A women dries maize grain after shelling. Photo: CIMMYT/ Wasim Iftikar
Unforeseen market effects, particularly rising land values and falling maize prices, have blocked the headway of women’s groups in eastern India who had begun profiting from maize farming on fallow land.
Leveraging the region’s favorable rainfall and soils and leasing fallow land from mostly male landholders, women’s groups had been growing improved maize, including hybrids, in Badbil Village, Mayurbhanj District, on the north-central plateau of Odisha State, a populous area on India’s East Coast.
In conjunction with the Odisha State Department of Agriculture in 2016, the Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia (CSISA), led by the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), provided technical training on improved maize production practices including mechanized line sowing using a seed drill, the safe application of pre-emergence herbicides, weed control using a power weeder, precision fertilizer management, and the marketing of dry grain.
Across Mayurbhanj, CSISA supported the cultivation of more than 1,800 hectares of hybrid maize. The women’s groups in Badbil grew more than 32 hectares and obtained an average yield of 5.6 tons per hectare. CSISA facilitated the purchase by poultry feed mills from neighboring districts of around 100 tons of dry grain at $240 per ton, generating net gains of from $700 to $783 per hectare. The farmers also harvested surplus green cobs for family consumption.
Women farmers ready to bag up maize grain for storage. Photo: CIMMYT/ Wasim Iftikar
The success of maize cultivation in Badbil received attention in leading Odia-language newspapers, became a regional example for turning fallows into cash, and even featured in a report of the CGIAR Research Program on Maize.
But seeing that maize cultivation could yield profits, landowners declined to lease their fields in 2017. Fewer women farmers were able to grow maize and difficulties in sustaining linkages with millers due to the low output led many of the women to sell their crop as green cob at a lower price.
Worse yet, maize market prices plunged in Odisha in 2017. Farmers in Nuapada and Bolangir districts ended up selling at $167 per ton, against a declared minimum support price of $226 and as compared to $190 in 2016, demonstrating farmers’ vulnerability to price volatility.
Women farmers in Badbil wish to continue growing maize, despite the obstacles, and are encouraging male farmers to produce hybrid maize to keep supplying millers and thus maintain that market connection.
Anita Lohar, a progressive woman farmer, said, “The introduction of mechanization has helped the self-help groups to come forward to adopt maize and earn money from fallow land. We had one acre of maize in 2014 and now we cultivate maize on more than 80 acres. Maize farming has changed a lot from traditional practices, which were time consuming, labor intensive and less profitable, and now has asserted women’s fundamental role in agriculture.”
CSISA is working with the Odisha State Department of Agriculture and Farmers’ Empowerment, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and the National Commodity & Derivatives Exchange Limited to convene a maize marketing forum. On the agenda are improved infrastructure and aggregation and connectivity with nearby markets, such as poultry mills. CSISA also believes that better coordination among agencies involved in production, post-harvest management, storage, warehousing, and e-trading can unlock the potential for maize to generate significant incomes for smallholders, especially women, in the Odisha plateau.
Women are adopting mechanization and using seed drills. Photo: CIMMYT/ Wasim Iftikar
CIMMYT research in Ethiopia and other countries has shown that, in communities where women and men work together and women have access to knowledge and resources and share in decision making, everyone benefits. Photo: CIMMYT/Apollo Habtamu
Gender awareness and gender-sensitive approaches are slowly spreading into agricultural research, extension, and policy in Ethiopia, based on recent statements from a cross section of professionals and practitioners in the country.
Moges Bizuneh, deputy head of the agricultural office of Basona District, attended a CIMMYT-organized workshop in which Ethiopia-specific results were presented from GENNOVATE, a large-scale qualitative study involving focus groups and interviews with more than 7,500 rural men and women in 26 developing countries. “I have learned a lot about gender and it’s not just about women, but about both women and men,” said Bizuneh.
The District of Basona has nearly 30,000 households, 98 percent of which depend on agriculture for food and livelihoods but have access to an average of only 1.5 hectares of land. More than 10,000 of those households are headed by females, because many males and youth have left Basona to seek opportunities in large cities or other countries.
Bizuneh and his colleagues are working with a district gender specialist and a women and gender unit to make gender sensitive approaches a regular part of their activities. In this, he concedes that he and other professionals are contending with “deep-rooted social and cultural norms around divisions of labor and a lack of awareness regarding gender issues.”
One surprise for Bizuneh, from group discussions regarding innovation and involvement in CIMMYT’s gender research, was that women said it was important to share experiences with other farmers and obtain new knowledge.
“No men mentioned that,” he remarked. “This shows that, if provided with information and support, women can innovate.”
Kristie Drucza, CIMMYT gender and development specialist, has been studying, publishing on, and presenting widely about people-centered, evidence-based approaches for gender equality that are being taken up by agriculture-for-development professionals. Photo: CIMMYT/Apollo Habtamu
Women and men plan and change together
Another product from the project is a 2017 review of gender-transformative methodologies for Ethiopia’s agriculture sector, co-authored by Kristie Drucza, project lead, and Wondimu Abebe, a research assistant, both from CIMMYT.
Drucza presented on the people-centered methodologies described in the publication at a recent workshop in Addis Ababa, offering diverse lessons of use for research and development professionals.
“The methodologies involve participatory research to help households and communities assess their situation and develop solutions to problems,” said Drucza. “By working with men and boys and allowing communities to set the pace of change, these approaches reduce the likelihood of a backlash against women—something that too frequently accompanies gender-focused programs.”
Annet Abenakyo Mulema, social scientist in gender at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), intends to apply some of the same methods to help rural families understand household and community gender dynamics and their role in managing the families’ goats, sheep, and other livestock.
Annet Abenakyo Mulema, social scientist in gender at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), is applying participatory research and gender-sensitive methods to help households and communities assess their situation and develop solutions to problems. Photo: ILRI archives
“A 2015 study we did uncovered gender relationships associated with disease transmission,” Mulema explained. “Women and girls normally clean the animal pens and so are exposed to infections. Social conventions in the community make women feel inferior and not empowered to speak out about animal health, which is considered a man’s domain. We encouraged men and women to share roles and work together, and this made it easier for both to quickly identify disease outbreaks at early stages and prevent infections from spreading throughout the herd or to humans.”
Mulema said Drucza’s workshop helped her to understand and appreciate methodologies such as social analysis and action, community conversations, and gender action learning systems to support a shared, local response to the problem. “As another outcome, we spoke to service providers, such as veterinarians and extension agents, who needed to understand how gender related to animal health and the fact that the relationships between women and men in a community can change.”
Meskerem Mulatu, gender and nutrition specialist in Ethiopia’s Agricultural Growth Program II (AGP II) Capacity Development Support Facility (CDSF), said her group invited Drucza to speak on gender and social norms at a national workshop organized by AGP II CDSF in October 2017.
“Our event was on gender, nutrition, and climate-smart agriculture,” according to Meskerem. “Many technologies are gender-sensitive but research and extension are not giving this adequate attention because there is no common operational definition. Their preconception is ‘technology is technology; it’s the same for men and women.’ Drucza’s evidence-based presentation showed that men and women may have different technology demands.”
Meskerem is going to train district agricultural officers to use a transformative methodology identified by Drucza. “Kristie’s report is really good timing,” she said. “We were thinking of doing something in terms of gender and these methodologies make sense.”
Recording data on changes in social norms
In June 2017, Drucza presented the findings of her meta-analysis of evaluations of gender in Ethiopian agricultural development at a senior staff meeting of the Ethiopia office of CARE, the global humanitarian organization. Among the 26 agricultural program evaluations considered, explained Drucza, only three had strong findings, a heavy inclusion of gender, and evidence of changes in social norms—and all three were CARE projects.
Moges Bizuneh helps lead an agricultural office in Basona District, home to more than 10,000 female-headed households, and is working to support innovation by women. Photo: CIMMYT/Mike Listman
One was the Graduation with Resilience to Achieve Sustainable Development (GRAD) initiative. As an outcome of Drucza’s presentation, CARE is refining the way it records certain social data, according to Elisabeth Farmer, Deputy Chief of Party for the CARE’s Feed the Future Ethiopia–Livelihoods for Resilience Activity project, which emerged from GRAD.
“Our baseline study protocol and questionnaire for the new project hadn’t been finalized yet,” Farmer said. “We were thinking through the difference between using a scale that scores responses along a range, such as a Likert scale, versus asking respondents “yes or no”-type questions, for instance regarding women’s access to information or equitable decision-making in the household.
“As Drucza explained, when it comes to gender norms, you may not get all the way from a “no” to a “yes”, but only from a “2” to “3”, and we want to make sure that we are capturing these smaller shifts, so we incorporated scales with ranges into our baseline and will ensure that these are used in future assessments to track transformations in social norms.”
According to Drucza, who leads the CIMMYT project “Understanding gender in wheat-based livelihoods for enhanced WHEAT R4D impact in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Ethiopia,” funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, research must be relevant and useful.
“I’m happy to learn that our results are useful to a diverse range of actors, from development partners to policy makers and local agricultural officers,” she said.
A new publication suggests strategies to improve rural women’s access to agricultural machinery. Photo: CIMMYT/ Martin Ranak
A new research note published for International Women’s Day, details current gender gaps in rural mechanization in Bangladesh, and outlines plans to overcome these challenges.
Using simple technologies, such as multi-crop reaper-harvesters can reduce the time farmers spend harvesting by up to 80 percent and can reduce the costs of hiring field labor by up to 60 percent. The problem is that women may face cultural constraints to working in the field, running machinery service provision businesses, and do not have equal access to financing, which is a huge barrier, as the technologies can cost $500-2000 up front.
The authors suggest a number of gender-balanced approaches to scaling-out technologies such as use of targeted, selective and smart subsidies and access to finance to women-headed households, methods to spread investment risks, and prioritizing joint learning, with husbands and wives attending field courses together and jointly developing business plans.
The research note is a result of joint efforts between the USAID/Washington and Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation supported Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia (CSISA), the USAID/Bangladesh CSISA – Mechanization and Irrigation Project, and the the USAID/Washington funded USAID funded Gender, Climate Change, and Nutrition Integration Initiative (GCAN) project, all of which involve collaborations between the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center, the International Food Policy Research Institute, International Development Enterprises, the International Rice Research Institute and the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security.
EL BATAN, Mexico (CIMMYT) – A new set of resources has been released to aid agricultural researchers integrating gender sensitivities into their research for development projects. The guidance notes are based on findings from GENNOVATE, a global comparative gender norms research initiative, funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
“Integrating gender into research is challenging,” said the project leader Lone Badstue. “The purpose of these GENNOVATE resources is to inspire and help scientists who are not gender experts to think gender into their own work.”
Agricultural research often fails to use gender analysis, which provides important information on women’s and men’s different needs and opportunities in agriculture, Badstue said.
(Photo: CIMMYT)
In a bid to turn the tide, GENNOVATE initiated a series of tools and guides to give evidence about gender roles in agriculture, challenge assumptions and provide gender-inclusive data collection instruments that are easily accessible to researchers.
“These resources provide evidence-based inputs and recommendations on how to integrate gender considerations in research on, for example, climate-smart-agriculture, conservation agriculture, mechanization, farmer training events and more,” said Badstue. “Some of the tools have broad geographical relevance, while others have a regional or even country-level focus.”
The resources draw on GENNOVATE research, which focuses on how gender norms influence women’s and men’s abilities to learn about, adopt and adapt innovations in agriculture and natural resource management. This research initiative runs across multiple CGIAR research programs to provide contextually grounded evidence on how gender interacts with access to information, resources and decision-making processes.
Offering a very warm welcome to the Australian High Commissioner and team by Arun Joshi. (Photo: Hardeep/CIMMYT)
Australian High Commissioner to India, Harinder Sidhu, visited the Borlaug Institute for South Asia (BISA) in Ladhowal, Ludhiana, India on February 19.
Arun Joshi, Managing Director for BISA & CIMMYT in India, welcomed her with an introduction about the creation, mission and activities of BISA and the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT).
Sidhu also learned about the work CIMMYT and BISA do in conservation agriculture in collaboration with Punjab Agricultural University, machinery manufacturers and farmers. This work focuses on using and scaling the Happy Seeder, which enables direct seeding of wheat into heavy loads of rice residue without burning. This technology has been called “an agricultural solution to air pollution in South Asia,” as the burning of crop residue is a huge contributor to poor air quality in South Asia. Sidhu learned about recent improvements to the technology, such as the addition of a straw management system to add extra functionality, which has led to the large-scale adoption of the Happy Seeder.
The high commissioner showed keen interest in the Happy Seeder machine, and was highly impressed by the test-wheat-crop planted on 400 acres with the Happy Seeder.
Salwinder Atwal showed Sidhu the experiments using Happy Seeder for commercial seed production, and ML Jat, Principal Researcher at CIMMYT, presented on the innovative research BISA and CIMMYT are doing on precision water, nutrient and genotype management.
Happy Australian High Commissioner riding a tractor at BISA Ludhiana. (Photo: Hardeep/CIMMYT)
Sidhu visited fields with trials of climate resilient wheat as Joshi explained the importance and role of germplasm banks and new approaches such as use of genomic selection in wheat breeding in the modern agriculture to address the current challenges of climate change. He also explained the work CIMMYT does on hybrid wheat for increasing yield potential and breeding higher resistance against wheat rusts and other diseases.
ML Jat, who leads the CIMMYT-CCAFS climate smart agriculture project, explained the concept of climate smart villages and led Sidhu on a visit to the climate smart village of Noorpur Bet, which has been adopted under the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security.
During Sidhu’s visit to Noorpur Bet, a stakeholder consultation was organized on scaling happy seeder technology for promoting no-burning farming. In the stakeholder consultation, stakeholders shared experiences with happy seeder as well as other conservation agriculture amd climate smart agriculture technologies. BS Sidhu, Commissioner of Agriculture for the Government of Punjab chaired the stakeholder consultation and shared his experiences as well as Government of Punjab’s plans and policies for the farmers to promote happy seeder and other climate smart technologies.
“I am very impressed to see all these developments and enthusiasm of the farmers and other stakeholders for scaling conservation agriculture practices for sustaining the food bowl,” said Sidhu. She noted that Punjab and Australia have many things in common and could learn from each other’s experiences. Later she also visited the Punjab Agricultural University and had a meeting with the Vice Chancellor.
This visit and interaction was attended by more than 200 key stakeholders including officers from Govt. of Punjab, ICAR, PAU-KVKs, PACS, BISA- CIMMYT-CCAFS, manufacturers, farmers and custom operators of Happy Seeder.
The Borlaug Institute for South Asia (BISA) is a non-profit international research institute dedicated to food, nutrition and livelihood security as well as environmental rehabilitation in South Asia, which is home to more than 300 million undernourished people. BISA is a collaborative effort involving the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) and the Indian Council for Agricultural Research (ICAR).
CIMMYT and the Pakistan Agricultural Research Council are set to hold a seminar on women and youth in wheat-based farming systems on March 8. Photo: CIMMYT archives
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (CIMMYT) – As part of activities around 2018 International Women’s Day, the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) and the Pakistan Agricultural Research Council (PARC) will hold a seminar on women and youth in wheat-based farming systems: How do women and youth contribute? What are their problems and concerns? How can their issues be addressed to increase farm productivity and benefit all household members?
The event will draw some 70 participants from public, private, and academic organizations, including high-level wheat sector officials, social scientists from all Pakistan provinces, and scientists from CIMMYT, the global leader in publicly-funded research on maize and wheat and related farming systems.
Among other topics, speakers will share and discuss Pakistan-specific findings from GENNOVATE, a large-scale qualitative study by CGIAR during 2014-16, based on focus groups and interviews involving more than 7,500 rural men and women in 26 developing countries.
The event, which takes place in the Inspire Meeting Hall, Agricultural Economics Research Institute (AERI), NARC Premises, Park Road, Islamabad, on Thursday, 8 March from 8:45 to 11:30 a.m., will feature presentations followed by question and answer sessions and discussions and will be chaired by Ghulam Muhammad Ali, Director General, NARC, and Dr. Imtiaz Muhammad, Country Representative, CIMMYT Pakistan.
The program includes Muhammad Khair and Zarmina Achakzi from Balochistan University of Information Technology, Engineering and Management Sciences (BUITEMS), who will highlight the role of women in farming in Balochistan and factors that limit their income and social status. Sidra Majeed and Nusrat Habib of the Agricultural Economics Research Institute (AERI), NARC, will present on gender roles and responsibilities in Pakistan.
From CIMMYT, Mulunesh Tsegaye, a research associate, will describe GENNOVATE findings on women and youth’s roles in wheat-based agriculture in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Baluchistan provinces. Consultant Sidra Minhas will share gender-related results from 14 agricultural program evaluations in Pakistan and how better to address gender dynamics in project design, programming, monitoring, and evaluation. Kristie Drucza, gender and social development research manager, will introduce results of three quantitative surveys that highlight the need for greater participation of women in agriculture research to raise the sector’s productivity and profitability.
The theme of 2018 International Women’s Day is #PressforProgress, and encourages global momentum in striving for gender parity.
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), women make up 43 percent of the agricultural workforce in developing countries, but for many access to resources and services is severely restricted and they are often left out of decisions regarding use of income—even that which they earn.
GENNOVATE is supported by generous funding from the World Bank; the CGIAR Gender & Agricultural Research Network; the government of Mexico through MasAgro; Germany’s Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ); numerous CGIAR Research Programs; and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
USAID’s Mary Hobbs, Director of the Economic Growth and Agriculture Section, and Kenneth Dunn, Deputy Director, met with CIMMYT-Pakistan’s Country Representative, Imtiaz Muhammad and NARC’s Director General, Ghullam Muhammad Ali.
During the visit, the delegation toured wheat field trials, the Maize Stem Borer Mass Rearing Lab at the NARC and discussed the importance of public-private partnerships and collaborations for developing a strong agricultural system. They also toured the NARC germplasm bank, which provides vital support to the national crop improvement programs in the form of required germplasm seeds of different crops and is a genetic resource of cultivated crops and their wild relatives, useful for breeding.
Hobbs said, “CIMMYT’s efforts are really worthy and contribute to the overall agriculture-based economy and uplifting the livelihoods of farming communities.”
Left to right: Miguel Lengua, director general of Maxi Semillas S.A.S; Bram Govaerts, Latin America regional director at CIMMYT; Martin Kropff, CIMMYT director general; Howdy Bouis, interim HarvestPlus CEO; and Felix San Vicente, CIMMYT maize breeder; at the launch of new biofortified zinc maize. (Photo: Jennifer Johnson/CIMMYT)
Cali, Colombia (CIMMYT) — A new zinc-enriched maize variety was released in Colombia on February 23 to help combat malnutrition in South America.
Zinc is an essential mineral that plays an important role in human development but is not naturally produced by humans. Zinc deficiency can lead to impaired growth and development, respiratory infections, diarrheal disease and a general weakening of the immune system. In Colombia, an average of 22 percent of the population is affected by zinc deficiency. However, in certain regions, such as the pacific coast and Amazonia, up to 65 percent of the population is deficient in zinc.
CIMMYT Director General Martin Kropff speaks at the launch of zinc-enriched maize. (Photo: Jennifer Johnson/CIMMYT)
“The support that CIMMYT and CIAT have received from HarvestPlus has been fundamental in allowing our researchers to develop crops with enhanced vitamin and mineral content,” said Martin Kropff, CIMMYT director general. “The improved maize that we present today is an important example of the impact we can have when we work together in partnership.”
The minimum daily requirement for zinc is 15mg, but not everyone has access to foods with naturally occurring quantities of zinc, which makes this zinc-enriched maize variety a boost for nutrition in a region where maize is a staple food.
BIO-MZN01 contains 36 percent more zinc on average than other maize varieties, meaning that arepas (a common maize-based Colombian dish) made of this new variety offer consumers up to five times more zinc than those made with traditional varieties. Additionally, BIO-MZN01 can yield up to 6 to 8 tons per hectare(t/ha), nearly double the national average in Colombia of 3.7 t/ha and is tolerant to several maize diseases that are common in the region, including rust, turcicum leaf blight, and gray leaf spot. Another advantage is it can be grown between 0 and 1400 meters above sea level during both cropping seasons in the country.
The official launch of BIO-MZN01 was held at CIAT in Palmira, Colombia, and was attended by local farmers, seed companies, and government officials as well as CIMMYT, HarvestPlus and CIAT staff. As part of the launch, visitors and staff were invited into the field to see the variety firsthand and learn more about its properties and the history of its development.
New zinc-biofortified maize variety BIO-MZn01. (Photo: CIMMYT)
“The conservation and utilization of genetic diversity have been crucial for the development of this new biofortified variety, as well as other CIMMYT varieties with improved nutrition or resistance to climate change,” said Natalia Palacios, maize nutritional quality specialist at CIMMYT. “This has been an inter-institutional and interdisciplinary effort at all levels of the maize value chain.”
Other products of the CIMMYT/HarvestPlus partnership include zinc-enriched wheat and biofortified provitamin A maize, which helps to prevent blindness in children.
“We have been working with CIMMYT since HarvestPlus began,” said Marilia Nutti, the regional director for Latin America and the Caribbean at HarvestPlus. “The greatest advantage of working with CIMMYT is their quality research—CIMMYT has all of the knowledge of maize and wheat, and maize is a big part of the diet in Latin America. Meanwhile, HarvestPlus and CIAT already had the partnerships on the ground in Colombia to ensure that this improved zinc maize could get to farmers and consumers. This has truly been a win-win partnership to improve nutrition.”
A farmer examines a zinc-enriched maize plant. (Photo: CIMMYT)
The scientific work conducted at CIMMYT, HarvestPlus and CIAT reaches the hands of farmers through local seed companies such as Maxi Semillas S.A.S., a partner of CIMMYT Colombia for the past 40 years that will be commercializing the new variety. “These varieties are the product of an incredibly long and costly investigation that we do not have the resources to conduct ourselves. In turn we work to ensure that the variety can reach the hands of the farmers and consumers that need it most,” said Miguel Lengua, director general of Maxi Semillas S.A.S.
The variety will be sold at a similar price to currently available maize varieties in Colombia, and certified seed will be available beginning in August.
BIO-MZN01 will also form part of a new initiative in Colombia called “Semillas para la Paz,” or Seeds for Peace, which seeks to provide improved seed varieties as an alternative to illicit crops. The program, organized by the Colombian government and the Colombian Agricultural Research Corporation (CORPOICA), will promote the cultivation of nine different crops, including maize and beans. Over 20 tons of this new zinc-enriched maize variety will be produced by Maxi Semillas for this program, along with an iron-enriched biofortified bean variety developed by CIAT with HarvestPlus.
CIMMYT’s Maize Germplasm Bank has its entire collection backed up in the Svalbard Global Seed Vault. Photo: CIMMYT archives
EL BATAN, Mexico (CIMMYT) — The “Doomsday Vault,” that safeguards fall-back collections of key food crop seeds in the arctic cold of Longyearbyen, Norway, marks its tenth anniversary this year. To celebrate, leaders in the conservation of crop genetic resources are gathering next week to discuss best practices and to encourage sustainable use of the resources.
The Svalbard Global Seed Vault sits 1,300 kilometers north of the Arctic Circle; the farthest north commercial flights will take you. It is described as the world’s largest secure seed storage and was established by the Norwegian Government in February 2008. Repurposing an abandoned coal mine, the global seed vault is set deep into the natural permafrost of the Norwegian island of Svalbard.
Over the last decade, seed-preserving institutions worldwide have shipped backup collections of seed and other plant parts for storage in the vault, which now holds nearly 900,000 varieties of essential crops, representing over 4,000 plant species, which could be drawn upon to restart agriculture in case of a catastrophe.
The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) is the top contributor to the vault, with over 150,000 unique collections containing a total of nearly 50 million seeds and representing roughly 85 percent of the entire CIMMYT germplasm bank collection.
The target is to have 90 percent of the CIMMYT entire collection backed up at Svalbard within two years, according to Thomas Payne, head of CIMMYT’s Wheat Germplasm Bank, which is located in Mexico. CIMMYT’s Maize Germplasm Bank, led by Denise Costich, has already reached that goal.
“We send seeds every other year, accumulating packets until we have a critical mass and sending them in a large, single shipment,” Payne said.
Preparing and shipping the seed involves intricate coordination and painstaking work. For starters, seed must be sent in the winter to avoid it sitting on hot airport tarmacs. Additionally, the Svalbard vault opens for new deposits only a few times a year, so shipping logistics need to match up those dates.
CIMMYT’s Wheat Germplasm Bank aims to have 90 percent of its collection backed up at Svalbard within two years. Photo: CIMMYT archives.
Only seed of the highest quality is sent to Svalbard, in part to ensure that the stored seed retains as long as possible its ability to germinate.
CIMMYT Germplasm Bank seed collections are regularly tested for germination capacity by placing a batch of seeds in a wet paper towel for 7-10 days. When less than 85 percent of a unique collection is viable, then the entire collection is replaced with fresh seed grown from the viable portion.
“There are seed collections at CIMMYT that still meet the minimum viability standard after more than 50 years under storage,” Payne said, noting that the center’s long-term collections are kept at minus 18 degrees Centigrade and in low humidity.
Payne said the center keeps duplicate collections in Mexico of all the seed it sends to Svalbard and monitors those Mexico back-ups to keep tabs on the viability of its Svalbard deposits.
Payne explained “To check seed viability, we have to take seeds out of storage, representing a loss of several hundred seeds. It’s almost a self-defeating process, balancing viability testing with sufficient quantities of seed to test and distribute.”
Payne said scientists are seeking new, non-invasive ways to test seed viability, potentially by checking seed respiration rates or rapid germination imaging technologies.
The government of Norway and the Global Crop Diversity Trust cover the cost of storage and upkeep of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, coordinating shipments in conjunction with the Nordic Genetic Resource Center. Established in 2006, the Crop Trust supports the conservation and availability of crop diversity for food security worldwide and helps to fund CIMMYT’s work to collect and conserve maize and wheat genetic resources. The CGIAR Genebank Platform also supports CIMMYT’s maize and wheat germplasm bank.
CIMMYT’s Germplasm Bank staff prepare a seed shipment set for Svalbard. Photo: Alfonso Cortés/ CIMMYT
Cali, Colombia (CIMMYT) – The first zinc-enriched maize variety developed for South America will be released in Colombia on February 23 in an effort to combat malnutrition in the country.
Developed using traditional breeding techniques, this biofortified maize variety has naturally higher concentrations of zinc, an essential mineral that plays an important role in human development. It is estimated that in some regions of Colombia up to 50 percent of the population is zinc deficient, a condition that can lead to respiratory infections, diarrheal disease and a general weakening of the immune system.
The new variety, known as BIO-MZN01, was developed by the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) with the support of HarvestPlus, the CGIAR Research Program on Maize (MAIZE) and the CGIAR Research Program on Agriculture for Nutrition and Health (A4NH). The official launch of BIO-MZN01 will be held at the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) in Palmira, Colombia.
“The support that CIMMYT and CIAT have received from HarvestPlus has been fundamental in allowing our researchers to develop crops with enhanced vitamin and mineral content,” said Martin Kropff, CIMMYT director general. “This product shows the value of conserving, studying and utilizing the biodiversity of staple crops such as maize. These genetic resources are the base of our breeding work, and allow us to develop the improved seeds that will help us to fight malnutrition and the challenges of climate change.”
According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), 6.6% of the population of Latin America, or 42 million people, suffer from malnutrition. Biofortified crop varieties such as maize with enriched zinc content seek to reduce this malnutrition burden by making micronutrients more bioavailable, or readily able to be used by the human body. CIMMYT has developed several other forms of biofortified crops in the past, including provitamin A maize, quality protein maize (QPM) and zinc-enriched wheat.
Zinc is an essential micronutrient that plays a crucial role in pre-natal and post-natal development, including bone, brain and nervous system development, and is key to maintaining a healthy immune system, however, it is not produced by the human body. In Colombia, zinc deficiency affects around 22 percent of the population.
BIO-MZN01 contains 36 percent more zinc on average than other maize varieties, meaning that arepas (a maize-based Colombian staple food) made of this new variety offer consumers five times more zinc than those made with traditional varieties. Additionally, BIO-MZN01 can yield up to 6 to 8 tons per hectare(t/ha), nearly double the national average in Colombia of 3.7 t/ha and is resistant to several maize diseases that are common in the region, including rust, turcicum leaf blight, and gray leaf spot. It can be grown between 0 and 1400 meters above sea level during both cropping seasons in the country.
“This is incredible news for the food and nutritional security of all Colombians. It is also an excellent opportunity to share the positive results that can be achieved by teamwork and partnerships such as the work we are doing with HarvestPlus, CIAT, seed companies such as Maxi Semillas S.A.S and of course, with farmers,” said Luis Narro, maize breeder at CIMMYT Colombia.
For Marilia Nutti, the regional director for Latin America and the Carribean at HarvestPlus, the release of this new biofortified variety is the result of “a joint effort we began in 2012, that was only made possible by the trail blazed by the research of several CIMMYT scientists long ago. Together, we have worked to turn maize, a staple food in the region, into a tool capable of reducing zinc deficiency in countries such as El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Nicaragua and several regions of Colombia.”
These goals are well on their way to becoming reality, as the CIMMYT-HarvestPlus partnership released a zinc-enriched maize variety in Honduras in 2017, and will release others in Guatemala and Nicaragua later this year.
The scientific work conducted at CIMMYT, HarvestPlus and CIAT reaches the hands of farmers through local seed companies such as Maxi Semillas S.A.S., a partner of CIMMYT Colombia for the past 40 years that will be commercializing the new variety. Miguel Lengua, director general of Maxi Semillas S.A.S., considers this new biofortified variety “a seed that will be a useful tool to fight malnutrition due to its increased micronutrient content, including zinc. CIMMYT’s work has given us new varieties that will contribute to better nutrition in Colombia, Latin America and the world.”
CIMMYT
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.
HarvestPlus
The HarvestPlus mission is to improve nutrition and public health by developing and promoting everyday food crops that are rich in vitamins and minerals, and providing global leadership on the technology and evidence that have enabled and proven this innovation. HarvestPlus is part of the CGIAR Research Program on Agriculture for Nutrition and Health (A4NH), which helps realize the potential of agricultural development to deliver gender-equitable health and nutritional benefits to the poor. CGIAR is a global agriculture research partnership for a food secure future.
The HarvestPlus program works with over 400 partners worldwide and is coordinated by two CGIAR centers, the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) and the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI). HarvestPlus’ principal donors are the UK Government; the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation; the U.S. Government’s Feed the Future initiative; the European Commission; the Government of Canada and donors to A4NH. HarvestPlus is also supported by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. Visit www.HarvestPlus.org for more information.
CIAT
The International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) – a CGIAR Research Center – develops technologies, innovative methods, and new knowledge that better enable farmers, especially smallholders, to make agriculture eco-efficient – that is, competitive and profitable as well as sustainable and resilient. Eco-efficient agriculture reduces hunger and poverty, improves human nutrition, and offers solutions to environmental degradation and climate change in the tropics. With headquarters near Cali, Colombia, CIAT conducts research for development in tropical regions of Africa, Asia, and Latin America. www.ciat.cgiar.org
Contact:
Genevieve Renard
Head of Communications
International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT)
Nepal’s National Grain Legumes Research Program (NGLRP), in collaboration with USAID’s Feed the Future Nepal Seed and Fertilizer Project, led by The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), began a two-day workshop to foster lentil productivity and profitability Tuesday. Engaging both public and private stakeholders involved in lentil research and development activities, the workshop will examine the intricate challenges and tap into potential opportunities for lentil interventions and innovations in Nepal. During the workshop, a newly formed lentil working committee will define a strategic roadmap which will be used to strengthen the lentil market system.
Speaking at the workshop, NGLRP national coordinator Rajendra Darai remarked, “there is high demand for the product globally, but we need to enhance competitiveness and reinforce the lentil value chain.” A lentil seed producer and farmer from Kapilvastu added that “improved variety of seeds, combined with best management practices and technology, will be the key to achieving higher yields.”
Lentils have emerged as an important agricultural export commodity for Nepal. The country is the second largest lentil producer in South Asia and the fifth in the world. However, there is a huge yield gap of almost a ton per hectare between the national average and the achievable yield.
The major constraint to boosting output at the farm level is the limited availability of improved varieties and low quality of seeds and fertilizers. Farmers and lentil seed producers are also impacted by weak market linkages, limited access to new technologies and lack of access to finance. Low-profit margin and price fluctuation of lentil seed hinders companies from selling improved seeds in the market. Meanwhile, export growth is constrained by the lack of proper linkages with international buyers, compatible policies and quality standards.
To enhance Nepal’s lentil productivity and profitability, NGLRP is collaborating with the CGIAR Centers to develop improved varieties and production technologies to better suit different ecological regions. USAID’s Feed the Future Nepal Seed and Fertilizer Project, implemented by CIMMYT, supports the NGLRP by building linkages with private seed companies to develop new varieties of seeds best suited for Nepal’s geography.
CIMMYT’s AbduRahman Beshir, the seed system lead for USAID’s Feed the Future Nepal Seed and Fertilizer Project, said, “we are working with partners to enhance the lentil value chain in Nepal and to ensure that farmers have access to improved farming inputs and technologies. This will result in increased lentil productivity and reel in more earnings for the farmers and the suppliers.”
USAID’s Nepal Seed and Fertilizer Project is made possible thanks to the generous support of the American people through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
For further inquiries, please contact: AbduRahman Beshir, Seed System Lead – CIMMYT a.issa@cgiar.org
Group photo of agricultural attachés at CIMMYT. Photo: CIMMYT/P.Arredondo
Agricultural attachés from 10 Mexican embassies visited the headquarters of the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) on February 15. Countries represented included, Australia, Belgium, France, Germany, Hungary, Israel, Kazakhstan, Spain, the Netherlands and New Zealand.
Annie Tremblay, who was representing the Netherlands, gave a presentation on agriculture in the Netherlands. She emphasized the most commonly traded commodities between the Netherlands and Mexico and said she sees Mexico as a “sleeping giant” in the flower-trading world.
Following Tremblay’s presentation, Martin Kropff talked about how CIMMYT works globally to improve livelihoods. As Kropff explained CIMMYT’s biofortification work, he stressed that in a perfect world people would be able to diversify their diets and get nutrients from all kinds of plants, but that many people CIMMYT serves are living on less than two dollars a day. “This is not the solution, but it is a solution.”
Bram Govaerts gave a presentation about the work Sustainable Intensification Program in Latin America (SIP-LatAm) is doing and discussed the importance of public-private partnerships to the MasAgro program. This underscored Kropff’s points about the importance of public-private partnerships to CIMMYT and the importance of corporate social responsibility.
The final presentation to the group of attachés was by Hans Braun and Carolina Saint Pierre on the Global Wheat Program. They emphasized wheat as a good source of fiber, antioxidants, micronutrients and protein. The presentation focused on global partnerships in the wheat program and meeting future production goals.
The attachés then toured the CIMMYT campus, learning about the germplasm bank and biodiversity, the global wheat and maize breeding programs and goals to improve seeds and crops. They also were introduced to CIMMYT’s work enhancing nutrition, food safety and processing quality in the seed health labs and about sustainable intensification to improve rural livelihoods.
To conclude, attachés discussed the current priorities of their embassies and potential collaborations between their embassies in Mexico and CIMMYT.
New study flattens claims that gluten and wheat are bad for human health. Photo: CIMMYT archives
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
EL BATAN, Mexico (CIMMYT) – A new, exhaustive review of recent scientific studies on cereal grains and health has shown that gluten- or wheat-free diets are not inherently healthier for the general populace and may actually put individuals at risk of dietary deficiencies.
Based on a recent, special compilation of 12 reports published in the scientific journal Cereal Foods World during 2014-2017, eating whole grains is actually beneficial for brain health and associated with reduced risk of diverse types of cancer, coronary disease, diabetes, hypertension, obesity and overall mortality.
“Clear and solid data show that eating whole-grain wheat products as part of a balanced diet improves health and can help maintain a healthy body weight, apart from the 1 percent of people who suffer from celiac disease and another 2 to 3 percent who are sensitive to wheat,” said Carlos Guzmán, wheat nutrition and quality specialist at the Mexico-based International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), which produced the compilation.
Guzmán said wheat and other grains are inexpensive sources of energy that also provide protein, digestible fiber, minerals, vitamins, and other beneficial phytochemicals.
“Among wheat’s greatest benefits, according to the research, is fiber from the bran and other grain parts,” he explained. “Diets in industrialized countries are generally deficient in such fiber, which helps to regulate digestion and promote the growth of beneficial gut bacteria.”
Contributing to humankind’s development for the last 10,000 years, wheat is cultivated on some 220 million hectares (539 million acres) worldwide. The crop accounts for a fifth of the world’s food and is the main source of protein in many developing and developed countries, and second only to rice as a source of calories globally. In the many countries where milling flours are fortified, wheat-based foods provide necessary levels of essential micronutrients such as iron, zinc, folic acid and vitamin A.
Inhabitants in developing and industrialized countries are experiencing higher incidences of diabetes, allergies, inflammatory bowel disorder, and obesity. A profitable industry has developed around gluten- and wheat-free food products, which the popular press has promoted as beneficial for addressing such disorders. But much scientific evidence contradicts popular writings about these food products.
“Much of the anti-grain messaging comes from publications produced by supposed ‘specialists’ who are not nutritionists, and are often built on faulty premises.” according to Julie Miller Jones, Distinguished Scholar and Professor Emerita at St. Catherine University, U.S.A., and a key contributor to the review studies in the compilation.
“Causes of obesity and chronic disease are complex, and it is not only simplistic but erroneous to name a single food group as the cause or the cure for these problems,” Miller Jones explained. “We do know that we consume large portions, too many calories, and too few fruits, vegetables, or whole grains. Instead today’s lifestyles encourage consumption of many high calorie foods and beverages that contain few nutrients. Then the risks of poor diets are often amplified by our sedentary lifestyles.”
CIMMYT scientists are concerned that the negative portrayal of wheat to promote the lucrative gluten-free fad diet industry will discourage low-income families from consuming the grain as part of an affordable and healthy diet, particularly in areas where there are few low-cost alternatives.
Consumer Reports magazine reported in January 2015 that sales of “gluten-free” products soared 63 percent between 2012 and 2015, with almost 4,600 products introduced in 2014 alone. Retail sales of gluten-free foods in the United States were estimated at $12.2 billion in 2014 and by 2020 the market is projected to be valued at $23.9 billion, Statistica reports.
However, wheat biofortified through breeding or fortified during milling with zinc and iron can play a vital role in diets in areas where “hidden hunger” is a concern and where nutritional options are unaffordable or unavailable. About 2 billion people worldwide suffer from hidden hunger, which is characterized by iron-deficiency anemia, vitamin A and zinc deficiency.
The compilation draws on more than 1,500 peer-reviewed studies regarding the dietary and health effects of eating cereals and wheat-based foods.
CIMMYT specialists also worry that misinformation about wheat might affect investments in vital research to sustain wheat production increases of at least 60 percent by 2050, the output required to keep pace with rising population and demand, according to Hans Braun, director of the center’s global wheat program.
“Climate change is already constraining wheat production in regions such as South Asia, where more than 500 million inhabitants eat wheat-based foods,” Braun said. “Worldwide, the crop is threatened by deadly pest and disease strains, water shortages, and depleted soils.”
“As we have seen in 2008, 2011, and just recently in Tunisia and Sudan, grain shortages or price hikes in bread can lead to social unrest,” Braun added. “The international community needs to speed efforts to develop and share high-yielding, climate-resilient, and disease-resistant wheat varieties that also meet humanity’s varied nutritional demands.”
The compilation was produced with special permission from AACC International.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION OR INTERVIEWS
Mike Listman
Communications officer, CGIAR Research Program on Wheat
tel: +52 (55) 5804 7537
cel: +52 (1595) 114 9743
Email: m.listman@cgiar.org
Biofortification of crops through traditional breeding techniques has become very common in the fight against malnutrition globally. Biofortified provitamin A maize is bred to produce increased carotenoids (a naturally occurring molecule also found in carrots) to reduce vitamin A deficiency (VAD). VAD affects 190 million children globally and causes an estimated 500,000 cases of preventable blindness per year. A study in 2014 showed that provitamin A maize, was as effective as a high-dose supplement at increasing vitamin A stores in Zambian children.
However, processing and storage can drastically reduce the level of carotenoids in these foods by the time they are consumed. The authors of a new study explain that processing of maize grains makes vitamins more bioavailable, but that exposure to heat, light and air can oxidize carotenoids, reducing the amount remaining in food.
The study shows that when stored for six months in traditional conditions, up to 65 percent of provitamin A may be lost, but it differs among maize varieties, with some varieties losing 40 percent of their carotenoid content in the first two weeks.
The study also examined processing and cooking methods of biofortified maize and eggs from hens who ate this maize to find the best and worst conditions for carotenoid retention. They found that boiling whole grain maize into porridge had the best retention rates of any tested processing methods, with retention rates over 100 percent, and deep frying maize and scrambling eggs had the lowest retention rates of around 70 and 80 percent, respectively.
Overall, the authors say cooking allowed both maize and eggs to retain upwards of 80 percent of effects carotenoid content, but storage at or above room temperature quickly degraded the carotenoid content. They suggest that whole grain and courser ground maize may be a good way to retain more provitamin A while sitting on a shelf, but say more research is necessary.
A white paper on global wheat health based on scenario development and analysis. Savary, S., Djurle, A., Yuen, J., Ficke, A., Rossi, V., Esker, P.D., Fernandes, J.M.C., Del Ponte, E.M., Kumar, J., Madden, L.V., Paul, P., McRoberts, N., Singh, P.K., Huber, L., Pope de Vallavielle, C., Saint-Jea, S., Willocquet, L. In: Phytopathology v. 107, no. 10, p. 1109-1122.
Characterization of leaf rust and stripe rust resistance in spring wheat ‘Chilero’. Ponce-Molina, L.J., Huerta-Espino, J., Singh, R.P., Basnet, B.R., Alvarado Beltrán, G., Randhawa, M.S., Caixia Lan, Aguilar Rincón, V.H., Lobato-Ortiz, R., García Zavala, J.J. In: Plant disease v. 102, no. 2, p. 421-427.
Evaluation of grain yield of heat stress resilient maize hybrids in Nepal. Koirala, K.B., Giri, Y.P., Rijal, T.R., Zaidi, P.H., Ajanahalli, R.S., Shrestha, J. In: International Journal of Applied Sciences and Biotechnology v. 5, no. 4, p. 511-522.
Genetic analysis of heat adaptive traits in tropical maize (Zea mays L.). Krishnaji Jodage., Kuchanur, P.H., Zaidi, P.H., Patil, A., Seetharam, K., Vinayan, M.T., Arunkumar, B. In: International Journal of Current Microbiology and Applied Sciences v. 7, no. 1, p. 3237-3246.
Genetic analysis of morpho-physiological traits and yield components in F2 partial diallel crosses of bread wheat (Triticum aestivum L.). Abidine Fellah, Z.E., Hannach, A., Bouzerzour, H., Dreisigacker, S., Yahyaoui, A.H., Sehgal, D. In: Revista Facultad Nacional de Agronomía v. 70, no. 3, p. 8237-8250.
Genomics selection in plant breeding : methods, models, and perspectives. Crossa, J., Pérez-Rodríguez, P., Cuevas, J., Montesinos-Lopez, O.A., Jarquín, D., De los Campos, G., Burgueño, J., Camacho-González, J. M., Perez-Elizalde, S., Beyene, Y., Dreisigacker, S., Ravi Gopal Singh, Zhang, X., Gowda, M., Roorkiwal, M., Rutkoski, J., Varshney, R. K. In: Trends in Plant Science v. 20, no. 11, p. 961-975.
Grain yield and stability of white early maize hybrids in the highland valleys of Mexico. Torres Flores, J. L., Mendoza García, B., Prasanna, B.M., Alvarado Beltrán, G., San Vicente, F.M., Crossa, J. In: Crop Science v. 57, no. 6, p. 3002-3015.
High-throughput measurement methodologies for developing nutrient-dense crops. Guild, G., Parkes, E., Nutti, M., Palacios-Rojas, N., Stangoulis, J. In: African Journal of Food, Agriculture, Nutrition and Development v. 17, no. 2, p. 11941-11954.
Retention of carotenoids in biofortified maize flour and β-Cryptoxanthin-Enhanced eggs after household cooking. Sowa, M., Jiaoying Yu, Palacios-Rojas, N., Goltz, S. R., Howe, J. A., Davis, C.R., Rocheford, T., Tanumihardjo, S. A. In: ACS Omega no. 2, p. 7320-7328.
Risk assessment and spread of the potentially invasive Ceratitis rosa Karsch and Ceratitis quilicii De Meyer, Mwatawala and Virgilio sp. Nov. using life-cycle simulation models : implications for phytosanitary measures and management. Tanga, C. M., Khamis, F. M., Tonnang, H., Rwomushana, I., Mosomtai, G., Mohamed, S. A., Ekesi, S. In: PLoS One v. 13, no. 1:e0189138
Over the next 50 years, the world’s population is set to be more than 9 billion. To feed this amount of people food production will need to more than double.
Doing this will require us to grow food faster than ever before, a global task which will be even more challenging if we don’t first improve the way we collect and share information, according to Carolina Rivera, a wheat physiologist at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) and data coordinator with the International Wheat Yield Partnership (IWYP).
Demand for wheat by 2050 is predicted to increase by 70 percent from today’s levels due to population growth and dietary changes, but the challenges to wheat production are stark and growing. The crop is at risk from new and more aggressive pests and diseases, diminishing water resources, limited available land and unstable weather conditions related to climate change.
“The data tells us that we won’t meet future demand unless we’re able to significantly increase genetic gains,” says Rivera. Current annual genetic yield gains of cereals range from 0.5 to 1 percent, meaning that genetic improvements made to crops by scientists are at best resulting in 1 percent higher yields than the previous year, notwithstanding the possibility of improvements due to crop management which are known to be much harder for resource-poor farmers to implement.
Since Rivera started as an IWYP data coordinator, she’s helped release a new instance of the public database called “Germinate,” which hosts phenotypic, genotypic and other data on wheat collected by CIMMYT staff, IWYP project members, and partners around the world. She seeks to deploy new technologies to capture data and develop better systems to standardize, collect, compile and curate field data gathered by members of her CIMMYT research team and their partners.
“Three years ago, around 80 percent of CIMMYT’s wheat physiology field data in Mexico were collected manually,” said Rivera. “But now, the use of tablets for data collection, improved protocols for data processing, among other tools allow us to have real-time quality control. By standardizing our results and facilitating data curation and analysis, we help scientists make faster, more informed decisions.”
Rivera has a unique perspective in crop data management because she applies her on-the-ground knowledge of wheat research to adopt and adapt new technologies and systems that meet the needs of scientists. As a wheat physiologist, she has identified new traits associated with the optimization of plant morphology aiming to boost grain number and yield.
“Data management can seem like an afterthought to the research, but having more controlled and optimized workflows will become crucial for breeding programs as data volumes increase,” says Rivera. “Achieving high-quality data management is a challenge – like with any change in technology, it requires a huge shift in the way people do their job and tools they use.”
Despite this, more than 2 billion genotypic data from CIMMYT have been made available in the Germinate and Dataverse platforms, and Rivera believes that data sharing will eventually become part and parcel to the work wheat researchers conduct.
Before starting her current position at CIMMYT, Rivera received her doctorate in crop science from the University of Nottingham. Ultimately, she believes that the adoption of better data management practices across research institutions will soon become a cornerstone in the ability to create “ideal” wheat plants that produce more grains, feeding more people.
The International Wheat Yield Partnership (IWYP) is a long-term global collaboration with funding from public and private research organizations that seeks to increase the genetic yield potential of wheat by 50 percent in 20 years. Find a full list of funders here.
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