NEW DELHI (CIMMYT) – If women were given the same access to land, seed and other resources as men, they could increase yields on their farm up to 30 percent, reducing the number of hungry people in the world by 150 million. However, large gender disparities in agriculture continue to make it difficult for rural women to access resources and make their own farming decisions.

In response, the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) and the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) began initiatives to empower rural women such as campaigns to eliminate residue burning, build partnerships with local organizations and more.

Climate-smart agriculture (CSA) addresses the interlinked challenges of food security and climate change by sustainably increasing agricultural productivity, building resilience in food-production systems and reducing greenhouse gas emissions in agriculture.

In celebration of International Women’s Day, two events promoting the adoption of CSA technologies and practices among women farmers – like the GreenSeeker sensor, zero tillage farming and others – were organized in the states of Bihar and Haryana, India, representing contrasting agro-ecological and socio-economic regions.

In Bihar, the event was held in collaboration with the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR)-Research Complex for Eastern Region, Patna and the Borlaug Institute for South Asia and was attended by 80 women farmers from climate smart villages (CSVs), areas that integrate CSA technologies and practices into village development plans, using local knowledge and expertise and supported by local institutions, to help communities adapt to and mitigate the effects of climate change.

Usha Singh, professor of home science at Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agriculture University, Bihar, highlighted the role of women in Bihar’s agriculture sector and their contribution to sustainable food production, nutrition and livelihoods. Singh shared home remedies to overcome malnutrition among children and women in rural areas by using their farm produce to prepare balanced diet. R.K. Asthana, animal husbandry scientist with the agricultural extension center Krishi Vigyan Kendra (KVK) in Biroli, emphasized the important role training activities for livestock management can have in improving the socioeconomic status of women in the area.

In Haryana, the event was organized at a climate smart village in Bastara, Karnal in collaboration with the ICAR-Central Soil Salinity Research Institute, which was attended by over 70 women farmers from across several villages. Women shared their experiences under CSVs, discussed ways to increase productivity and profitability, and raise awareness among other women farmers in the area.

HS Jat, CIMMYT senior scientist in Karnal, provided an overview of CIMMYT-CCAFS activities in Haryana and emphasized strengthening and formalizing women groups to enhance knowledge and increase access to resources. CIMMYT event organizers and assistant research associates Munmun Rai and Deepak Bijarniya, and assistant research scientist JM Sutaliya, collectively emphasized the positive impact of CSA interventions in India, which have built farmer resilience to climate change while increasing their productivity and incomes. Deepa Chandra and DK Gosain, program coordinators for National Dairy Research Institute’s KVK in Haryana, also spoke at the event.

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Women in agriculture step together for change

MEXICO CITY (CIMMYT) –  Marker-assisted recurrent selection (MARS) is helping maize breeders develop higher yielding and drought-tolerant improved varieties faster than ever before, according to a recent study from scientists at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT).

“With conventional breeding, it often takes up to 7-8 years for varieties to reach farmers,” said Yoseph Beyene, a CIMMYT maize breeder working with the CGIAR Research Program on Maize (MAIZE) and one of the authors of the study. “With MARS, those varieties take only 5 years to reach farmers, and display greater genetic gain, even under drought conditions”

The study “Improving Maize Grain Yield under Drought Stress and Non-stress Environments in Sub-Saharan Africa using Marker-Assisted Recurrent Selection” found that by using MARS, breeders can develop new maize varieties farmers need faster and cheaper than conventional breeding methods by reducing the breeding cycle, showing scientists which varieties have desired traits at a quicker rate. This study focused on developing improved, drought-tolerant and high-yielding tropical maize varieties for areas such as sub-Saharan Africa that suffer from frequent drought and an unpredictable climate.

“Climate change is changing environments faster than agriculture can naturally adapt,” said Beyene. “It is crucial that farmers are able to access drought-resistant maize varieties as quickly as possible so that they can adapt to these new conditions,” he said.

MARS also dramatically cuts costs by using genotypic data to predict the best maize varieties before planting them. Previously, breeders would have to visually examine and select the best maize varieties every year.

The study found that MARS can be used to improve maize varieties in both drought and optimum environments throughout sub-Saharan Africa, where it is the most important staple food for over 300 million people. The study used MARS to estimate the genetic gain for 10 biparental tropical maize populations and found that overall, the grain yield for the 10 populations increased by 105 kilograms (kg) per hectare per year under well-watered and 51 kg per hectare per year under water-stressed conditions using MARS. The subsequent generations of test crosses were found to have significantly greater grain yields than their parents and commercial checks, suggesting that MARS has excellent potential for increasing genetic gain under both drought and optimum environments in sub-Saharan Africa.

Over 1,000 improved maize lines, including 352 doubled-haploid lines, have been developed from each cycle of the 10 biparental populations used in this study, and tested in multi-location trials. Several hybrids were derived using lines developed through MARS and pedigree methods. The best hybrids from each population are currently under national performance trials and are expected to be released soon for commercialization in sub-Saharan Africa. CIMMYT is one of the first research organizations to apply this technology to maize breeding specifically for the needs of smallholder farmers.

This study was implemented under the Water Efficient Maize for Africa (WEMA) project, supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Howard G. Buffet Foundation and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).

Read the study “Performance and grain yield stability of maize populations developed using marker-assisted recurrent selection and pedigree selection procedures” published in Euphytica (2016) 208:285–297 for more information.

Eastern Cape, SOUTH AFRICA (CIMMYT) – Smallholder farmers in South Africa can now access and grow new maize varieties with transgenic resistance to stem borers, the most damaging insect pest of maize.

Partners in Water Efficient Maize for Africa (WEMA) – a public-private crop breeding initiative that helps farmers manage the risk of drought and stem borers infestation in Africa –developed the genetically modified maize seed branded as “TELA,” which has been released and licensed royalty-free to South Africa seed companies for sale to farmers at affordable prices.

TELA – derived from a Latin word Tutela meaning “protection” – contains a gene from Bacillus thurigiensis (Bt) that helps the maize to resist damage from major stem borers to give farmers better yields. Five seed companies – Capstone, Jermat, Monsanto, SeedCo and Klein Karoo – are marketing the seed to smallholders.

The WEMA project is helping smallholder farmers face two of their chief menaces through the new insect protected and drought tolerant maize hybrids. Led by the African Agricultural Technology Foundation (AATF), WEMA brings together public and private partners including the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), Monsanto and the national agricultural research organizations of Kenya, Mozambique, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda.

Stem borers affect maize production on about 30 million hectares  in developing countries, feeding aggressively on leaves, stems and ears and significantly reducing grain yield.

In eastern and southern Africa, two stem borers – Busseola fusca and Chilo partellus – are the most damaging pests. In South Africa, reported annual yield losses in maize range between 10 and 75 percent. Yield losses in maize and sorghum as a result of Chilo partellus have exceeded 50 percent.

During the last 2016 planting season, Nontoko Mgudlwa was one among the selected smallholders to host a trial for TELA maize hybrid.

“I received a small packet of TELA from our extension officer, and planted it in this small portion of land on December 9, 2016,” said Mgudlwa. “The land was not enough to add my indigenous maize, but I’m very happy to see how the crop is performing despite the very visible attack on the border crop by stem borers,” continued Mgudlwa, pointing out the severely damaged border crops that were planted with refuge seed as a control group alongside TELA.

The farmers who hosted trials were given a 2 kilogram packet of TELA maize as part of demonstrations to raise awareness about the variety and help farmers see its performance. The packet also contained a small pack of seed of non-Bt maize called “refuge” seed to sow at the border of the main plot. This non-Bt maize allows the survival of susceptible borers and thus delays the emergence or spread in borer populations of individuals able to overcome the Bt maize resistance.

Mgudlwa’s home in Nqatu Great Palace suffers frequent borer infestations, which most farmers control using insecticides. As part of the trial, Mgudlwa did not use chemicals despite a heavy invasion of the pests on her farm and evidence of significant damage in the refuge crop.

“It is critically important for farmers to understand the requirement and procedure of planting TELA maize and the refuge seed found in a small bag inside the TELA seed pack,” said Kingston Mashagaidze, WEMA project coordinator in South Africa. “The extension officers have been trained on how to plant TELA and the refuge seed, so they can help farmers to plant the crop the right way.”

Recently, Mozambique joined Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda to successfully conduct confined field trials (CFT) for genetically modified maize. The CFTs are important to generate data on the performance of the Bt maize and commercial conventional hybrids infested by stem borers to support the application for the release of TELA hybrids in the remaining four WEMA countries.

EL BATAN, Mexico (CIMMYT) – Compiling gender-inclusive data could help scientists understand how to help smallholder farmers improve nitrogen fertilizer application practices, according to a new research paper.

Smallholder maize and wheat farmers need to make use of inorganic nitrogen fertilizer alongside other good agronomic practices to produce healthy and productive crops, but nitrogen can be misapplied.

Fertilizer overuse can be harmful to plants and soil, contaminate drinking water and kill off fish species. Additionally, nitrogen fertilizer produces nitrous oxide, a potent greenhouse gas, which contributes to climate change.

“Gender and environmentally-blind fertilizer policies have been the norm in many regions, leading to negative effects in both high and low nitrogen fertilizer use scenarios that impact most strongly on women and children”, said Clare Stirling, a senior scientist with the Sustainable Intensification Program at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT).

“Our study shows that moving towards a more balanced and efficient use of nitrogen fertilizer will significantly improve gender and social equity outcomes,” Stirling said, adding that such outcomes can only be brought about by significant socio-economic and cultural changes influencing gender and social norms.

“Agriculture needs to function within a ‘safe operating space’ for nitrogen,” she said. “We need to make sure that nitrogen use efficiency is neither too high nor too low. If it’s too high, soils are at risk of being mined and become degraded, if it’s too low, large amounts of reactive nitrogen are released to the environment.”

In developing countries, women make up about 43 percent of the agricultural labor force, but in comparison to men, they have access to only a fraction of the land, credit, inputs – such as improved seeds and fertilizers, agricultural training and information, according to the Farming First coalition

The lack of resource access puts women heads of household at a disadvantage. Even if they are primary decision makers, in general they are hampered by weaker socio-economic status, lower availability of male labor, lower access to markets, agricultural technologies, machinery, credit, collateral and advice, including on how to mitigate and adapt to climate change. As a result of unequal access, women use less fertilizer. They may also forgo food to ensure that children and other family members eat nutritious food, putting their own health at risk.

“Even with training, women may find it more difficult to apply practical knowledge than men due to socio-economic constraints,” said Simon Attwood, an agroecology scientist with Bioversity International, who collaborated on the new study, titled “Gender and inorganic nitrogen: what are the implications of moving towards a more balanced use of nitrogen fertilizer in the tropics?”

“There’s a growing consensus that gender gaps in access to inputs are in part behind differences in productivity and on-farm practices,” he said.

Women farmers who use too little nitrogen fertilizer are trapped in a negative cycle of lower crop yields and income, leading to a greater risk of household food and nutrition insecurity, the scientists said. On the other hand, where too much nitrogen fertilizer is used woman and children are likely to be the most vulnerable to suffering ill-health consequences.

Despite their significant role in agricultural production, particularly in the developing world, women are neglected in most development initiatives, suggesting that the returns on targeting women farmers in relation to promoting best practice fertilizer use, may be very high with respect to increasing production and incomes, according to the authors.

Due to their central role regarding child health, nutrition and education, women should be key beneficiaries of development efforts, the scientists argue.

“These factors make the case that the social returns on agricultural investments are higher when targeted to women,” Attwood said.

The scientists took several case studies from India and sub-Saharan Africa, confirming their theory that imbalanced nitrogen fertilizer use has a greater impact on women and children.

The first case study revealed clear connections between negative health outcomes for poor rural women and their infants and the timing of nitrogen fertilizer applications in India. The study showed that morbidity of the babies of poor rural women appears to be negatively affected through their mother’s work in rice paddy fields, where they absorb fertilizer-derived toxins.

The second case study suggests that applying nitrogen fertilizer to cash crops rather than staple food crops such as maize may contribute towards less food availability and poorer nutrition outcomes for families in some sub-Saharan African countries.

The third case study in Lake Victoria connects the dots between insufficient fertilizer use, soil degradation leading to soil erosion and runoff into the lake and health problems for both men and women. The presence of high levels of nitrogen in the lake due to poor land management is changing its ecology, affecting the lives of artisanal fisher communities and leading to higher rates of HIV/AIDS.

“As long as the majority of policy-makers and planners remain frozen into a conceptual lock-in oblivious to the gendered implications of technically balanced and socially balanced fertilizer use, women smallholder farmers will not reach their potential,” said Cathy Farnworth, a gender specialist working with the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) and lead author on the research paper.

“We need gender awareness in research studies and rural advisory services to develop appropriate strategies to reach and empower women in different households to help them act independently.”

The project was funded by CCAFS, Bioversity, CIMMYT, and the CGIAR Research Programs on wheat and maize.

EL BATAN, Mexico (CIMMYT) – Most current food security projections show that staple crop production must double by 2050 to keep up with global need, which will continue to expand due to population growth and changing dietary demands.

In South Asia, where population pressures pose a significant food security challenge, yields of major cereal crops have not changed dramatically since the Green Revolution of the 1970s and 1980s. This has prompted regional governments and development practitioners to focus instead on efforts to expand double cropping – the practice of growing at least two crops per year on the same piece of land – in order to boost productivity on an annual basis.

This approach is in line with sustainable intensification techniques, which aim to boost production, rather than encroach on natural ecosystems and harm the environment by expanding farmland into limited natural areas.

Scientists with the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) are researching how best to increase double cropping in Bangladesh, which, as South Asia’s most densely populated country, poses unique food security challenges.

In the northwest of the country, farmers already rotate at least two crops in the same field each year using groundwater irrigation to overcome drought risks during the dry winter season.

“Most development initiatives favor the use of groundwater resources for irrigation, although in Bangladesh, ground water extraction can result in high energy costs and in some areas can present a health risk due to natural arsenic contamination of groundwater,” said Timothy Krupnik, systems agronomist at CIMMYT.

“In support of government programs recommending the conjunctive use of surface water as an irrigation alternative, we investigated the available land in Bangladesh that could be reliably cropped to wheat, maize, or rice in double cropping patterns,” Krupnik said, adding that the effort resulted in a new online geospatial tool that can be used by water resource planners and policymakers to target the use of surface water in support of sustainable intensification. It helps identify surface water irrigation resources and land area most suited for double cropping and sustainable intensification.

“Using satellite data for irrigation technology targeting in Bangladesh enabled us to identify areas that are under low input and output crop production in a region with abundant surface water,” said Urs Schulthess, CIMMYT’s remote sensing scientist involved in developing the geospatial tool. “This is an example of sustainable intensification that does not deplete water resources.”

Instead of extracting water from underground aquifers, surface water irrigation involves deploying water through low-lift irrigation pumps and canal distribution networks managed by water sellers who direct water to farmers’ fields. Although Bangladesh is likely to remain largely reliant on groundwater irrigation, use of available surface water presents a low-energy and low-carbon emissions alternative in select areas of the country, Krupnik said.

The research conducted by scientists funded by the CIMMYT-led Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia (CSISA) project, provides initial evidence to support a government of Bangladesh policy aimed at stimulating a $500 million investment in development aid from donors to help farmers transition from rice-fallow or rainfed systems to surface water irrigation and double cropping. The funds form part of an overall request for investment of over $7 billion to support agricultural development in southern Bangladesh.

After mapping rivers and freshwater canals in southern Bangladesh with the new tool, the scientists conservatively estimate that at least 20,800 of fallow and 103,000 hectares of rainfed cropland could be intensified through surface water irrigation to substantially increase cereal crop production through double cropping. These figures account for land set into non-crop reserves to limit risks of nitrate or phosphorous contamination of rivers and canals.

Groundwater irrigation techniques have been difficult to implement in the south of the country due to high energy pumping costs for groundwater, and additional challenges posed by saline shallow water tables. Currently, about 1.7 million farming households in Bangladesh simply leave cropland fallow and unproductive after the monsoon season, according to the World Bank.

By integrating the use of groundwater with lower-cost surface water irrigation, farmers could benefit from increased cropping intensity.

To evaluate potential land productivity resulting from conversion from fallow or rainfed crops to surface water irrigated maize, wheat, and rice, CIMMYT scientists measured yields produced by farmers on their own farms and in farmer-managed demonstrations implemented by the CSISA project.

The three crops are among the most important cereals grown in Bangladesh for food security and income.

Based on analysis, CIMMYT’s scientists estimate that if 25 to 75 percent of fallow or low-intensity land is converted to irrigated maize, production could increase from 10 to 14 percent or from 29 to 42 percent, respectively. Conversion to wheat could increase production from 9 percent to 10 percent or from 26 percent to 31 percent. On the other hand, rice is projected to increase only about 3 percent under such conditions.

Overall, increasing maize and wheat production through double cropping could generate revenues from $36 to $108 million each year for farmers, Krupnik said.

EL BATAN, Mexico (CIMMYT) – In a move to bolster gender equity in agriculture, the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) will launch a series of training courses promoting the integration of gender awareness and analysis in research for development.

“Gender is a defining factor in farming and influences many areas, for example, resource ownership and adoption of new technologies,” said Marion Büttner, a gender specialist at CIMMYT. “These courses will help researchers understand the importance of gender roles, relations and norms in agriculture and integrate gender analysis into their work, strengthening agricultural research for development outcomes.”

Although women account for 43 percent of the agricultural labor force in developing countries, they are 30 percent less productive than men, according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). This is due mainly to unequal access to extension services and resources, such as land and improved seed.

Despite such trends, agricultural research often fails to include gender analysis in projects, opting instead for a gender-unaware approach that neglects women’s and men’s important roles and their different needs and opportunities in agriculture, Büttner said. “The trainings are an important step to address this gap,” she said.

The Gender Capacity Strengthening Program was developed in partnership with the Royal Tropical Institute (KIT in its Dutch acronym) gender training team and Cultural Practice, LLC. The sessions will be rolled out from April for researchers and support staff at CIMMYT offices in Africa, Asia and Latin America.

The main focus of agriculture for development is to research the biophysical aspects of introducing new agriculture technologies and management practices. This often diverts attention from the social analysis that reveals the human context in which new technologies and practices are introduced, said Franz Wong, a senior gender advisor at KIT who will be one of the training facilitators.

Failing to understand gender issues in a specific local context may cause contrary results to what researchers set out to accomplish, Büttner said. For example, the mechanization of an agricultural activity may lead to reduced drudgery for women. However, the same process may also result in men taking over these now successful activities, which could shift power dynamics between men and women and potentially increase already existing inequalities between genders.

“To gain the most knowledge and impact from agriculture for development initiatives, researchers should consider what impact interventions will have on both men and women,” Büttner said. “The concept of gender is often confused with simply adding women to strategy development, but it’s not that straightforward. It’s about addressing the needs and constraints of both men and women and changing relations to improve the situation for all.”

Büttner refers to gender-responsive research, which is designed to ensure that both women and men benefit from research interventions. It analyzes and takes into account how gender relations influence men and women’s ability to access and adopt improved agricultural technologies, including new knowledge and practices, as well as how policies and other interventions affect women and men differently.

Large donors like the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the United Stated Agency for International Development (USAID) and German Corporation for International Cooperation (GIZ, for its acronyms in German) require gender-responsive research, which is part of the reason why gender analysis must become a standard process for researchers, Büttner added.

The program aims to position gender analysis as a routine process at all stages of the research cycle. Different training modules offer insight into gender-responsive research, including developing and implementing projects with gender integration and setting indicators to measure gender outcomes.

“Raising awareness of the benefits gender analysis has on the impact of agriculture for development projects is the best promoter of its inclusion in research,” said Maitrayee Mukhopadhyay, a senior gender advisor at KIT who aided in the development of the program.

“Many agriculture for development researchers do not see the relevance of gender for their work because they lack adequate training and exposure to gender analysis and knowledge,” she added.

Pilot workshops of the program were delivered last October at CIMMYT’s headquarters and gained strong reviews, with participants reporting increased gender awareness and knowledge of practical methods to integrate gender into projects.

Researchers are keen to integrate gender once they become aware of how gender-responsive research helps to make an assessment of how agriculture is organized in a community, and how it aids the design and delivery of relevant agricultural technologies that complement gender roles or transform them to increase equality, Wong added.

Both Büttner and Wong said the gender training was purposely designed to be practical and interactive so that participants could apply methods to their areas of expertise.

The program will begin in April in Ethiopia, followed by sessions in other CIMMYT offices in Kenya, Zimbabwe, Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Mexico.

Büttner is one of five experts working at CIMMYT as part of the GIZ sponsored CIM Integrated Experts program. The CIM program aims to strategically place managers and technical experts in public and private organizations in the developing world to pass on their professional knowledge and contribute to capacity building.