project to promote the benefits of improved varieties will go a long way toward convincing smallholder farmers to adopt them.

ADDIS ABABA — As Ethiopia struggles with its worst drought in 50 years, farmers pin their hopes on seed delivered through emergency seed projects.

“The situation last year was so bad that we could only laugh or cry,” said Rameto Tefo, a smallholder farmer from Tsiaroa district in central Ethiopia. “We were highly affected by the drought and we are now reliant on the assistance of the government and organizations such as CIMMYT. Without the seed provided to us from CIMMYT through the emergency seed project, I would have had to beg from my neighbors or just plant grain and hope that it germinated.”

Tefo would have had a difficult time begging for seed from his neighbors; the drought in this district was so severe that most farmers lost all their harvest. Furthermore, the effects of the strongest El Niño on record continued from 2015 into 2016 and the short belg rains that normally fall during March and April were erratic and scarce. By late April, the ground was once again dry and cracked, but the day before we visited Tsiaroa in early May, torrential rain had washed away roads and flooded houses and fields. No one knew whether this was late belg rains, or the start of the main rainy season, which would normally not occur until June.

In this district alone, 67 villages were affected by drought last year and produced little or no harvest. This meant that farmers were unable to save seed for planting this season, and also lacked the income to purchase seed. According to Bekele Abeyo, CIMMYT (International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center) senior wheat breeder/pathologist for sub-Saharan Africa, immediate large-scale support is critical to ensure that the food shortages encountered during 2016 do not balloon into a future crisis for Ethiopia. Abeyo is currently leading the emergency seed project being implemented by CIMMYT in collaboration with the Ethiopian government with support from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). The project’s primary partner, Ethiopia’s Agricultural Transformation Agency (ATA), is supported by a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Under this project, 50 tons of maize seed are being supplied to Tsiaroa district – enough for each of 4,000 farmers to plant 0.5 ha with improved, drought resistant maize.

“We are optimistic that the high quality maize varieties provided through the emergency seed project will help ensure the future food security of this region,” said Dagne Wegary, CIMMYT maize breeder and maize seed coordinator for the emergency seed project. “Thanks to the long-established network of CIMMYT experts, government development agents, and district focal people, we are able to provide a complete package of improved seed and agronomy advice.”

Nearby Zewai Dugda district was also severely affected by the drought, and now has more than 20,000 farmers in need of emergency seed assistance. CIMMYT is working alongside the government and other organizations to provide seed to 4,400 farmers under the emergency seed project.

It’s a complex logistical task to ensure that the correct farmers receive the right amount of seed, but storekeeper Embete Habesha in Zewai Dugda has everything under control. Farmers may request one of four varieties of drought-tolerant maize (three hybrids and one open-pollinated variety). Habesha is responsible for collecting information and fingerprint signatures from the farmers who receive seed. They are optimistic that – with normal growing conditions – they will be able to achieve yields of up to 4.4 tons/hectare.

Demetu Edao was one of the farmers scheduled to receive seed on the day we visited. She has a 1-ha plot in the village of Ubobracha where she grows teff and wheat, in addition to maize, and she uses the income to pay the school fees for her six children. Edao said she is grateful not only for the seed, but also for the assistance and agronomy advice she receives from government development agents and agriculture experts. Her neighbor and fellow farmer, Boti Decheso, joked that while he looks young, he feels old with the pressure of providing for a wife and two young children. Decheso hopes to use this seed to produce a successful harvest and save some seed for next year, while also ensuring his family has enough to eat. Any surplus maize will be sold so that the family can purchase some livestock and diversify its livelihood as a buffer against future financial and environmental shocks.

Through the emergency seed project implemented by CIMMYT, more than 226,000 households will benefit from the provision of maize, wheat, and sorghum seed. “We hope that this provision of emergency seed will enable Ethiopian smallholder farmers to quickly recover from the devastating drought of 2015,” said Abeyo. “Our unique and strong links with the Ethiopian government, the formal seed sector, farmers’ cooperatives, and partners such as ATA have allowed CIMMYT to quickly respond to farmers’ needs and provide more than 2,700 tons of seed to help ensure Ethiopia’s future food security.”

KIGALI, Rwanda (CIMMYT) – The recent designation of wheat as a strategic crop for Africa by the African Union in 2013 reflects the rising importance of wheat production on the continent. Since then, efforts have intensified to incorporate wheat production into existing farm systems and to help smallholders grow it to meet rising demand and reduce the economic impact of the high cost of imports.

The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) is contributing to these efforts through a project launched this month in Kigali, Rwanda. The four-year Enhancing Smallholder Wheat Productivity through Sustainable Intensification of Wheat-based Farming Systems in Rwanda and Zambia (SWPSI) project aims to enhance the potential of wheat produced by smallholder farmers to bolster food security.

“Given the increasing opportunities in wheat research, CIMMYT is happy to work with partners to help farmers adopt improved technologies, establish innovation platforms and strengthen wheat value chains in the two countries,” said Bekele Abeyo, Ethiopia country representative and wheat breeder at CIMMYT.

Zambia and Rwanda rank 46th and 59^th respectively in the list of wheat-producing nations, topped by China. Production in Zambia, where wheat grows on more than 40,000 hectares (99,000 acres), is largely undertaken by medium and largescale commercial operations in irrigated conditions with very little smallholder production. On the other hand, in Rwanda wheat is grown on about 35,000 hectares in rainfed conditions mainly by smallholder farmers.

“The contrast between the two countries will help generate wider lessons on variations and give an opportunity to test whether wheat is still a potential crop to produce profitably under smallholder systems,” said Moti Jaleta, CIMMYT SWPSI project leader.

The new project will target 4,000 smallholder farmers in the two countries, with a focus on increasing wheat productivity from the current 2.1 tons per hectare to an average of 4.5 tons per hectare.

Smallholders will also benefit from improved technologies, which include rust-resistant and high-yielding wheat varieties, such good agronomic practices as row planting, precise fertilizer application, plant density and planting dates. Additionally, threshing technologies to enhance grain quality and efforts to link farmers with established traders and millers to help them secure markets for their wheat surplus will be undertaken.

The project mandate includes a scoping study on the potential for smallholder wheat production in Madagascar, Mozambique and Tanzania.

Funded by the International Fund for Agricultural Development and the consortium of agricultural researchers, the CGIAR Research Program on WHEAT, SWPSI will be implemented under the leadership of CIMMYT in close collaboration with the Center for Coordination of Agricultural Research and Development for Southern Africa (CCARDESA), the Rwanda Agriculture Board and the Zambia Agricultural Research Institute.

Speaking during the launch, the acting executive director of CCARDESA, Simon Mwale, noted the rising demand for wheat, particularly in southern Africa, which also has a very conducive climate for wheat farming.

“Inclusion of Rwanda in the project is a unique opportunity for CCARDESA, and it will facilitate strong collaboration and new learning opportunities, being a new country to be covered by CCARDESA,” he said.

Experts hope SWPSI will contribute to the broader focus of the strategy to promote African wheat production and markets.

Some 30 key stakeholders met at a side event organized by CIMMYT at the recent 7th Africa Agricultural Science Week (AASW) to discuss how best to implement the region’s wheat strategy. The AASW and FARA General Assembly is the principal forum for all stakeholders in African agriculture science, technology and innovation to share solutions to some of the most pressing challenges the continent faces. CIMMYT’s SWPSI project is key to supporting the wheat for Africa strategy whose goal is to  increase agricultural productivity and food security throughout the region.

ISLAMABAD — A new planter that promotes dry seeding of rice, saves water and increases planting efficiency is being used increasingly in Pakistan’s Punjab Province.

Many farmers in Punjab alternately grow rice and wheat in their fields throughout the year, and the province produces more than 50% of Pakistan’s rice and 75% of its wheat.

Traditionally, rice planting involves transplanting 4-6-week old seedlings into puddled fields, a process that requires large amounts of water and labor, both of which are becoming increasingly scarce and expensive. Repeated puddling negatively affects soil physical properties, decreases soil aggregation and results in hardpan formation, which reduces the productivity of the following wheat crop.

Sustainable intensification aims to increase the productivity of labor, land and capital. Conservation agriculture (CA) relies on practices such as minimal soil disturbance, permanent soil cover and the use of crop rotation to maintain and/or boost yields, increase profits and protect the environment. It also helps improve soil function and quality, which can improve resilience to climate variability.

Dry seeding of rice (DSR), a practice that involves growing rice without puddling the soil, can save up to 25 percent of the water needed for growing the crop and reduces greenhouse gas emissions. However, the old fluted roller drills used for DSR do not guarantee uniform plant-to-plant spacing and break the rice seeds, requiring farmers to purchase more seed than otherwise needed.

In 2014, the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) imported a multicrop, zero-till planter from India that drills the seed and the fertilizer simultaneously while maintaining appropriate spacing between plants without breaking the seeds.

That same year, CIMMYT evaluated locally modified multicrop zero-till planters for dry seeding of Basmati rice at five sites in Punjab. As a result, the plant populations, tillers and grain yields at these sites were 10 percent higher compared to those at the sites where old fluted roller drills were used. During the current 2016 rice season, Greenland Engineering has so far manufactured and sold over 30 multicrop planters to rice growers across Pakistan.

CIMMYT’s initiative to spread the locally adapted, multicrop, zero-till planter throughout Pakistan was made possible through the Agricultural Innovation Program supported by the United States Agency for International Development, in collaboration with Greenland Engineering and Engro Fertilizers. National partners such as the Rice Research Institute Kala Shah Kaku, Adaptive Research Punjab and Engro Fertilizers are also helping to scale out the multicrop planter and other CA technologies throughout Punjab’s rice-wheat areas.

CIMMYT’s initiative to spread the locally adapted, multicrop, zero-till planter throughout Pakistan was made possible through the Agricultural Innovation Program, supported by the United States Agency for International Development, in collaboration with Greenland Engineering and Engro Fertilizers. National partners like the Rice Research Institute Kala Shah Kaku, Adaptive Research Punjab and Engro Fertilizers are also helping to spread the multicrop planter and other CA technologies throughout rice-wheat areas in Punjab.

NAIROBI, Kenya (CIMMYT) – A staggering 80% of the 67 million inhabitants of central Africa’s Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) rely on maize for food, despite the country’s underdeveloped national maize breeding and seed production program. The ravages of war may have limited development efforts, but renewed interest in the DRC by regional and global development partners will provide much needed infrastructure and knowledge sharing support.

Even with abundant resources such as water, labor and fertile land, availability of and access to quality seed remains a major hindrance to a thriving agricultural sector in the DRC. According to the state-run agricultural organization, Institut National pour l’Etude et la Recherche Agronomiques (INERA), North and South Kivu provinces in particular still import food from neighboring Rwanda, Uganda and Tanzania, with maize taking up the lion’s share of purchases.

Strategic public-private sector partnerships in agricultural research and development, such as the one between INERA, the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) office in Kenya, and the Alliance for Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), are an invaluable investment towards growth and sustainability of maize production in the region. AGRA funds multiple agricultural research projects in the DRC, while CIMMYT is renowned for its excellence in maize research globally. It is against this backdrop that breeders, agronomists, technicians and students gathered at the drought-tolerant (DT) maize site in Kiboko, Kenya, for a ten-day training course dubbed ‘Pollinations, Nursery and Trials Management’. The training, held from June 13 – 23, 2016, and jointly supported by CIMMYT and AGRA, and hosted by CIMMYT, emphasized hand pollination in maize variety development and seed multiplication.

Remarks by Stephen Mugo, CIMMYT Regional Representative for Africa, and Maize Breeder, highlighted training as one of the ways CIMMYT supports capacity building and development in the region.

He said, “It is my hope that knowledge and skills imparted during this course will be shared with other professionals at INERA, to improve maize breeding and production capabilities in the DRC.”

The course, organized by CIMMYT Maize Breeder, Lewis Machida, featured a mix of detailed lectures and practical exercises, expertly delivered by various CIMMYT scientists. Presentations covered topics such as basic seed production (hybrids and open pollinated varieties) and maintenance, breeding methods, and maize pollinations including hand pollination.

Hand pollination

Pollination, the process responsible for reproduction and continuity of plant life, is also a breeder’s playground, enabling shuffling of genes, plant adaptation and evolution. In maize breeding, this means development of seeds with tolerance to stresses such as drought, heat, pests and diseases.

Hand pollination, the general term for human intervention in this delicate process, can be further classified into self pollination, and cross pollination. As the name suggests, hand pollination is done by hand, calling for extreme care to minimize contamination and damage of plants.

“Successful production and maintenance of varieties depends largely on hand pollination. Without this process, it would be difficult to produce genetically pure seeds,” says Mugo, adding, “For this reason, hand pollination is considered the core of variety development in maize breeding.”

For the practical sessions of the course, participants deftly carried out the steps in hand pollination, including shoot bagging, pollen collection & placement, and detasseling.

Elois Cinyabuguma, Manager of INERA’s Cereal Unit, shared that the training offered much needed technical skills to scale up seed production in his country, saying, “With CIMMYT germplasm, and sound technical knowledge on multiplication, storage and pest & disease management, DRC is well on its way to setting up a well-rounded maize development program.”

Beyond building the DRC’s capacity for maize breeding and production in general, lessons from the training will be implemented first in North and South Kivu provinces, in hopes of reducing or eliminating maize imports. The event was also a unique opportunity to enhance collaboration among INERA, CIMMYT and AGRA, in anticipation of future shared projects pertaining to maize research, production and distribution.

All participants were issued with a certificate on successful completion of the course.

Presentations from the course are available here.

As the Rio 2016 Olympics draw near, team managers are rushing to recruit their best sportspeople from all over the country, put them through fitness tests, and get them to various stadiums before the starter’s gun goes off.

The team working on the Emergency Seed Support for Drought Affected Maize and Wheat Growing Areas of Ethiopia initiative is facing a similar challenge. But instead of recruiting long jumpers and marathon runners, they are tasked with procuring quality seeds of elite maize, wheat, and sorghum varieties and distributing them to farmers before the start of the main planting season to increase food security in regions devastated by recent droughts.

Dry conditions are not uncommon in Ethiopia, but the 2015-2016 El Niño – the strongest on record – has led to the worst drought in a decade. Harvests across Ethiopia were affected, leaving 10.2 million people – more than 1 in 10 Ethiopians – in need of emergency food assistance.

Planning for a food-secure future

The government of Ethiopia and international organizations are working to provide food aid for people facing immediate shortages, but Bekele Abeyo, senior wheat breeder and pathologist at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) for sub-Saharan Africa and leader of the emergency seed project, is focusing on a more sustainable future.

“Relief efforts will provide sustenance today, but we need to ensure there is also food on plates tomorrow,” says Abeyo. “With the large crop losses experienced in 2015, farmers were not able to save seed for planting in 2016 and did not have sufficient income to purchase more. Unless these farmers are able to access seed, we may face further shortages in 2017.”

CIMMYT, with support from the U.S. Agency for International Development, is working with partners to supply over 2,700 tons of seed to more than 226,000 households across 71 woredas (districts) in four regions of Ethiopia. CIMMYT will work with both the formal seed sector and farmers’ cooperatives to source quality seed from within Ethiopia and make sure it reaches the farmers who need it the most. These high-yielding, drought resistant varieties are being supplied along with agronomic advice to further increase farmers’ resilience.

Together with Ethiopia’s Agricultural Transformation Agency (ATA), a primary partner in the project, CIMMYT organized workshops in each of the target regions –Amara, Oromia, Southern Nations, Nationalities, and People’s Region (SNNPR), and Tigray – to engage stakeholders and collectively finalize the workplan. Based on participant feedback, some sorghum will now also be supplied to selected regions, in addition to maize and wheat.

“It is important to consider the needs of the individual communities and regions,” says Yitbarek Semeane, director of ATA’s Seed Systems. “ATA has very strong links with the regions and government institutions so is able to provide feedback on farmers’ needs and preferences. As weather patterns in Ethiopia are becoming increasingly unpredictable, many farmers are changing their farming practices, or even switching crops.”

A race against time

With the main planting season rapidly approaching, the team is racing to source, procure, certify, transport and distribute seeds.

“The success of this project will depend on us procuring enough quality seed and distributing it to farmers before the main planting season,” says Tadele Asfaw, CIMMYT-Ethiopia program management officer and member of the project’s Seed Procurement Committee.

By mid-April, the team had successfully procured almost all the required maize and sorghum seeds and were navigating the complex logistics to get the requested varieties to each woreda. Agreements are also being signed with farmers’ cooperatives to ensure that wheat seed can be purchased without disrupting the normal seed system.

According to Ayele Badebo, CIMMYT scientist and wheat seed coordinator for the project, CIMMYT does not have the capacity to collect seed from individual farmers within each woreda, but this is something the cooperatives are ideally placed to do. They have the trust of both CIMMYT and farmers, and through the previous seed scaling project, they know which farmers were given seed to multiply and will now have it available for sale.

At the end of March, the seed procurement team traveled to eastern Oromia – one of the areas most affected by the 2015 drought – to meet with Chercher oda bultum, a farmers’ cooperative and seed supplier. The team was very satisfied to see that the supplier had sufficient stock of Melkassa2 and Melkassa4, locally-adapted drought resistant maize varieties that had already been certified for germination and moisture by another collaborator, Haramaya University. This same process is now underway for wheat seed.

Ethiopia’s Bureaus of Agriculture and Natural Resources are also working with woreda representatives to ensure that the seed will be distributed to those farmers who need it most, and who have sufficient land and agronomic tools to benefit from this initiative.

“Working with local enterprises and partners enables us to procure and deliver seed to drought-affected farmers as quickly as possible,” says Abeyo. “In combination with CIMMYT’s longer-term efforts in the region, we hope that we can foster a more robust seed system and increase food security for 2016 and beyond.”

Partnering for success

While CIMMYT has the knowledge, networks and experience in Ethiopia to spring into action, the cooperation of partners such as the Agricultural Transformation Agency (ATA), farmers’ unions and Ethiopia’s Bureaus of Agriculture and Natural Resources is vital.

Established in 2010, the ATA is acting as a catalyst to spur the growth and transformation of Ethiopia’s agriculture sector. With funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, ATA is working with the Ministry and Regional Bureaus of Agriculture and Natural Resources to coordinate the collection, cleaning, packing, labeling and distribution of quality seed to drought-affected farmers, as well as help train development agents and raise farmer awareness.

EL BATAN, MEXICO (CIMMYT) — Genetically engineered (GE) crops are as safe to eat as conventionally bred crops and have benefited the environment and ecosystem diversity by reducing pesticide use, according to a study released by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences (NAS) earlier this month.

Conducted by a committee of 20 scientists chosen by the NAS to represent diverse disciplines relevant to the topic, the study brought together ample and broad-ranging evidence from the last 20 years, the period since the first commercial release of GE crops, regarding their impacts on yields, the abundance and diversity of insects, insecticide and herbicide use, the development of resistance to agrochemicals in weeds and pests, human and animal health and various other aspects of concern to society.

The committee collectively read 900 studies and publications, listened to 80 speakers at public meetings and webinars and reviewed over 700 comments and documents submitted by the public on GE crops past, present and future.

“Consumers and stakeholders have made diverse claims about GE crops, ranging from ‘they cause cancer’ to ‘we cannot feed the world without them,’” said Kevin Pixley, director of the Genetic Resources Program at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) and member of the committee authoring the report. “The report is both retrospective and forward-looking; it openly considers all credible views and evidence, and provides findings and recommendations on a wide range of issues pertinent to GE and future novel crops.”

Regarding health concerns, the committee found no conclusive evidence that GE crops have contributed to obesity, diabetes, kidney disease, autism, celiac disease or food allergies. The report also states that there is “no conclusive evidence of cause-and-effect relationships between GE crops and environmental problems.”

The committee raised a red flag regarding weed and insect species developing resistance to commonly used herbicides and pesticides where farmers had grown GE crops without following proper practices to avoid this development. The authors noted that these issues are not unique to GE crops and said they deserved special attention and research.

“The report contains a wealth of information about GE crops that enables readers to delve into the issues and topics of greatest interest or concern,” said Pixley. “Sweeping conclusions about GE crops are few, because the issues are multidimensional and often viewed differently by each individual.”

For the last 20 years some publics have waged a war on GE crops and urged they be banned from production. As one result, virtually no GE crops have been grown in most of Europe and calls for stricter labeling on GE products have also been made in countries including the United States and Canada.

The report states that regulators should not focus on genetic engineering or the process by which new crops are bred, but rather perform safety testing on individual products, based on their novelty and potential for adverse health or environmental effects.

Along the same lines, the study observed that a variety of new technologies, including gene-editing techniques, such as CRISPR/Cas9, which allow researchers quickly and efficiently to edit, cut out, and replace genes, are blurring the distinction between genetic engineering and conventional plant breeding.

“This is similar to the blurring of the differences between what we have been able do with our cell phones and computers over the last 20 years,” explained Pixley.

Included in the report is a list of traits, including those which can enhance nutritional value, food safety, forage quality and post-harvest storage, that are being or will likely be bred into future varieties using an expanding toolbox that includes genetic engineering, gene editing, genomic selection and others.

“This report provides a fresh perspective and proposes a conceptual framework for managing potential health or environmental risks of novel crop traits, regardless of which process or technology is used to breed them into our crops,” said Pixley “Genetic engineering and other emerging technologies offer options for plant breeders to meet the crop production and food security challenges of this and future generations.”

HARARE (CIMMYT) — As CIMMYT joins the world in celebrating the International Day for Biological Diversity on 22 May, it can take pride in the diverse maize varieties it develops which have improved the livelihoods and health of smallholder farmers globally.

These varieties have brought tremendous benefits to smallholders in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Over 90 percent of agricultural production in SSA is rainfed, which puts farmers at risk for drought and heat in addition to the poor soil fertility, pests and diseases they face. Drought alone damages about 40 percent of all maize crops in SSA, endangering the livelihoods and food security of millions of smallholder farmers.

Stress tolerant maize not only reduces risks for farmers in the face of unpredictable environmental and biological conditions, it also allows more stable crop production. The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) breeds high-yielding, locally-adapted maize varieties with farmer-preferred traits such as drought tolerance, nitrogen use efficiency, and disease and insect pest resistance. Many of these varieties also have increased nutritional traits such as high protein quality and increased provitamin A content, which help increase children’s weight and height growth rates and reduce childhood blindness.

“Increasing adoption of these stress tolerant maize varieties is helping African farmers cope with drought and climate change, improve yields at household level and thereby enhance the livelihoods and food security of tens of millions of farmers,” said Cosmos Magorokosho, CIMMYT-Southern Africa maize breeder.

These drought-tolerant varieties have proven resistant despite harsh conditions brought on in southern Africa by an intense El Niño, according to Magorokosho. “Significant impacts have been observed in plots of smallholder farmers who grow these varieties.”

In 2014, over 54,000 metric tons of certified seed of the stress tolerant maize varieties were produced and delivered by partner seed companies for planting by smallholders. By the end of that year, more than five million smallholders had planted the improved drought tolerant varieties on over two million hectares, benefiting more than 40 million people in 13 countries in SSA.

Today, there are more than 200 stress tolerant maize varieties that yield the same or more than commercial varieties under average rainfall, and more importantly, produce up to 30 percent more than commercial varieties under moderate drought conditions. Armed with these improved varieties, CIMMYT is assuming a greater role to ensure stress tolerant maize reaches nearly five and a half million smallholder households in SSA by the end of 2019.

“In close collaboration with our partners, we were able to create excitement about what can be achieved with drought tolerant maize in Africa,” said Tsedeke Abate, leader of CIMMYT’s Stress Tolerant Maize for Africa project. CIMMYT is working with national agricultural research systems, international research centers, and other development programs to disseminate improved maize seed to smallholder farmers in SSA through small-and medium-sized seed companies.

“The work we have undertaken on drought tolerant maize has created significant impacts. However, several challenges still remain,” cautioned B.M. Prasanna, Director of CIMMYT’s Global Maize Program and the CGIAR Research Program MAIZE. One of these challenges is maize lethal necrosis (MLN), which emerged in Kenya in 2011 and has since devastated maize crops across East Africa. CIMMYT is working to generate improved stress tolerant maize varieties with resistance to MLN and other major diseases.

Maize production in Africa is growing rapidly, making maize the most widely cultivated crop on the continent, and the staple food of more than 300 million people. Providing farmers with diverse, improved seed choices will thus strengthen food security, health and livelihoods in SSA.

ISLAMABAD – The maize sector in Pakistan is benefiting from an upsurge in investments leading to new varieties from the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) that have the potential to increase production, enhance nutrition and strengthen national industry.

Maize is the third most important cereal crop in Pakistan, which at a production rate of four tons per hectare, has one of the highest national yields in South Asia. Maize productivity in Pakistan has increased almost 75 percent from levels in the early 1990s due to the adoption and expansion of hybrid maize varieties. The crop is cultivated both in spring and autumn seasons and grows in all provinces throughout the country.

However, the lack of a strong national seed system has caused Pakistan to import more than 85 percent of its hybrid maize seed at a cost averaged about $50 million annually since 2011. When coupled with other factors including a limited source of seed providers and non-relaxation of duties on imported seed, this causes the unit price of hybrid maize seed to be the most expensive in South Asia.

PROJECT BOOSTS SEED

A project launched in 2013, CIMMYT’s Agricultural Innovation Program (AIP) funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), led to a large-scale evaluation of maize varieties, which have since resulted in more than 1,000 diverse genotypes tested for favorable traits across Pakistan. Currently, 20 public- and private-sector companies are partnering with CIMMYT to test new varieties and deploy locally-adapted products.

In just two years since the launch of this initiative, more than 80 CIMMYT-derived hybrids and open pollinated varieties of maize have been identified and adapted to diverse ecologies in Pakistan. In the first phase, CIMMYT allocated 49 maize products for registration, commercial release, further seed scale-up and delivery in the target geographies in Pakistan. This maize germplasm was sourced from CIMMYT’s regional maize breeding hubs mainly from Colombia, Mexico and Zimbabwe. With the help of national partners, these improved varieties are being put in the hands smallholder farmers throughout the country.

Seed businesses in Pakistan now have the leverage to run a competitive domestic market for maize seed, thanks to these new varieties. Diverse new lines are also more nutritious, mature earlier and are more tolerant to drought. They can also be delivered at an affordable price which is a huge step forward compared to the limited options smallholder farmers had before AIP started.

Biofortification, or the enhancement of the nutritional value of a crop, has been a cornerstone of CIMMYT’s work in developing improved varieties. Quality Protein Maize (QPM) was the first new hybrid product to reach farmers in Pakistan.  Demonstration seeds from the first two biofortified maize hybrids in Pakistan were officially distributed to farmers this February by the National Agricultural Research Center (NARC), one of the national partners to AIP. The two QPM hybrids, originally from CIMMYT-Colombia, will reach about 300 farmers this season and further distribution is expected by 2017.

“We know how precious (CIMMYT’s) parental seeds are,” said Muhammad Hashim Popalzai from Pakistan’s Ministry of National Food Secuirity and Research.  “At times it will take up to eight years to develop inbred lines and another 3-4 years to constitute hybrid seeds, however, we are getting them easily under the AIP program.”

Although developing new seeds takes time, the benefits could make a huge contribution to Pakistan’s economy, health and livelihoods for farmers across the country.

“These parental seeds will help us to produce the seed locally,” said Faiysal Hayat, deputy manager of seed company Jullundur Private Ltd., adding that they will also “enable us to provide quality seed at an affordable price to farmers.”

In reviewing the progress of AIP maize activities, Abdu Rahman Beshir, CIMMYT’s maize improvement and seed systems specialist said: “The overwhelming interest and collaborations from public-private stakeholders of Pakistan’s maize sector are the main thrust for CIMMYT’s maize varietal deployment drive in Pakistan.”

Subsequent activities in quality seed production and enhanced product positioning will further reinforce the encouraging gains of AIP which aims to have a vibrant maize seed system in Pakistan, according to Beshir.