Howard G. Buffett and Patronato visit CENEB to discuss conservation agriculture in Sonora
On 22 February 2012 we welcomed Howard G. Buffett and members of Sonora’s ‘Patronato’ (Patronato para la Investigación y Experimentación Agrícola del Estado de Sonora; PIEAES) to CIMMYT’s CENEB (Campo Experimental Norman E. Borlaug) station near Ciudad Obregón, Sonora, Mexico. The visit emphasized our joint concerns to improve food security and identified shared interests for improving opportunities for smallholder farmers and local entrepreneurs, and for widespread promotion of CA.
Patronato is a union of farmer organizations that has supported research by CIMMYT and partners such as INIFAP throughout the last four decades. This support has enabled greater advances in the state of Sonora, Mexico and throughout the world.
In addition to being a philanthropist, entrepreneur, and author, Howard G. Buffett is a farmer actively practicing no-till methods (a key component of CA) on his farm in Nebraska. He has strong links with Mexico; in 2000, he received the Aztec Eagle Award, the highest honor bestowed on a foreign citizen by the Government of Mexico. Currently, he acts as an Ambassador Against Hunger for the United Nations World Food Programme, and in 2011, the World Food Programme awarded him the George McGovern Leadership Award, alongside Bill Gates.
“Increasing Sustainable Agricultural Production in Mozambique through Drought Tolerant Maize and Conservation Agriculture” is a USAID-supported initiative bringing together two key components of CIMMYT’s work: Breeding for drought tolerance and sustainable land management to mitigate the effects of climate change.
As part of the 
The group also discussed the MAIZE CRP and CIMMYT’s strong partnership with the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA). Institutional linkages such as these can be very beneficial to African smallholder farmers, as demonstrated by the major projects accomplished by CIMMYT’s Africa offices, such as Drought Tolerant Maize for Africa (DTMA), Sustainable Intensification of Maize- Legume Cropping Systems for Food Security in Eastern and Southern Africa (SIMLESA), Water Efficient Maize for Africa (WEMA), Insect Resistant Maize for Africa (IRMA), and Improved Maize for African Soils (IMAS). “CIMMYT has had an enormous impact on wheat in Africa. Most cultivars are CIMMYT derived and many wheat scientists from African NARS have been trained at CIMMYT,” said Ammar.
Since 2005, farmers, extension officers, and researchers have joined forces in starting a revolution from traditional farming systems in Malawi to locally adapted CA systems. The number of farmers practicing CA in the TLC communities of Central Malawi has grown from the initial 12 in 2005 to over 30,000 in 2012. This extension of CA was largely due to the development of an innovation network with different actors: Researchers assured training and quality implementation of the new technologies in target communities; the network facilitated participatory interaction and dialogue with farmers; and farmers raised social capital, subsequently boosting interest in the project within their own communities and the surrounding areas. These successful results enabled TLC and other partners to attract further funding and they linked farmers with input suppliers and a soft loan program for herbicides and improved seed. Farmers can currently access the input loan at seeding and pay back the amount for both inputs at harvest. Linking farmers to input markets was a major success, but more work needs to be done to also develop output markets for increased production from CA fields.
During 21 January-05 February, a delegation consisting of Director General Thomas Lumpkin, Global Wheat Program Associate Director and Head of Pathology, Etienne Duveiller, Board member Andy Barr, and Development Officer Cheraé Robinson travelled from El Batán to visit the three sites of the newly established Borlaug Institute for South Asia (BISA). They were accompanied by Ajai Kumar and Raj Gupta, from CIMMYT’s New Delhi office.
On 08 February 2012, CIMMYT’s Director General Thomas Lumpkin participated as a speaker in the Economist Conference “Feeding the World: The 9 Billion People Question” in Geneva, Switzerland. Attendees included a number of high level representatives and government officials, including Kanayo Nwanze, President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), Jikun Huang, Founder and Director of the Center for Agricultural Policy, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAAS), and Bruno Le Maire, the French Minister of Agriculture, Food, and Fishing.
A 
Innovative techniques in wheat breeding are necessary to meet the increasing population demand and overcome environmental challenges, said CIMMYT Wheat Breeder, Ravi Singh, at the annual meeting of the 
Many of us were celebrating love and friendship on 14 February 2012, and CIMMYT’s online image collection was no exception. Users around the world showed us how much they love CIMMYT’s photos, with the flickr site receiving its 200,000th view since the collection began. If you haven’t yet seen our fantastic photos, join in at: 
During 06-10 February 2012, a team of CIMMYT scientists travelled to six communities in Zambia’s Eastern Province to monitor progress on activities implemented under the Sustainable Intensification of Maize-Legume systems for the Eastern Province of Zambia (SIMLEZA) project, funded by USAID as part of Barack Obama’s “Feed the Future” initiative. The team was joined by national partners from governmental extension services, field coordinators from Total Land Care, Zambian researchers from Msekera Research Station, IITA, and CIP, and a group of farmers from Monze, in Zambia’s Southern Province. Journalists from two radio stations, one daily newspaper, and Zambian television covered the visit.