Days #2 and 3 of CIMMYT Visitors Week, Ciudad Obregon, Sonora, Mexico

Many people perceive that wheat is a food eaten only by the rich; but they are wrong, argues Hans Braun, Head of CIMMYT’s Global Wheat Program. Addressing the group of scientists, farmers, politicians, and policymakers, in the INIFAP auditorium at CENEB, Ciudad Obregon, Braun presented some dramatic figures, illustrating just how many of the world’s poor are dependent on this staple crop.

Wheat is the main staple for approximately 1.2 billion poor people (living on less than 2 USD per day); providing 20% of the daily calories and 20% of the protein for people in the least developed countries. Rural migration in sub-Saharan Africa is causing the demand for wheat to increase faster than any other commodity – it is the basis of many of the ‘fast foods’ preferred by men who have left their families behind to earn money in the city.

Perhaps what is most concerning are the predictions for the near future. South Asia, where wheat is the second most important crop after rice, and where 74% of people live in poverty, will soon be home to 25% of the world’s population. If you look at a map showing the sites of recent food riots, it is almost identical to a map that shows countries where wheat provides more than one third of a person’s daily calories. The extreme heat wave and subsequent fires that led Russia to close it’s borders to wheat exports caused a dramatic rise in food prices and sparked riots across the region. “If food prices rise, governments fall,” stated Braun, and with climate change predicted to cause more extreme weather events such as those seen in Russia, CIMMYT’s wheat program is working to develop new varieties of drought-, heat-, and pathogen-resistant wheat.

On Day Two of Visitors Week, we visited Roberto Encinas, who is not a rich man at all. He farms 12 hectares of wheat just outside of Ciudad Obregon, 2 of which are now farmed under conservation agriculture (CA) practices. In fact, one of the reasons Encinas started to adopt CA was to reduce his costs, and so far he estimates that his CA crop has cost 200 USD less per hectare. Not only that, his crop his healthier. “I could see a difference right from the start,” says Encinas, “the CA crop is greener and has developed more slowly.” His technician says that whereas the conventional crop will probably produce 5tons/ha, the CA crop should produce 7tons/ha. “I am very convinced that CA is working and I will extend next year,” stated Encinas. Together with his farmer group, next year they hope to plant 50% of their 200ha total land under CA, with the support and guidance of CIMMYT-trained technicians.

Day #1 of CIMMYT Visitors Week, Ciudad Obregon, Sonora, Mexico

One wall is dominated by a map of the Yaqui Valley, speckled with LED dots and flanked by computer projections. Two metre high maps of the region cover the side and back walls. In the middle of the room is one small desk, manned by one single technician. This is the control room of the Yaqui Valley District Irrigation System.

In 1992, the Mexican Government transferred management of the region’s irrigation channels to the farmers and their unions. The irrigation system is now controlled at this station, and consists of over 200 wells and three dams, providing water for 220,000 hectares of irrigated farmland.

The aquifer of the Yaqui Valley contains 600 million cubic metres, and is one of the few unexploited aquifers in Mexico. The irrigation station has permission to use the water, but they must also replace the supply. However, the severe droughts of 2003-2004 showed the organization that they could not only rely on their natural water supplies; when the dams almost ran dry they realised that they needed to format a plan to combat these dry periods. The existing computer system is the result of this forward thinking; the wells can be turned on or off from anywhere in the world using the organization’s wifi system,monitoring systems instantly send out alerts if a problem arises, and on-site cameras allow both monitoring of water releases and act as a security measure.

Generally, the water used for irrigation is 80% from the dams and 20% from the wells. Once a month, the organization’s laboratory tests the well water for salinity levels, so that the percentages of each type of source water can be adjusted to create the ideal water nutrient levels for agriculture. When the district received control of the system, 20,000 hectares of the land had salinity problems, but they have now managed to reduce this to just 4,000 hectares through a process they call “washing” the land.

But the irrigation station is not resting on its laurels. The Yaqui Valley produces 80% of Mexico’s wheat, and 74% of the Yaqui Valley’s crop is wheat. With this in mind, it’s no surprise that a mural declaring “The future is in our hands” is the first thing you see when you enter the station.

Many of us often underestimate the importance of water on our daily lives – that is until the taps run out of water or the well runs dry. For farmers, their lives are intimately connected to the abundance or lack of water. Many farmers in the developing world produce crops which are dependent on unpredictable patterns of rainfall. For these farmers, water is not only a resource, but truly the source of life.

When there is a lack of rain, it’s not only the crops that suffer, but farmers’ livestock, incomes, and livelihoods are put in jeopardy. In periods of drought, children are often the most vulnerable segment of the population. Children often suffer from malnutrition, stunting, and starvation as the result of drought, causing long-term effects on their health and well-being.

Episodes of drought have occurred with increasing intensity and frequency in recent months. The drought in the Horn of Africa – which began in July 2011 – has been called the worst drought in the region in over 60 years. The lack of food and grain has resulted in the tripling of prices in some areas. Millions of people continue to suffer from extreme hunger, starvation, and in some areas, famine. The current drought in Mexico has been called the worst drought in 70 years. As a result, farmers have lost over a billion dollars worth of crops since the drought began in October 2011. The effect of these severe droughts will be seen for years to come.

As we reflect on World Water Day, let us not only recognize how important water is to our everyday lives, but also acknowledge those who are developing more efficient solutions for water usage. Today, over 70 percent of the water used globally goes towards agriculture. How we use water for farming is one of the most important issues to address in the management of global water consumption.

In response to this challenge, our scientists are working to develop crops that can produce higher yields with less water. Our agronomists are working to develop systems which conserve water through the management of soils. Our researchers are developing systems which better utilize and apply agricultural inputs – such as pesticides and fertilizer – so that fewer chemicals enter our water sources.

We are all interconnected. Lack of water in one area also impacts other regions through the elevation of food prices, availability of staple foods, and competition for resources. As the world’s population expands to 9 billion – each of us have to take responsibility to address and reflect on how we utilize water. Today, let’s remember just how vitally important water is to our lives, to our planet, and to our future.

Visitors to the Centro Experimental de Norman E. Borlaug (CENEB) station, near Ciudad Obregon, Sonora, were lucky enough to witness the launch of CIMMYT’s first blimp on 13 March 2012. Made possible through generous support from the Sustainable Modernization of Traditional Agriculture (MasAgro) project, the 8-meter helium-filled balloon underpins the airborne remote-sensing “platform” of the CIMMYT wheat physiology group. It will help analyze the physiological properties of thousands of wheat lines being tested as part of the Mexican phenotyping platform (MEXPLAT).

“The blimp enables us to take data from large areas that previously had to be covered on foot,” said Maria Tattaris, a remote sensing specialist from the UK who has been working as a CIMMYT Post-Doc since January. Floating up to 300 meters above the fields, it provides a tactical vantage point for a thermal infrared imager and multispectral camera mounted on its underside. With four handlers guiding the blimp using ropes tied to the head and tail, its devices will quickly capture images and readings for attributes such as canopy temperature, stomatal conductance, canopy water content, vegetation indices, and pigment indices—all without having to destructively sample plants. The data will reveal plant stress levels under varying environments, as well as estimates of canopy biomass, growth rates, and photosynthetic capacity. The blimp also allows single, large-area measurements, helping avoid temporal variation effects. Finally, mounting multiple cameras enables simultaneous readings on different plant canopy properties in a specific area.

Obregón’s soaring dirigible will soon share airspace with another remotesensing UAV—“unmanned aerial vehicle,” in fly-tech parlance: the AscTec Falcon 8, a camera-loaded, propellor-driven drone that looks like a dragonfly but takes high-resolution infrared and multispectral images.

The blimp launch caused a sensation among CENEB staff and 60 members of the Wheat Yield Consortium (WYC), hailing from 30 countries and currently in Obregón for the Consortium’s 2nd international workshop. According to Tattaris, data detected by the new bird’s-eye sensors should significantly further WYC work.