Providing climate data that is useful for farmers is crucial for adapting Europe’s agriculture to weather and climate extremes. Several programmes within the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) are tailoring their climate data and models to help agriculture respond better to climate change.
The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) is using C3S data to improve crops; by looking at how the plants perform in various weather conditions, researchers focus on selecting cereal varieties resilient to drought and heat.
The locust invasion is the biggest in Ethiopia and Somalia in 25 years, and the biggest in Kenya in 70 years, according to the FAO. Photo: Ben Curtis/AP
East African countries are battling the worst desert locust invasion in decades. The locusts are devouring crops and pasture leaving in their wake a region that is staring at a potential food crisis. The swarms have swept across Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, South Sudan, Somalia, Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda, with some of these countries reporting the worst outbreak in 70 years.
Experts have warned of a second round of the flare-up, as the eggs laid along the locust path hatch. Both aerial and ground spraying with insecticides continue but such interventions have not yielded much success.
Stephen Njoka, Director of the Desert Locust Control Organization for Eastern Africa (DLCO-EA) and Hugo De Groote, Agricultural Economist at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) share some insights on the outbreak, effective control measures and what can be done to mitigate the damage currently and in potential future outbreaks.
Q: What is your opinion on the locust invasion across the eastern Africa region?
A: The current locust invasion in the eastern Africa region is one of the most serious occurrences in decades. For Ethiopia and Kenya, this is the worst outbreak in over 25 years and 70 years respectively. The locusts have caused significant damage in pastoral regions, where they have devoured pasture and tree leaves. They are now reaching some of the major maize growing areas where they are likely to cause a lot of damage to the crops.
Q: Why are they called desert locusts?
A: They breed in the wet desert sands. In west Africa for instance, they would breed in the border areas between the Sahel and the Sahara Desert. They go through six stages; five of which are the non-flying phases. Once they reach adult stage, they start flying, mating and laying eggs, and the cycle continues.
They are usually solitary in nature, but occasionally move into their gregarious state, in which they alter their behavior and physical appearance, form swarms and migrate over long distances following the winds. This is what differentiates locusts from grasshoppers. When they land at a particular location, they cause a lot of damage in that specific area. Apart from that local destruction, however, they may not cause much harm on a national scale.
Q: How serious of a problem is this invasion to the food security status of countries like South Sudan that are just recovering from decades of conflict and a recent drought?
A: The invasion could pose a serious food security challenge in some areas as these insects consume their own weight in a day (one insect weighs 2 grams and a swarm can contain over 50 million insects).
For countries like South Sudan and Somalia where conflicts can hamper locust control efforts, the food insecurity situation gets compounded. Pastures are the worst hit as locusts tend to prefer hotter climates where livestock keeping is the main source of livelihood.
Q: In your experience, what is the best way to deal with such an invasion? What are the most effective control measures?
A: The best way to deal with such an invasion is to conduct aerial spraying using Ultra Low Volume (ULV) chemical or biological pesticides at the early stages for effective control. It is important to identify the egg-laying sites early on so that the emerging hoppers are sprayed before they can fly.
Q: We understand that this is the worst invasion in Kenya in about 70 years and the worst in 25 years in some neighboring countries such as Ethiopia. Should we expect another infestation a few years from now?
A: It is unlikely that we can expect another invasion of this magnitude in the near future. The current invasion may have been driven by climatic changes in the breeding areas of the Red Sea coast, war-torn Yemen and Somalia.
Q: How can we be better prepared given that such invasions are cyclical in nature and may happen again after some years or decades?
A: Continued monitoring and forecasting of the locust population in the traditional breeding sites should be a priority. Countries in the invasion areas should establish Locust Control Units under the appropriate ministries. These units should frequently get updates from the FAO Desert Locust Information Service (DLIS) in Rome and take precautionary steps as advised.
As the eastern Africa region, member countries of DLCO-EA should step up their support for the organization by acquiring modern aircrafts, which can conduct aerial spraying more effectively and efficiently.
Q: What monitoring measures are in place for the surveillance and recommended remedial measures, especially in periods of low densities just before they become gregarious? Who does the monitoring and how frequently is the monitoring done?
A: Locust scouting teams in the breeding areas are charged with monitoring and surveillance of these pests. The exercise is continuous and largely supported by FAO DLIS using appropriate equipment like elOCUST 3, a data recording and transmission system for crop pest monitoring, currently used as a detection and early warning tool for desert locusts.
Q: Are mitigation measures such as compensation for affected farmers an option?
A: Where farmers are seriously hit, government, intergovernmental agencies or non-governmental organizations may consider easing the farmers’ losses by offering food and/or financial support.
Q: We have seen efforts such as aerial or ground spraying of the pests. How effective are these interventions? What implications does this control measure have on the environment and people’s health?
A: The safe use of pesticides remains the best choice for control of insects occurring in such big numbers. It is important to use environmentally safe products which cause minimum harm to non-targets. Spray teams should be well trained on how to handle the pesticides.
People living in the invaded areas should also be alerted on keeping themselves and their livestock safe by not getting into the sprayed areas as advised. One effective biological control is the use of the Metarhizium, which the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) developed out of the locust skin fungus.
Nevertheless, some chemicals may cause more harm to the environment, especially when aerial spraying is applied on swarms in flight. The pesticides can contaminate the environment, water, crops and can cause skin rashes or respiratory, neurological or eye problems. They can also cause harm to animals and aquatic species.
In times of locust outbreaks, like now, there is a tendency to procure large quantities of pesticides. However, once the locusts are gone, stockpiles of the unused pesticides remain. This brings about a new challenge of destroying or safely disposing of the old or obsolete pesticide stock.
Q: Can the locusts be eaten?
A: Many communities in the world eat locusts and other insects. It is, however, important to caution against eating sprayed locusts. Additionally, locust swarms can contain billions of locusts, so catching them for food may not have a significant effect in reducing their population.
When disease outbreaks occur, the impacts can be devastating. In the 1840s, the Irish potato famine, caused by the fungal disease late blight, killed around one million people and caused another million to emigrate.
The recent invasion of desert locusts throughout the horn of Africa – the worst in decades – shows how vulnerable crops are to pests as well.
The desert locust is one of the most destructive pests in the world, with one small swarm covering one square kilometer eating the same amount of food per day as 35,000 people. The outbreak could even provoke a humanitarian crisis, according to the FAO.
How does climate change affect pests and diseases?
Climate change is one factor driving the spread of pests and diseases, along with increasing global trade. Climate change can affect the population size, survival rate and geographical distribution of pests; and the intensity, development and geographical distribution of diseases.
Temperature and rainfall are the big drivers of shifts in how and where pests and diseases spread, according to experts.
“In general, an increase in temperature and precipitation levels favors the growth and distribution of most pest species by providing a warm and humid environment and providing necessary moisture for their growth,” says Tek Sapkota, agricultural systems and climate change scientist at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT).
However, when temperatures and precipitation levels get too high, this can slow the growth and reproduction of some pest species and destroy them by washing their eggs and larvae off the host plant, he explains.
This would explain why many pests are moving away from the tropics towards more temperate areas. Pests like warmer temperatures – but up to a point. If it is too hot or too cold, populations grow more slowly. Since temperate regions are not currently at the optimal temperature for pests, populations are expected to grow more quickly in these areas as they warm up.
Crop diseases are following a similar pattern, particularly when it comes to pathogens like fungi.
Movement towards the earth’s poles
Research shows that since 1960, crop pests and diseases have been moving at an average of 3 km a year in the direction of the earth’s north and south poles as temperatures increase.
Tar spot, a fungal disease native to Latin America, which can cause up to 50% of yield losses in maize, was detected for the first time in the US in 2015. Normally prevalent in tropical climates, the disease has started emerging in non-tropical regions, including highland areas of Central Mexico and many counties in the US.
Maize-producing counties in the USA vulnerable to tar spot complex (TSC) calculated based on climate similarity. Khondoker Mottaleb et al. 2018
The southern pine beetle, one of the most destructive insects invading North America, is moving north as temperatures rise and is likely to spread throughout northeastern United States and into southeastern Canada by 2050.
Wheat stem rust was reported by the Greeks and Romans, and the latter sacrificed to the gods to avoid disease outbreaks on their wheat crops. Photo: CIMMYT/Petr Kosina
Wheat rusts, which are among the greatest threats to wheat production around the world, are also adapting to warmer climates and becoming more aggressive in nature, says Mandeep Randhawa, CIMMYT wheat breeder and wheat rust pathologist.
“As temperatures rise, larger quantities of spores are produced that can cause further infection and could potentially result in pathogenic changes through faster rate of their evolution.”
Scientists recently reported that stem rust had emerged in the UK for the first time in 60 years. Climate changes over the past 25 years are likely to have encouraged conditions for infection, according to the study.
Rising CO2 levels
Rising carbon dioxide (CO2) levels could also affect pests indirectly, by changing the architecture of their host plant and weakening its defenses.
“Elevated CO2 concentrations, as a result of human activity and influence on climate change, will most likely influence pests indirectly through the modification in plant chemistry, physiology and nutritional content,” says Leonardo Crespo, CIMMYT wheat breeder.
Despite high confidence among scientists that climate change will cause an increase in pests and diseases, predicting exactly when and where pests and diseases will spread is no easy task. There is significant variation between different species of pests and types of pathogens, and climate models can only provide estimates of where infection or outbreaks might occur.
Keeping pests and disease pandemics at bay
To address these uncertainties, experts increasingly recognize the need to monitor pest and disease outbreaks and have called for a global surveillance system to monitor these and improve responses.
Recent technological tools like the suitcase-sized mobile lab MARPLE, which tests pathogens such as wheat rust in near real-time and gives results within 48 hours, allow for early detection. Early warning systems are also crucial tools to warn farmers, researchers and policy makers of potential outbreaks.
Breeding pest- and disease-resistant varieties is another environmentally friendly solution, since it reduces the need for pesticides and fungicides. Collaborating with scientists worldwide, CIMMYT works on developing wheat and maize varieties resistant to diseases, including Fusarium Head Blight (FHB), wheat rust, wheat blast for wheat and maize lethal necrosis (MLN) for maize.
A ladybug (or ladybird) beetle sits on a wheat spike of an improved variety growing in the field in Islamabad, Pakistan. Photo credit: A. Yaqub/CIMMYT.
Beneficial insects can also act as a natural pest control for crops. Ladybugs, spiders and dragonflies act as natural predators for pests like aphids, caterpillars and stem borers. Other solutions include mechanical control measures such as light traps, pheromone traps and sticky traps, as well as farming practice controls such as crop rotation.
The United Nations has declared this year as the International Year of Plant Health, emphasizing the importance of raising global awareness on how “protecting plant health can help end hunger, reduce poverty, protect biodiversity and the environment, and boost economic development.”
As part of this initiative, CIMMYT will host the 24th Biannual International Plant Resistance to Insects (IPRI) conference from March 2-4. The conference will cover topics including plant-insect interactions, breeding for resistance, and phenotyping technologies for predicting pest resistant traits in plants.
Cover photo: A locust swarm in north-east Kenya. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization has warned that the swarms already seen in Somalia, Kenya and Ethiopia could range further afield. Photograph: Sven Torfinn/FAO
A new study by researchers at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) assesses how three large projects have scaled service provision models for agricultural mechanization in Bangladesh, Mexico and Zimbabwe. In what is possibly the first cross-continental assessment of these issues to date, the study gauges the extent to which each initiative fits with the needs of its environment to enable sustained machinery use by farmers at a large scale, while acknowledging the influence of project design on outcomes.
Each of the projects has made considerable progress towards increasing the adoption of agricultural machinery in their target area. In Bangladesh and Mexico, mechanization service providers and machinery dealers have been able to strengthen their business cases because the projects use geospatial and market data to provide targeted information on client segmentation and appropriate cropping systems. In Zimbabwe, CIMMYT and partners have worked to strengthen the market for two-wheeled tractors by creating demand among smallholders, developing the capacity of existing vocational training centers, and spurring private sector demand.
However, despite these initial successes, it can often be difficult to gauge the sustained change and transformative nature of such interventions.
Applying a scaling perspective
To address this challenge, research teams held a series of workshops with project partners in each country, including regional government representatives, national and local private sector stakeholders, and direct project collaborators such as extension agents and site managers. Participants were asked to answer a series of targeted questions and prompts using the Scaling Scan, a user-friendly tool which facilitates timely, structured feedback from stakeholders on issues that matter in scaling. Responses given during this exercise allowed project designers to analyze, reflect on, and sharpen their scaling ambition and approach, focusing on ten scaling ‘ingredients’ that need to be considered to reach a desired outcome, such as knowledge and skills or public sector governance.
Local service provider uses a bed planter for crop production in Horinofolia, Bangladesh. (Photo: Ranak Martin)
“Although at first sight the case studies seem to successfully reach high numbers of end users, the assessment exposes issues around the sustainable and transformative nature of the project interventions,” says Lennart Woltering, a scaling advisor at CIMMYT.
The added value of this approach, explains Jelle Van Loon, lead author and CIMMYT mechanization specialist, is that lessons learned from project-focused interventions can be amplified to generate broader, actionable knowledge and implement thematic strategies worldwide. “This is especially important for CIMMYT as we do exactly that, but often face different constraints depending on the local context.”
The use of a scaling perspective on each of these projects exposed important lessons on minimizing project dependencies. For example, though each project has invested considerably in both capacity and business development training, in all three case studies the large-scale adoption of recommended service provision models has been limited by a lack of finance and insufficient collaboration among the value chain actors to strengthen and support mechanization service provider entrepreneurs.
“While provision of market and spatial information helps local businesses target their interventions, local stakeholders are still dependent on the projects in terms of transitioning from project to market finance, facilitating collaboration along the value chain, and provision of leadership and advocacy to address issues at governance level,” Woltering explains. This, Van Loon adds, demonstrates a need for the inclusion of properly planned exit strategies from projects, as well as a degree of flexibility during the project development phase.
In all three regions, the supply of appropriate mechanization services is struggling to meet demand and few solutions have been found to support the transition from project to market finance. Continued capacity development is required at all stages of the value chain to ensure the provision of high-quality services and it has been suggested that incentivizing potential clients to access mechanization services and linking service providers with machinery dealers and mechanics might produce more satisfying results than simply supporting equipment purchases.
Reduced response diversity does not negatively impact wheat climate resilience. 2019. Snowdon, R.J., Stahl, A., Wittkop, B., Friedt, W., Voss-Fels, K.P., Ordon, F., Frisch, M., Dreisigacker, S., Hearne, S., Bett, K.E., Cuthbert, R.D. In: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS) v. 116, p. 10623-10624.
The Mutwales farm a small plot of land in the camp, growing primarily cassava and maize for food. They are also one of the 105 refugee farming families participating in an initiative during the 2019/2020 growing season to help them cultivate nutritious, vitamin A-biofortified orange maize, which was developed by the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) in partnership with HarvestPlus.
The public sector plays a vital catalytic role, through enabling policies and programs, in ensuring that biofortified crops like iron pearl millet, zinc wheat, and zinc rice reach the most vulnerable populations to address the problem of ‘hidden hunger’.
Farmer receiving information from a phone-based service. (Photo: Michelle DeFreese/CIMMYT)
Agricultural research is entering a new age in Bangladesh. The days, months and years it takes to collect farm data with a clipboard, paper and pen are nearing their end.
Electronic smartphones and tablets are gaining ground, used by researchers, extension workers and farmers to revolutionize the efficiency of data collection and provide advice on best-bet practices to build resilient farming systems that stand up to climate change.
Digital data collection tools are crucial in today’s ‘big data’ driven agricultural research world and are fundamentally shifting the speed and accuracy of agricultural research, said Timothy Krupnik, Senior Scientist and Systems Agronomist at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT).
“Easy-to-use data collection tools can be made available on electronic tablets for surveys. These allow extension workers to collect data from the farm and share it instantaneously with researchers,” he said.
“These tools allow the regular and rapid collection of data from farmers, meaning that researchers and extension workers can get more information than they would alone in a much quicker time frame.”
“This provides a better picture of the challenges farmers have, and once data are analyzed, we can more easily develop tailored solutions to farmers’ problems,” Krupnik explained.
It is the first time extension workers have been involved in data collection in the country. Since the pilot began in late 2019, extension workers have collected data from over 5,000 farmers, with detailed information on climate responses, including the management of soil, water and variety use to understand what drives productivity. The DAE is enthused about learning from the data, and plans to collect information from 7,000 more farmers in 2020.
Bangladesh’s DAE is directly benefiting through partnerships with expert national and international researchers developing systems to efficiently collect and analyze massive amounts of data to generate relevant climate-smart recommendations for farmers, said the department Director General Dr. M. Abdul Muyeed.
Workers spread maize crop for drying at a wholesale grain market. (Photo: Dreamstime.com)
For the first time widespread monitoring examines how farmers are coping with climate stresses, and agronomic data are being used to estimate greenhouse gas emissions from thousands of individual farmers. This research and extension partnership aims at identifying ways to mitigate and adapt to climate change, he explained.
“This work will strengthen our ability to generate agriculturally relevant information and increase the climate resilience of smallholder farmers in Bangladesh,” Dr. Muyeed said.
Next-gen big data analysis produces best-bet agricultural practices
“By obtaining big datasets such as these, we are now using innovative research methods and artificial intelligence (AI) to examine patterns in productivity, the climate resilience of cropping practices, and greenhouse gas emissions. Our aim is to develop and recommend improved agricultural practices that are proven to increase yields and profitability,” said Krupknik.
The surveys can also be used to evaluate on-farm tests of agricultural technologies, inform need-based training programs, serve local knowledge centers and support the marketing of locally relevant agricultural technologies, he explained.
“Collecting farm-specific data on greenhouse gas emissions caused by agriculture and recording its causes is a great step to develop strategies to reduce agriculture’s contribution to climate change,” added Krupnik.
Global schemes to fight climate change may miss their mark by ignoring the fundamental connections in how food is produced, supplied and consumed, scientists say in a new paper published in the journal Nature Food.
Representatives of the Satmile Satish Club (SSCOP) meet with members of the Grambikash Farmers Producer Company in Sitai, Cooch Behar, West Bengal, India. (Photo: SSCOP)
For many years, the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) has been working to improve the productivity, profitability and sustainability of smallholder agriculture in India through conservation agriculture and sustainable intensification practices. The Sustainable and Resilient Farming Systems Intensification (SRFSI) project began in 2014 in the state of West Bengal, with participatory research in eight farming cooperatives from the cities of Cooch Behar and Malda. Through the SRFSI project, CIMMYT has helped encourage women to participate in agricultural processes, adopt sustainable practices for various crops and utilize new technologies to improve their livelihoods.
Women farmers in West Bengal have demonstrated an interest in part-time agribusiness occupations. Some of them are coming together to form farmer groups and cooperatives that make a profit.
Mooni Bibi and other women from her community founded the Mukta Self Help Group. This organization of female farmers, supported by CIMMYT through the SRFSI project, helped turned rice cultivation into a business opportunity that helps other women. As a result of these efforts, these women now enjoy more financial freedom, can afford healthier food, are able to provide a better education for their children and benefit from an improved social standing within the community.
The Satmile Satish Club O Pathagar (SSCOP), a CIMMYT partner, has been vital in this process. SSCOP is now a resource for technical support and a training hub for conservation agriculture. It is now focused on introducing conservation agriculture practices to more areas, beginning with Sitai, a new neighborhood in Cooch Behar. This area is rich in proactive female farmers, but its agricultural sector is not fully modernized yet.
A group of women in Sitai founded Grambikash Farmers Producer Company, another farming cooperative that aims to increase crop yields and promote sustainability. The company challenges social norms and helps women become more financially and socially independent. This group of entrepreneurs is committed to apply conservation agriculture and sustainable intensification technology on 30 acres of land, beginning in 2020, with continuous support from SSCOP.
Through its work helping farmers in Cooch Behar, SSCOP is now a center of excellence for rural entrepreneurship as well as an advocate for conservation agriculture in West Bengal. They provide technical support and serve as a training hub for conservation agriculture and various associated sectors. Much of the training done by SSCOP is now self-funded.
Since 2014, CIMMYT has been collaborating with SSCOP to reach out to more than 70,000 farmers in Cooch Behar, spreading the benefits of conservation agriculture and sustainable intensification beyond the lifespan of the SRFSI project.
Rezatec, a leading provider of geospatial data analytics, has launched a free smartphone app which acts as a portal for farmers to record their agricultural activities and provides recommendations for optimal sowing and irrigation scheduling. Based on preliminary results from the experimental stations, the app has demonstrated the potential to increase wheat yields by up to 12%.
“Yaqui Valley farmers are very experienced farmers; however, they can also benefit by using an app that is designed locally to inform and record their decisions,” explains Francelino Rodrigues, Precision Agriculture Scientist at CIMMYT. “Sowing and irrigation timing are well known drivers of yield potential in that region – these are two features of the app we’re about to validate during this next season.”
A second ‘Green Revolution’ is needed to increase global wheat production by sixty per cent by 2050 when the world population is predicted to be 9.3 billion, global wheat research organisation, ‘Wheat Initiative’ said in a report.
Early Maturing Short Duration High Yielding White Maize open-pollinated variety. (Photo: MMRI)
Pakistan’s maize sector achieved a remarkable milestone in 2019 by releasing ten new maize varieties developed by the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) for commercial cultivation. The new varieties were released by two public sector research institutes.
The Maize and Millets Research Institute (MMRI) in Yousafwala, one of the leading and the oldest maize research institutes in Pakistan, released four open-pollinated varieties (OPVs) sourced from CIMMYT. The varieties, named Gohar-19, CIMMYT-PAK, Sahiwal Gold, and Pop-1 are the newest additions to Pakistan’s maize variety list. All the varieties are short-duration, which means they can be harvested quickly to rotate land for the next crop. They can also be grown in the main and off season, which makes them suitable for many different cropping systems.
The Agricultural Research Institute (ARI) in Quetta received approval for six of CIMMYT’s white kernel OPVs from the Provincial Seed Council (PSC), a government body responsible for variety registration in Balochistan. The varieties are named MERAJ-2019, MAHZAIB-2019, NOOR-2019, PAGHUNDA-2019, SILVER-2019, and SAR-SUBZ-2019. They are early-maturing with high yielding potential & drought tolerance. Drought stress is a major challenge for farmers in the Balochistan province, which covers 45% of Pakistan’s territory.
A group of maize experts visits maize research and seed production fields at the Maize and Millets Research Institute (MMRI) in Yousafwala, Pakistan. (Photo: CIMMYT)
Muhammad Arshad, Director of MMRI, acknowledged CIMMYT’s efforts to deploy the wide range of maize germplasm in the country. Arshad added that the Institute is working with partners to widely distribute these seeds to smallholder farmers at a reasonable price. “We are able to harvest maize yields from these early maturing varieties by applying 4-6 irrigations, unlike other varieties that require a minimum of ten irrigations per crop cycle,” said Syed Asmatullah Taran, Director of Cereal Crops at the Agricultural Research Institute in Quetta, Balochistan. “These are the first ever released maize varieties in our province,” he added, applauding CIMMYT for this milestone.
Muhammad Imtiaz, CIMMYT’s Country Representative for Pakistan and leader of the Agricultural Innovation Program (AIP), appreciated MMRI and ARI for their dedication and impactful efforts to strengthen the local maize seed system. Imtiaz explained that these new varieties will help cash-strapped smallholder farmers improve their livelihoods.
Through the AIP project, CIMMYT and its partners are helping new seeds reach farmers. “We expect to see more releases in 2020, as many varieties are in the pipeline,” said CIMMYT’s Seed Systems Specialist for South Asia, AbduRahman Beshir. “What is important is to scale up the seed production and distribution of these varieties so that farmers can get their share from the interventions. Water-efficient maize varieties will not only contribute to climate change adaptation strategy, but will also support the livelihood of marginal farmers.” Beshir also emphasized the importance of private sector engagement for seed delivery.
A maize field is prepared manually for planting in Balochistan province, Pakistan. (Photo: CIMMYT)
Maize is Pakistan’s third most important cereal following wheat and rice, encompassing an area of 1.3 million hectares. Maize productivity is also among the highest in South Asia, with national yields reaching almost 5 tons per hectare.
Despite its growing demand, maize production in Pakistan faces various challenges such as a lack of diverse genotypes suitable for various uses and ecologies, a weak seed delivery system unable to reach marginal farmers, high retail price of seeds and unpredictable weather conditions due to climate changes.
To enhance the availability, accessibility and affordability of quality maize seeds, the Agricultural Innovation Program (AIP) for Pakistan, led by CIMMYT and funded by USAID, is working with partners to benefit smallholder farmers across the country. The project focuses on the development and deployment of market-ready maize products sourced from different breeding hubs and systematically testing their adaptation in order to accelerate seed and varietal replacement in Pakistan. In the last six years, AIP’s public and private partners were able to access over 60 finished maize products and more than 150 parental lines from CIMMYT and IITA for further testing, variety registration, demonstration and seed scale up.
Maize-bean intercrop in the milpa system of the western highlands of Guatemala. (Photo: Carlos Gonzalez Esquivel)
Researchers from the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) in Tennessee, United States, and the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) in Texcoco, Mexico, describe why it is important for technical assistance to build upon indigenous farming knowledge and include women if programs are to succeed in tackling poverty and hunger in rural, Mesoamerican communities. Their findings, describing recent work in the Guatemalan Highlands, are recently published in Nature Sustainability.
According to government figures, 59% of Guatemalans live in poverty, concentrated in indigenous rural areas, such as the Western Highlands. Many factors contribute to pervasive malnutrition and a lack of employment opportunities for people in the Highlands. Recent crop failures associated with atypical weather events have exacerbated food shortages for Highland farm communities.
In early 2019, 90% of recent migrants to the southern border of the United States were from Guatemala, a majority of those from regions such as the Western Highlands. When they are unable to produce or purchase enough food to feed their families, people seek opportunities elsewhere. Historically, sugar cane and coffee industries offered employment but as prices for these commodities fall, fewer options for work are available within the region.
Indigenous peoples in the Highlands have been using a traditional agricultural production system called milpa for thousands of years. The milpa system involves growing maize together with climbing beans, squash, and other crops on a small plot of land. The maize plants support the growth of the climbing beans; the beans enrich soil through biological nitrogen fixation; and squash and other crops protect the soil from erosion, retain water, and prevent weeds.
However, frequent crop failures, declining farm sizes, and other factors result in low household production, forcing families to turn to non-agricultural sources of income or assistance from a family member working abroad. Studies have shown that as household income declines, dietary diversity decreases, which exacerbates undernutrition.
In prior decades, technical assistance for agriculture in Central America focused on larger farms and non-traditional export crops. The researchers recommend inclusion of indigenous communities to enhance milpa systems. Nutrition and employment options can be improved by increasing crop diversity and adopting improved seed varieties that are adapted to the needs of the local communities. This approach requires investments that recognize and advance ancestral knowledge and the role of indigenous women in milpa systems. The Nature Sustainability commentary highlights that technical assistance needs to include women and youth and should increase resilience in production systems to climate change, related weather events, pests, and disease.
“Improving linkages among local farmers, extensionists, students, and researchers is critical to identify and implement opportunities that result in more sustainable agricultural landscapes,” said Keith Kline, senior researcher at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. “For example, improved bean varieties have been developed that provide high-yields and disease resistance, but if they grow too aggressively, they choke out other milpa crops. And successful adoption of improved varieties also depends on whether flavor and texture meet local preferences.”
Strengthening institutions to improve agricultural development, health care, security, education can help create stronger livelihoods and provide the Western Highlands community with a foundation for healthier families and economic stability. As more reliable options become available to feed one’s family, fewer Guatemalans will feel pressured to leave home.
The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) is the global leader in publicly-funded maize and wheat research and related farming systems. Headquartered near Mexico City, CIMMYT works with hundreds of partners throughout the developing world to sustainably increase the productivity of maize and wheat cropping systems, thus improving global food security and reducing poverty. CIMMYT is a member of the CGIAR System and leads the CGIAR Research Programs on Maize and Wheat and the Excellence in Breeding Platform. The Center receives support from national governments, foundations, development banks and other public and private agencies. For more information, visit staging.cimmyt.org.
B.M Prasanna, Director of CIMMYT’s Global Maize Program and the CGIAR Research Program on Maize, says agriculture scientists have set their focus on making cultivation a profitable venture.
