News – Page 137

CIMMYT welcomes new board members

Written by on April 16, 2015. Posted in Features.

CIMMYT Board of Trustees April 2015 — Photo credit: CIMMYT

How are New Board Members Appointed?

CIMMYT’s Board of Trustees is composed of 13 experts appointed in their individual capacity and not as a representative of any outside entity.

The process to appoint new members to the Board is conducted by the Nominations Committee, whose sole duty is to ensure a mix of skills on the Board at any one time, based on a skills matrix of CIMMYT’s required expertise. As a result, the Board will represent expertise in science (CIMMYT’s key areas of research), finance, audit, risk management, governance, international partnerships and gender and diversity. Board members are also appointed with consideration of their geographical origins. Each member is appointed for a three-year term, with a maximum limit of two terms.

The chair of the Nominations Committee leads the search for new Board members. This is done through a referencing system, rather than a formal and advertised search. Prospective candidates are approached formally and then interviewed by the Board. Newly-appointed Board members undergo an induction program conducted by CIMMYT and the CGIAR and attend their first meeting as an observer.

Dr. Feng Feng

Dr. Feng is currently the director of the Chinese Bureau of International Cooperation, NSFC. He is responsible for developing international cooperation channels with foreign partners, making policy for international research cooperation in NSFC, and setting the budget for the different research areas for international cooperation. He received his B.Sc. in plant genetics and breeding, and M.Sc. and Ph.D. in plant pathology from the Agricultural University of China.

Dr. Luis Fernando Flores Lui

Dr. Flores Lui is General Director of the Mexican Institute of Forestry, Agriculture, and Livestock (INIFAP). Over the last 25 years he has held numerous positions within the organization. At an international level he has coordinated the biotechnology group at the Asia-Pacific Council (APEC); worked with the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA); and has taught undergraduate and graduate courses in different universities. He received his B.Sc. in Agricultural Engineering from the Antonio Narro Agrarian Autonomous University, his M.Sc. from Irrigation Water Use and Management in 1974 from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education and his Ph.D in Soil Sciences from the University of California, Davis.

Dr. Raul Obando Rodriguez — Photo credit: INIFAP

Dr. Raúl Gerardo Obando Rodríguez
Dr. Rodriguez is the Coordinator for Research and Innovation at the National Institute of Forestry, Agriculture and Livestock (INIFAP). He is an Agricultural Engineer by trade with a PhD in Plant Nutrition at the University of California, Davis. He has held various positions in in INIA, INIFAP, the National Coordinator of the Produce Foundation (COFUPRO), the National System for Research and Technology Transfer (SNITT) and the Graduate College (COLPOS), to name a few.

Bongiwe Nomandi Njobe

Bongiwe Njobe is Executive Director (founder and sole proprietor) of ZA NAC Consulting and Investments. Over the past 20 years she has held numerous positions in the Fast Moving Consumer Goods Sector (FMCG) sector and the Agricultural Public Sector including Group Executive: Corporate Sustainability at Tiger Brands Limited, Corporate Affairs Director at South African Breweries Limited and Director General at the South African National Department of Agriculture. She currently serves as a Director on the Vumelana Advisory Fund, Independent Board Member on the Regional Universities Forum for Capacity Building in Agriculture (RUFORUM) and as a Trustee at the Kagiso Trust. She is also a member of the High Level Advocacy Panel for the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA) and a member of the Institute of Directors (Southern Africa) Sustainability Development Forum.

Mapping agricultural opportunity: how GIS contributes to food security

Written by on April 16, 2015. Posted in News.

Head of GIS Unit Kai Sonder demonstrating GPS — Photo credit: CIMMYT

Geography matters – 80% of all data has a spatial component, which is “why geographic information systems (GIS) are growing exponentially,” said Kai Sonder, head of CIMMYT’s GIS unit, during a presentation to CIMMYT Day attendees, explaining that GIS involves the mapping and analyzing of spatial and geographic data. “By 2050, 70% of all farmers living in maize and wheat growing areas in Latin America, Asia and Africa will experience yield losses of 15% and more,” said Sonder. The GIS unit is able to make this prediction by analyzing, mapping and modelling climate change implications, crop suitability, socioeconomic and other data sets affecting agricultural production across the globe. The GIS unit also uses spatial analysis for targeting or defining the potential for spreading technologies such as new maize or wheat varieties or conservation agriculture practices, or gauging the market potential for the small- and medium-scale seed companies working with CIMMYT. The unit curates and continuously updates a comprehensive collection of geospatial datasets and geographic databases for all maize- and wheat-producing countries in the developing world.

Developing hybrids across the board at CIMMYT

Written by on April 16, 2015. Posted in News.

When a CIMMYT scientist discusses developing hybrids, the first thought that comes to mind is probably new variety of drought tolerant maize.

However, CIMMYT engineers in the global conservation agriculture program are producing a whole different set of hybrids in the fields of El Batán, Mexico. At CIMMYT Day, Jelle Van Loon, Leader of Smart Mechanization and Machinery Innovation, explained the importance of creating “hybrids” of already existing machinery to meet the demands of farmers regionally.

Taking into consideration a varying range of crops, soils and climates, farmers not only need the correct seed, but also the proper technologies to work in their prospective environments. Looking at existing and functional machinery from different parts of the world, like China, Brazil, USA and India, Van Loon and his team are able to convert the machines to make them suitable for use in Mexico, for Mexican farmers.

“It is all a learning experience,” explained Van Loon to his CIMMYT colleagues. “We have to go into the fields and see what is working for these farmers. We have to meet their needs.” This is the very basis for the CIMMYT’s Take it to the Farmer initiative, which is designed to offer advice on a personal level and make innovations readily available to Mexican farmers.

CIMMYT Day gives staff opportunity to explore colleagues’ work

Written by on April 16, 2015. Posted in News.

Comprising interactive presentations in English and Spanish on diverse aspects of the Center’s work, CIMMYT Day at El Batán on 10 April allowed more than 250 staff members to learn more about the science and get a first-hand understanding of CIMMYT activities and impact.

Thomas Lumpkin, CIMMYT director general, and John Snape, Chair of the Board of Trustees, welcomed participants. Snape presented Lumpkin, who will leave CIMMYT in June, with a miniature statue of Dr. Norman Borlaug, in honor of his humanitarian spirit and commitment to developing world farmers.

The tours began with wheat physiologist Matthew Reynolds explaining how this specialty contributes to improve wheat, elucidating wheat production environments and how they affect wheat, sources of useful new traits and the challenges of measuring and working with these traits. At the conservation agriculture experiment, Nele Verhulst, strategic research coordinator for this discipline in Latin America, astounded visitors by describing the yield increases possible through proper application of conservation agriculture’s three principles: reduced tillage, keeping crop residues on the soil, and careful use of crop rotations. In particular, the removal vs the retention of residues under zero tillage provided dramatic differences of 5.7 vs 7.9 tons per hectare (t/ha), respectively, with good rainfall, and of 3.6 vs 7.4 t/ha in drought years, due to the superior capture and retention of moisture on untilled soils with residues.

Jelle Van Loon, leader of machinery innovation and smart mechanization, demonstrated implements specially adapted for conservation agriculture, explaining that all are multi-use and multi-crop, to be most useful to farmers. Biosciences Greenhouse Laboratory Manager Ulises Gaona Ramírez demonstrated how to “separate the wheat from the chaff” using various methods, and gave everyone the opportunity to plant their very own wheat plant, which they were allowed to take home as a living souvenir. From there, participants visited the wheat and maize quality laboratories. Carlos Guzmán, head of the wheat quality laboratory, and Hector González, principal research assistant, explained the characteristics of different types of wheat used to create different food products, while Natalia Palacios, maize nutrition quality specialist, discussed the use of different maize varieties to make tortillas, the staple food of Mexico.

The day finished with a visit to the CIMMYT Germplasm Bank, during with Denise Costich, head of the maize germplasm bank, and Thomas Payne, head of the wheat germplasm bank, talked about their respective areas and led tours of the actual seed collections inside the Bank chamber, with support for Spanish-speaking visitors from Bibiana Espinosa, Paulina González and Martín Rodríguez.

Celebrating CIMMYT: what will the next 50 years hold?

Written by on April 16, 2015. Posted in Features.

CIMMYT_Ceremony_1 — Photo credit: CIMMYT

A year of celebrations in honor of Dr. Norman Borlaug’s birth centennial was officially closed last Thursday 9 April in a ceremony at CIMMYT headquarters in Mexico.

“If he (my father) were here,” said Jeanie Borlaug Laube, who chairs the Borlaug Global Rust Initiative, “he would remind you that it is your moral imperative to speak up and protest for the world’s right to science-based innovation.” She was addressing an audience of government representatives, private sector partners, researchers, CIMMYT trustees, and diplomats including the Australian and Belgian ambassadors to Mexico.

The occasion also marked the celebration of a double achievement for CIMMYT: the 2014 World Food Prize being awarded to Dr. Sanjaya Rajaram, former global wheat program director, and the 2014 Borlaug Field Award to Dr. Bram Govaerts, leader of the Sustainable Modernization of Traditional Agriculture (MasAgro) project.

During his distinguished career, Rajaram led work that resulted in the release of more than “480 varieties of bread wheat in 51 countries, occupying more than 58 million hectares,” said Prof. John Snape, Chair of CIMMYT’s Board of Trustees. “A feat unlikely to ever be surpassed by another wheat breeder.”

Rajaram’s merits were also recognized by Mexican government representatives at the World Food Prize ceremony in Des Moines, Iowa, USA, on 16 October 2014. Enrique Martínez y Martínez, head of Mexico’s Agriculture Secretariat (SAGARPA), congratulated him for developing varieties and technologies that have helped boost wheat productivity in Mexico and the rest of the world.

During the ceremony, Martínez y Martínez signed and renewed SAGARPA’s technical collaboration agreement with CIMMYT for the implementation of MasAgro, CIMMYT’s major project in Mexico. “MasAgro boosts a new model of agricultural extension based on sustainable technologies and capacity building activities that match Mexico’s Farmer’s Confederation’s development vision,” said Mexican Senator Manuel Cota, who is also President of the Farmer’s Confederation and of the Senate Agriculture Committee.

By the end of 2014, there were over 200,000 farmers linked to MasAgro on more than 440,000 hectares across Mexico. “To address farmer’s needs we must pursue scientific excellence as Norman Borlaug did,” stressed Dr. Bram Govaerts, MasAgro leader. “We must go out to the field and get our hands dirty; take risks and be bold in our research; let innovation flow and get rid of false illusions of control,” Govaerts added.

After the ceremony, Dr. Borlaug’s family, government officials and CIMMYT laureate scientists unveiled a statue of Dr. Borlaug at the Center facilities.

“Next year CIMMYT will celebrate its 50th anniversary,” said Thomas Lumpkin, CIMMYT director general. “For 50 years Mexico has been the cradle of CIMMYT’s global agricultural innovation. Our challenge now is to ask what the next 50 years will hold.”

Global Soil Week

Written by on April 16, 2015. Posted in News.

For the much-needed focus they bring on a burning issue, CIMMYT’s Improved Maize for African Soils (IMAS) Project celebrates the Global Soil Week and the International Year of Soils.
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Africa’s maize farmers must deal with drought, weeds and pests, but their problems start with degraded, nutrient-starved soils and the farmers’ inability to purchase enough nitrogen fertilizer.
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Smallholder maize yields in sub-Saharan Africa are a fraction of those in the developed world, due mainly to the region’s poor soils and farmers’ limited access to fertilizer or improved maize seed. On average, such farmers apply only 9 kilograms of fertilizer per hectare of cropland.

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Of that small amount, often less than half is captured by the crop; the rest is leached deep into the soil where plants cannot recover it or otherwise lost. But all is not bleak, and here are some of the solutions from the Improved Maize for African Soils Project.

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Videos

Links

IMAS Project | International Year of Soils | Global Soil Week 2015 – Press release • Short feature | Our work on maize

Screening for maize lethal necrosis (MLN) – May 2015

Written by on April 14, 2015. Posted in News.

CIMMYT wishes to announce that the start of the planting season for the 2015A planting season at the KALRO–CIMMYT maize lethal necrosis (MLN) artificial inoculation screening site at Naivasha, Kenya. Interested organizations from both the private and public sectors are invited to send their maize germplasm for screening. Planting is due to start at the end of May 2015 following an upgrade of the current irrigation system. Please note that it can take up to six weeks to process imports and clear shipments..

The MLN Screening Facility is the largest of its kind established in response to the MLN outbreak in eastern Africa in 2013. It supports countries in sub-Saharan to screen maize germplasm (hybrids, inbreds, and open pollinated varieties) against MLN in a quarantined environment. The facility is managed jointly by the Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization (KALRO) and CIMMYT, and was established with support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Syngenta Foundation for Sustainable Agriculture. Since its inception in 2013, the facility has evaluated more than 20,000 accessions from more than 15 multinational and national seed companies and national research programs.

For assistance in obtaining import permits and necessary logistics for the upcoming screening, please contact Biswanath Das

Tel: +254 20 7224600 (direct)
CIMMYT–Kenya, ICRAF House, United Nations Avenue, P.O. Box 1041–00621, Nairobi, Kenya.

Sculptor captures demeanor of Nobel laureate Norman Borlaug

Written by on April 13, 2015. Posted in News.

Sculptor Katharine McDevitt (R) stands in front of the bronze sculpture she created of Norman Borlaug with his daughter, Jeanie Borlaug Laube. (Photo: Marcelo Ortiz/CIMMYT)

EL BATAN, Mexico (CIMMYT) – Artist Katharine McDevitt, creator of a new bronze representation of wheat scientist Norman Borlaug, is fascinated by sculptures representing pre-Hispanic deities – so much so that she relocated to Mexico from the United States to learn more about the ancient art form.

She studied, and then taught, sculpture at “La Esmeralda,” the National School of Painting, Sculpture and Engraving in Mexico City, where renowned Mexican artists Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera taught in the 1940s.

Almost 40 years later, McDevitt is still in Mexico where for the past 21 years she has worked at the Chapingo Autonomous University of agriculture and the National Museum of Agriculture as a sculpture instructor and artist in residence.

The Chapingo campus, in the city of Texcoco about 30 kilometers (20 miles) from Mexico City, is home to a mural painted by Rivera in the 1920s titled “Fertile Land.”

Sculptor McDevitt says her personal pre-Hispanic favorite is a 16th century basalt depiction of the Aztec earth goddess Coatlicue, associated with agriculture, the cycle of life, the mother of the moon, stars and Huitzilopochtli, the god of war, sun and human sacrifice. The 2.6-meter (8.5-foot) tall sculpture, housed in Mexico’s National Museum of Anthropology, represents Coatlicue decapitated, snakes emerging from her neck, clad in a skirt of snakes and a necklace of human hearts, hands and a skull.

“I’m always very moved by pre-Hispanic sculpture, I find it very powerful – it’s a language that speaks across boundaries of culture, you can feel the tremendous energy,” said McDevitt, who has also made her own pantheon of deities, including the Diosa del Maíz statue at Chapingo.

The massive stone Coatlicue sculpture is a far cry from her own gentle tribute in bronze to a more contemporary agricultural giant – 1970 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Norman Borlaug – which was unveiled in the presence of his daughter Jeanie Laube Borlaug and members of the international wheat community at CIMMYT headquarters near Texcoco last week.

Borlaug, who died in 2009 at age 95, led efforts that began at CIMMYT in Mexico to develop high-yielding, disease-resistant, semi-dwarf wheat varieties in the mid-20th century. His successes, which earned him the title “Father of the Green Revolution,” are estimated to have helped save more than 1 billion lives in the developing world.

The life-size sculpture is based on an emblematic photograph of the scientist, McDevitt said. Borlaug, originally from Iowa, is wearing a familiar hat, jotting down notes in a book and wearing a class ring from the University of Minnesota where he earned his graduate degrees. The wheat stalks at his feet were made from casts of wheat plants of the varieties used for the Green Revolution, McDevitt said.

“This is the most inspiring figure I’ve ever had the privilege of doing,” McDevitt said, adding that she considers Borlaug a modern god of agriculture. “This project has been the greatest honor of my career. There was a lot of input from CIMMYT staff who knew Dr. Borlaug well. They offered suggestions, useful comments and tips on how to make the sculpture more life-like, how to make it more faithful to who Dr. Borlaug was.”

McDevitt also designs and produces pre-Hispanic rituals at the Chapingo Autonomous University, including a graduation ritual designed around Tlaloc, the Aztec god of rain, water, lightning and agriculture. Each August, McDevitt designs a welcome ritual for new students based around the story of Xilonen, the corn goddess.

In 2001, Borlaug participated in an interactive seed sowing-ritual inspired by Rivera’s murals. As part of the ritual, which occurs every year on Agronomy Day on February 22, a hand – created by McDevitt – emerges from furrows of earth, laid out in the National Agricultural Museum.

Three life-size versions of McDevitt’s Borlaug statue exist. One is in Ciudad Obregon in the northern Mexican state of Sonora and the other is in Delhi, India. A small number of miniature replicas have been distributed to recognize important achievements of key contributors to global food security, including 2014 World Food Prize laureate Sanjaya Rajaram, a former student of Borlaug’s at CIMMYT.

Innovation key to wheat yield potential advances, says in-coming CIMMYT DG

Written by on April 13, 2015. Posted in Features.

Photos: Alfredo Sáenz/CIMMYT — Outgoing CIMMYT Director General Thomas Lumpkin, incoming CIMMYT Director General Martin Kropff, Nynke Nammensma and Jeannie Laube Borlaug (L to R) chat during Visitors’ Week in Obregon, Mexico. CIMMYT/Alfredo Sáenz

CIUDAD OBREGON, Mexico (CIMMYT) — Martin Kropff, who will take the helm as director general of the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) in June, joined scientists, and other members of the global wheat community at the CIMMYT experimental research station near the town of Ciudad Obregon in Mexico’s northern state of Sonora for annual Visitors’ Week.

Following a tour of a wide range of research projects underway in the wheat fields of the Yaqui Valley made famous around the world by the work of the late Nobel Peace Prize winner Norman Borlaug, who died in 2009 at age 95, Kropff shared his views.

Borlaug led efforts to develop high-yielding, disease-resistant, semi-dwarf wheat varieties in the mid-20th century that are estimated to have helped save more than 1 billion lives in Pakistan, India and other areas of the developing world.

“I’m very impressed by what I’ve seen in Obregon,” said Kropff, who is currently chancellor and vice chairman of the executive board of Wageningen University and Research Center in the Netherlands.

“From the gene bank in El Batan, the breeding and pre-breeding and the work with farmers on a huge scale, it’s extremely high quality and innovative,” added Kropff, who with his wife Nynke Nammensma also visited CIMMYT’s El Batan headquarters near Mexico City earlier in the week.

“The MasAgro program is very impressive because it takes the step of integrating scientific knowledge with farmers’ knowledge – it’s a novel way to aid farmers by getting new technology working on farms at a large scale. It is a co-innovation approach,” Kropff said.

The Sustainable Modernization of Traditional Agriculture, led by country’s Secretariat of Agriculture, Livestock, Rural Development, Fisheries and Food (SAGARPA) and known locally as MasAgro, helps farmers understand how minimal soil disturbance, permanent soil cover and crop rotation can simultaneously boost yields and sustainably increase profits.

“The program is an example of how farmers, scientists and other stakeholders can think about and create innovations through appropriate fertilizer applications, seed technologies and also through such instruments as the post-harvesting machines,” Kropff said.

“This is fantastic. That’s what the CGIAR is all about.”

Left to right: Tom Lumpkin, John Snape and Martin Kropff. — Thomas Lumpkin, John Snape and Martin Kropff (L to R). CIMMYT/Alfredo Sáenz

“The HarvestPlus program, which adds more zinc and iron into the crop through breeding, also plays a key role in CIMMYT’s research portfolio,” Kropff said.

Zinc deficiency is attributed to 800,000 deaths each year and affects about one-third of the world’s population, according to the World Health Organization. Enhancing the micronutrient content in wheat through biofortification is seen as an important tool to help improve the diets of the most vulnerable sectors of society.

The climate change adaptation work he observed, which is focused on drought and heat stress resilience is of paramount importance, Kropff said.

Findings in a report released last year by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change state it is very likely that heat waves will occur more often and last longer throughout the 21st Century and that rainfall will be more unpredictable.

Mean surface temperatures could potentially rise by between 2 to 5 degrees Celsius or more, the report said.

“To safeguard food security for the 9 billion people we’re expecting will populate the planet by 2050, we need innovations based on breeding, and solid agronomy based on precision farming,” Kropff said.

“There’s no other organization in the world that is so well designed as the CGIAR to do this type of work. CIMMYT is the crown jewel of the CGIAR together with the gene banks. No other organization can do this.”

“We’ve done a lot of work in getting higher yields, but not much through increased yield potential, and that’s what we have to work on now,” he added.

“If you raise the yield through agronomy, you still need to enhance yield potential and there’s very good fundamental work going on here.”

“The partnerships here are excellent – scientists that are here from universities are as proud as CIMMYT itself about all the work that is being done. I’m really honored that from 1 June, I have the opportunity to be the director general of this institution. I cannot wait to get started working with the team at CIMMYT and I’m extremely grateful for the warm welcome I’ve received – a smooth transition is already underway.”

Follow Martin Kropff on Twitter @KropffMartin

Canadian foodgrains bank highlights CIMMYT’s Christian Thierfelder’s work in conservation agriculture

Written by on April 13, 2015. Posted in News.

Farmers admiring their maize-cowpea intercrop. Photo: Christian Thierfelder/CIMMYT

Christian Thierfelder, CIMMYT senior agronomist stationed at Harare, Zimbabwe, was recently profiled by the Canadian Foodgrains Bank for his work promoting conservation agriculture techniques for smallholder farmers in Africa. Conservation agriculture systems are not only better for soils but help make agriculture more ‘climate-smart’, argues Thierfelder. “The conventional system can only make use of the water that is in the ridge and not further down in the soil,” he said. “In conservation agriculture systems, there is access to deeper layers and a lot of water has infiltrated. The maize can actually access the water much better because of an improved root system.”
In addition, the techniques can provide far-reaching food security benefits to smallholder farmers. As conservation agriculture diminishes the risk of crop failure, it also allows farmers to reduce the land devoted to maize and to diversify the crops they produce. “Then there is room for new crops, cash crops, rotational crops, nutritional crops that help them to improve their diets and reduce malnutrition,” Thierfelder said. “That’s a very good way to overcome all of these problems at once.”To read the full article, click here.

Green manures help Zambian and Malawian farmers feed crops and livestock

Written by on April 13, 2015. Posted in News.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) has tasked CIMMYT with a new project to introduce green manure cover crops to smallholder farmers in eastern Zambia and central and southern Malawi.

Green manures can improve fertility, protect soils and provide fodder and grain for farm animals and humans. They also help substitute for mineral fertilizers, which are costly for landlocked African nations to produce or import. Most smallholder farmers cannot afford them and apply less than 10 kg per hectare of fertilizer to their crops, according to a 2013 study on profitable and sustainable nutrient management systems for eastern and southern African smallholder farming systems.

“This is less than one-tenth of average fertilizer rates in prosperous countries and a key reason why maize yields in southern Africa are around only one ton per hectare,” said Christian Thierfelder, CIMMYT conservation agriculture specialist based in southern Africa. “As a result, many farm families in the region remain food insecure and caught in a seemingly unbreakable cycle of poverty.”

With full participation of farmers, the project will test green manures in rotation with maize and as intercrops or relay crops in different farming systems, according to Thierfelder.

“Improved, high-yielding maize can show its potential only under good agronomic practices, such as optimal plant spacing, timely planting, good weed and pest control and adequate fertilization,” Thierfelder explained. “Farmers in Europe and the Americas have followed these basic principles for generations, and some of the ideas spread to Asia and Africa during the Green Revolution. But in Africa mineral fertilizers are most often used by rich farmers and for high-value crops.“

“Improved maize that tolerates drought and other stresses, coupled with conservation agriculture practices –minimum soil disturbance, crop residue retention and diversification through rotations and intercropping systems – are farmers’ best bet to escape the poverty trap,” Thierfelder said.

Keeping crop residues on the soil is a critical component of conservation agriculture, but the residues are traditionally fed to livestock, which also underpin smallholder farmers’ livelihoods. So the use of conservation agriculture hinges on the ability of a cropping system to produce enough biomass to feed farm animals while providing an adequate residue cover. This requires a source of fertilization to feed the cropping system.

The FAO-CIMMYT project will address this by allocating green manure cover crops for different uses. “Over the last five years, CIMMYT’s global conservation agriculture program has identified potential cover crop varieties that fit farmers’ needs,” Thierfelder said. “Velvet bean, lablab, cowpea, sunnhemp or jackbean can provide 10-50 tons per hectare of extra biomass for livestock. They can also leave 50-150 kilograms per hectare of nitrogen in the soil and do not need any additional fertilizer to grow. Finally, lablab and cowpea provide grain that humans can eat.”

One approach Thierfelder promotes is for a farmer to dedicate part of her land to grow maize under conservation agriculture practices, and other areas to sow green manures, nutritional and cash crops that increase soil fertility and household income. “In this way, a farmer can diversify and gradually have money to purchase mineral fertilizer, boost productivity and move out of poverty.”

Green manure cover crops are not new in Africa. Why should they work this time?

According to Thierfelder, there are examples of success in northern Mozambique with CIMMYT’s partner organization CARE International, using lablab and improved germplasm in cassava-based CA systems can increase cassava tuber yields from 4 to 13 tons per hectare, without using additional mineral fertilizer. “In Tanzania, lablab and other green manures are an important part of the cropping system,” he said. “In Zimbabwe, successful experiments with maize and green manures under an ACIAR-funded ZimCLIFFS project also provide hope. The FAO-CIMMYT project will guide the way on integrating green manures cover crops into these farming systems.”

Mother-baby trials promote conservation agriculture in Manica, Mozambique

Written by on April 13, 2015. Posted in Features.

A testament to increased climate variability and risk for farming systems already operating on the razor’s edge, the 2014-15 cropping season will be recognized as a sad write-off by most farmers in Central Mozambique. The rains started six weeks late and most of the rainfall fell in only two months (normally it’s distributed over four), followed by a long drought and some few showers at the end.

But with funds from the CGIAR Research Program on Maize, partners from the Instituto de Investigação Agrária de Moçambique (IIAM) and CIMMYT are working with farmers in Manica Province, Mozambique, to test and promote conservation agriculture practices that better capture and retain precious precipitation, among other advantages.

As part of this, they have revived “mother-baby” trials, a participatory methodology pioneered over a decade ago by CIMMYT for testing drought tolerant maize in Africa and which was subsequently adapted for diverse agronomic practices and is used by researchers worldwide.

Drought-stricken maize: For most farmers around Machipanda village, Manica Province, Mozambique, the situation this season is bleak, auguring complete crop failure or a harvest of a few small maize cobs. Photos: CIMMYT

Comprising field experiments grown in farming communities, mother-baby trials feature a centrally-located mother trial that is set up with researchers’ support. Baby trials, which contain subsets of the mother-trial treatments, are grown, managed and evaluated by interested farmers.

Moving from “business as usual” to innovation

In Machipanda, a small village in Manica on the border with Zimbabwe, IIAM maize breeder Dr. David Mariote established three mother trials, each with two conservation agriculture-based systems and a conventional control plot, combined with four maize varieties from the Drought Tolerant Maize for Africa (DTMA) project, which is funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and a traditional variety, in full rotation with cowpeas.

Farmers then put up the baby trials from a menu of practices that included direct seeding with no tillage, crop rotations, residue retention, herbicide applications, fertilizer use and improved varieties. Interest was high: 54 farmers grew baby trials and some even extended their plots beyond the designated areas, in the excitement of trying something new, according to Mariote.

“Conditions are changing fast; business as usual is no longer an option,” Mariote said. “We have to offer improved technologies that farmers can use to mitigate negative effects from climate change and improve their lives.”

Mariote witnessed first-hand the synergistic benefits of combining conservation agriculture and drought tolerant maize, as part of work in the Platform on Agriculture Research and Technology Innovation (PARTI), a project funded through the US Agency for International Development (USAID) via Feed the Future and implemented by CIMMYT in Central and northern Mozambique.

IIAM researcher David Mariote (right) with farmers of Manica Province, Mozambique.

With training from CIMMYT’s global maize program and technical backstopping from the CIMMYT global conservation agriculture program, Mariote sought new and stronger ways to spread these technologies. That’s when he hit upon mother-baby trials, which had never been used before with drought tolerant maize and conservation agriculture in tandem.

Farmers who grew baby trials unanimously agreed that new ways of farming are needed and that the trials had been eye-openers. In a community meeting, some said: “We often do not have money to buy expensive fertilizers but we have seen that with good agronomic practices and good maize varieties we can already increase our maize yields.”

More farmers in Machipanda have signed up for future baby trials and, as a clear indication of commitment and excitement about conservation agriculture and improved maize, they will use their own inputs to grow them.

Industrial water run-off can sustainably boost crop production

Written by on April 13, 2015. Posted in News.

Photo credit: Julie Mollins — Irrigation reservoir at the Kulumsa research station in Ethiopia. CIMMYT/Julie Mollins

KULUMSA, Ethiopia (CIMMYT) — An irrigation reservoir at the Kulumsa Agricultural Research Center in Ethiopia’s highlands captures water from a nearby beer distillery about 168 km (105 miles) southeast of the capital Addis Ababa.

Before the irrigation project was constructed, the industrial runoff from the brewery poured into the nearby river and affected the health of local residents.

Now it nourishes crops growing in neighboring fields during the dry season or in periods of drought. It can store up to 38,195 m³of water.

“The irrigation project has been a key investment – it’s very instrumental for accelerating seed multiplication of improved high-yielding rust resistant varieties for local wheat projects,” said Bekele Abeyo, a CIMMYT senior scientist and wheat breeder.

“It allows us to advance wheat germplasm and seed multiplication of elite lines twice a year, which we couldn’t do previously.”

This cuts the time by half from the currently required eight to 10 years to four to five years for the development and release of new varieties through conventional breeding.

An additional pond with the capacity to capture 27,069 m³of natural water from the river, generates the capacity to irrigate more than 30 hectares of land during the off season.

The project resulted from the joint investment of the East Africa Agricultural Productivity Program, the Durable Rust Resistance in Wheat Project and CIMMYT.

The construction of the ponds began in April 2012. Sprinkler irrigation was completed in 2014 and management of the project was handed over to the Kulumsa Research Center.

CIMMYT joins global move to adopt climate-smart agriculture

Written by on April 13, 2015. Posted in News.

Climate-smart agriculture can be “an effective tool to address climate change and climate variability,” according to Kai Sonder, head of CIMMYT’s geographic information systems (GIS) unit, who was one of 754 participants from 75 countries, including 39 CIMMYT representatives, at the third annual Global Science Conference on Climate-Smart Agriculture, held in Montpellier, France, during 16-18 March.

“Challenges are different for developing and developed countries, but climate change is affecting all of us,” said Sonder. Millions of smallholder farmers in developing countries have less than one hectare of land, earn less than USD $1 per day and are highly vulnerable to extreme climatic events. Many farmers in developed countries struggle to make a living, are dependent on subsidies and insurance payouts and are also highly vulnerable to extreme climatic events.

Modern agriculture, food production and distribution are major contributors of greenhouse gases, generating about one-quarter of global emissions. Climate-smart agriculture 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.

Challenges and areas where climate-smart agriculture has yet to take hold were addressed at the conference. “California has not practiced it for 50 years and is now dealing with the consequences of poor groundwater management,” said Sonder. “Likewise, Ciudad Obregón and Sinaloa in Mexico are fully-irrigated areas in the middle of a desert where climate-smart practices need to be implemented on a larger scale based on CIMMYT’s activities with local partners.”

Progress and exhibitions on climate-smart agriculture projects were also showcased. “This is becoming an integral part of CIMMYT work, as climate conditions increasingly disrupt growing seasons,” Sonder said. “MasAgro is looking at water and nutrient efficiency in Mexico, and CIMMYT is developing maize and wheat varieties that are tolerant to stresses like heat and drought and their combinations,” said Sonder. In collaboration with the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Food Security and Agriculture (CCAFS), CIMMYT has also piloted 27 climate-smart villages in Haryana, India, which will disseminate key climate-smart agricultural interventions.

The conference also allowed potential partners to meet and identify areas for future cooperation. Sonder mentioned interactions with Jacob van Etten, Senior Scientist at Bioversity International, who works on climate change and climate-smart agriculture in Costa Rica and uses iButton sensors to measure climate data in the field. “Such cheap and effective devices can allow us to reach more places, and I’d like to use them to monitor storage and humidity conditions in metal silos for CIMMYT’s Effective Grain Storage Project in eastern and southern Africa, as well as in the postharvest activities of MasAgro in Mexico,” said Sonder

Seed improvement to prevent rust disease key to boosting wheat productivity

Written by on April 13, 2015. Posted in News.

A new project in Ethiopia aims to improve the livelihoods of wheat farmers by encouraging the development and multiplication of high-yielding, rust-resistant bread and durum wheat varieties.

High-quality seed is the key entry point for elevating farmer productivity in Ethiopia. As Norman Borlaug, the late Nobel Peace Prize laureate and wheat breeder who worked for many years with the International Center for Maize and Wheat Improvement (CIMMYT) wrote: “Rust never sleeps.”

Stem, leaf and yellow rusts choke nutrients and devastate wheat crops without recognition of political boundaries, making it essential that global action is taken to control all virulent strains of these devastating diseases to ensure food security.

At a recent workshop hosted by the Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research (EIAR) in the capital, Addis Ababa, 150 participants from 24 organizations discussed the project, which builds upon the successes of a previous EIAR and International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA) program funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).

Bekele Abeyo points out that high-quality seed is critical in Ethiopia. Photo: CIMMYT

The purpose of the March workshop titled “Seed Multiplication and Delivery of High-Yielding Rust-Resistant Bread and Durum Wheat Varieties to Ethiopian Farmers” was to launch the three-year seed project, which has a budget of $4.75 million, and strengthen the involvement of stakeholders and key partners.

Aims include enhancing rust disease surveillance, early warning and phenotyping; fast-track variety testing and pre-release seed multiplication; accelerating seed multiplication of durable rust-resistant wheat varieties; demonstrating and scaling up improved wheat varieties; and improving the linkages between small-scale durum wheat producers and agro-industries.

To achieve these goals EIAR, CIMMYT and the University of Minnesota will implement project activities in collaboration with other key Ethiopian stakeholders, including agricultural research centers, public and private seed enterprises, the Ethiopian Agricultural Transformation Agency, the Ethio-Italian Development Cooperation “Agricultural Value Chains Project in Oromia” and the Ethiopia Seed Producers Association.

The project covers 51 districts in four major wheat-growing regions of Ethiopia. Milestones include the following: reaching 164,000 households with direct access to the new technology and having more than 2 million households benefiting from indirect access to high-yielding rust resistant cultivars; wheat yield increases of 25 percent for farmers with access to rust-resistant seed varieties; training for about 5,000 agricultural experts, development agents, seed producers and model farmers; more than 50 percent of the wheat area being sown to cultivars with durable resistance to current rust threats; an increased number of seed growers and associations participating in accelerated seed multiplication; and the increased participation of women farmers to lead accelerated seed multiplication and scaling up.

All partners will be involved in close monitoring and working groups related to the project.

At the workshop, a key topic was emphasizing to farmers that they must avoid susceptible rust suckers as they are pumping more spores on cultivars under production, which is one reason for the recurrent epidemics of wheat rusts and break down of resistant genes.

Delegates also engaged in discussions on the importance of cropping systems and variety diversifications. Fruitful deliberations and interactions occurred and important feedback was captured for project implementation and to ensure successful results.

A previous workshop on the surveillance, early warning and phenotyping component of the project was held at the Cereal Disease Laboratory in Minnesota.

Bekele Abeyo is a CIMMYT senior scientist based in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. He will lead the seed improvement project.