Location: Asia

As a fast growing region with increasing challenges for smallholder farmers, Asia is a key target region for CIMMYT. CIMMYT’s work stretches from Central Asia to southern China and incorporates system-wide approaches to improve wheat and maize productivity and deliver quality seed to areas with high rates of child malnutrition. Activities involve national and regional local organizations to facilitate greater adoption of new technologies by farmers and benefit from close partnerships with farmer associations and agricultural extension agents.

Wheat fields at the Campo Experimental Norman E. Borlaug (CENEB) near Ciudad Obregón, Sonora, Mexico. (Photo: M. Ellis/CIMMYT)

“Better, faster, equitable, sustainable” – wheat research community partners join to kick off new breeding project

Written by Marcia MacNeil on July 29, 2020. Posted in News. 1 Comment on “Better, faster, equitable, sustainable” – wheat research community partners join to kick off new breeding project

More than 100 scientists, crop breeders, researchers, and representatives from funding and national government agencies gathered virtually to initiate the wheat component of a groundbreaking and ambitious collaborative new crop breeding project led by the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT).

The new project, Accelerating Genetic Gains in Maize and Wheat for Improved Livelihoods, or AGG, brings together partners in the global science community and in national agricultural research and extension systems to accelerate the development of higher-yielding varieties of maize and wheat — two of the world’s most important staple crops.

Funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the U.K. Department for International Development (DFID), the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), and the Foundation for Food and Agriculture Research (FFAR), the project specifically focuses on supporting smallholder farmers in low- and middle-income countries. The international team uses innovative methods — such as rapid cycling and molecular breeding approaches — that improve breeding efficiency and precision to produce varieties that are climate-resilient, pest and disease resistant and highly nutritious, targeted to farmers’ specific needs.

The wheat component of AGG builds on breeding and variety adoption work that has its roots with Norman Borlaug’s Nobel Prize winning work developing high yielding and disease resistance dwarf wheat more than 50 years ago. Most recently, AGG builds on Delivering Genetic Gain in Wheat (DGGW), a 4-year project led by Cornell University, which ends this year.

“AGG challenges us to build on this foundation and make it better, faster, equitable and sustainable,” said CIMMYT Interim Deputy Director for Research Kevin Pixley.

At the virtual gathering on July 17, donors and partner representatives from target countries in South Asia joined CIMMYT scientists to describe both the technical objectives of the project and its overall significance.

“This program is probably the world’s single most impactful plant breeding program. Its products are used throughout the world on many millions of hectares,” said Gary Atlin from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. “The AGG project moves this work even farther, with an emphasis on constant technological improvement and an explicit focus on improved capacity and poverty alleviation.”

Alan Tollervey from DFID spoke about the significance of the project in demonstrating the relevance and impact of wheat research.

“The AGG project helps build a case for funding wheat research based on wheat’s future,” he said.

Nora Lapitan from the USAID Bureau for Resilience and Food Security listed the high expectations AGG brings: increased genetic gains, variety replacement, optimal breeding approaches, and strong collaboration with national agricultural research systems in partner countries.

India’s farmers feed millions of people. (Photo: Dakshinamurthy Vedachalam)

Reconnecting with trusted partners

The virtual meeting allowed agricultural scientists and wheat breeding experts from AGG target countries in South Asia, many of whom have been working collaboratively with CIMMYT for years, to reconnect and learn how the AGG project both challenges them to a new level of collaboration and supports their national wheat production ambitions.

“With wheat blast and wheat rust problems evolving in Bangladesh, we welcome the partnership with international partners, especially CIMMYT and the funders to help us overcome these challenges,” said Director General of the Bangladesh Wheat and Maize Research Institute Md. Israil Hossain.

Director of the Indian Institute for Wheat and Barley Research Gyanendra P. Singh praised CIMMYT’s role in developing better wheat varieties for farmers in India.

“Most of the recent varieties which have been developed and released by India are recommended for cultivation on over 20 million hectares. They are not only stress tolerant and high yielding but also fortified with nutritional qualities. I appreciate CIMMYT’s support on this,” he said.

Executive Director of the National Agricultural Research Council of Nepal Deepak K. Bhandari said he was impressed with the variety of activities of the project, which would be integral to the development of Nepal’s wheat program.

“Nepal envisions increased wheat productivity from 2.84 to 3.5 tons per hectare within five years. I hope this project will help us to achieve this goal. Fast tracking the replacement of seed to more recent varieties will certainly improve productivity and resilience of the wheat sector,” he said.

The National Wheat Coordinator at the National Agricultural Research Center of Pakistan, Atiq Ur-Rehman, told attendees that his government had recently launched a “mega project” to reduce poverty and hunger and to respond to climate change through sustainable intensification. He noted that the support of AGG would help the country increase its capacity in “vertical production” of wheat through speed breeding. “AGG will help us save 3 to 4 years” in breeding time,” he said.

For CIMMYT Global Wheat Program Director Hans Braun, the gathering was personal as well as professional.

“I have met many of you over the last decades,” he told attendees, mentioning his first CIMMYT trip to see wheat programs in India in 1985. “Together we have achieved a lot — wheat self-sufficiency for South Asia has been secured now for 50 years. This would not be possible without your close collaboration, your trust and your willingness to share germplasm and information, and I hope this will stay. “

Braun pointed out that in this project, many national partners will gain the tools and capacity to implement their own state of the art breeding strategies such as genomic selection.

“We are at the beginning of a new era in breeding,” Braun noted. “We are also initiating a new era of collaboration.”

The wheat component of AGG serves more than 30 million wheat farming households in Bangladesh, Ethiopia, India, Kenya, Nepal and Pakistan. A separate inception meeting for stakeholders in sub-Saharan Africa is planned for next month.

New project to ramp up genetic gains in maize for better livelihoods

Written by Mary Donovan on July 28, 2020. Posted in In the media.

A new project, Accelerating Genetic Gains in Maize and Wheat for Improved Livelihoods (AGG), seeks to achieve these results by speeding up genetic gains in maize and wheat breeding to deliver improved, stress resilient, nutritious seed to smallholders in 13 countries in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) and four in South Asia. The 5-year AGG project is funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the UK Department for International Development (DFID) and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).

Accelerating Genetic Gains in Maize and Wheat (AGG)

Written by Rodrigo Ordóñez on July 24, 2020. Posted in Uncategorized.

Accelerating Genetic Gains in Maize and Wheat (AGG), a project led by the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), brings together partners in the global science community and in national agricultural research and extension systems to accelerate the development of higher-yielding varieties of maize and wheat — two of the world’s most important staple crops.

Specifically focusing on supporting smallholder farmers in low- and middle-income countries, the project uses innovative methods that improve breeding efficiency and precision to produce varieties that are climate-resilient, pest- and disease-resistant, and highly nutritious, targeted to farmers’ specific needs.

The maize component of the project serves 13 target countries: Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe in eastern and southern Africa; and Benin, Ghana, Mali, and Nigeria in West Africa. The wheat component of the project serves six countries: Bangladesh, India, Nepal, and Pakistan in South Asia; and Ethiopia and Kenya in sub-Saharan Africa.

This project builds on the impact of the Delivering Genetic Gain in Wheat (DGGW) and Stress Tolerant Maize for Africa (STMA) projects.

Objectives

The project aims to accelerate the development and delivery of more productive, climate-resilient, gender-responsive, market-demanded, and nutritious maize and wheat varieties in support of sustainable agricultural transformation in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.

To encourage adoption of new varieties, the project works to improve equitable access, especially by women, to seed and information, as well as capacity building in breeding, disease surveillance, and seed marketing.

Funders

Project funding is provided by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, the United States Agency for International Development and the Foundation for Food and Agricultural Research (FFAR).

Key partners

The primary partners for this project are the national agricultural research systems in the project target countries and, for the maize component, the International Institute for Tropical Agriculture (IITA) and small and medium enterprise (SME) seed companies.

Scientific and technical steering committees

We are grateful to our excellent maize and wheat scientific and technical steering committees for their suggestions and thoughtful question on key issues for the success of AGG. Read about the recommendations from the maize steering committee here and the wheat steering committee here.

Year 1 Executive Summary

In its first year of operation, AGG has made great strides in collaboration with our national partners towards the project goals –despite the unprecedented challenges of working through a global pandemic. For specific milestones achieved, we invite you to review our AGG Year 1 Executive Summary and Impact Report (PDF).

Year 2 Executive Summary

AGG has made progress towards all outcomes. Our scientists are implementing substantial modifications to breeding targets and schemes. AGG is also in a continuous improvement process for the partnership modalities, pursuing co-ownership and co-implementation that builds the capacities of all involved. For specific milestones achieved, we invite you to review our AGG Year 2 Executive Summary and Impact Report (PDF).

CIMMYT’s adult plant resistance breeding strategy

Download a summary of CIMMYT’s breeding strategy for adult plant resistance (PDF).

Subscribe to the AGG newsletter

A farmer in Banke district during monsoon season drought in 2017. (Photo: Anton Urfels/CIMMYT)

Supporting smallholder farmers to better combat drought

Written by Alison Doody on July 23, 2020. Posted in Blogs.

Researchers from the Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia (CSISA) project have been exploring the drivers of smallholder farmers’ underuse of groundwater wells to combat in-season drought during the monsoon rice season in Nepal’s breadbasket — the Terai region.

Their study, published in Water International, finds that several barriers inhibit full use of groundwater irrigation infrastructure.

Inconsistent rainfall has repeatedly damaged paddy crops in Nepal over the last years, even though most agricultural lands are equipped with groundwater wells. This has contributed to missed national policy targets of food self-sufficiency and slow growth in cereal productivity.

A key issue is farmers’ tendency to schedule irrigation very late in an effort to save their crops when in-season drought occurs. By this time, rice crops have already been damaged by lack of water and yields will be decreased. High irrigation costs, especially due to pumping equipment rental rates, are a major factor of this aversion to investment. Private irrigation is also a relatively new technology for many farmers making water use decisions.

After farmers decide to irrigate, queuing for pumpsets, tubewells, and repairs and maintenance further increases irrigation delays. Some villages have only a handful of pumpsets or tubewells shared between all households, so it can take up to two weeks for everybody to irrigate.

To address these issues, CSISA provides suggestions for three support pathways to support farmers in combatting monsoon season drought:

1. Raise awareness of the importance of timely irrigation

To avoid yield penalties and improve operational efficiency through better-matched pumpsets, CSISA has raised awareness through agricultural FM radio broadcasts on the strong relationship between water stress and yield penalties. Messages highlight the role of the plough pan in keeping infiltration rates low and encouraging farmers to improve irrigation scheduling. Anecdotal evidence suggests that improved pump selection may decrease irrigation costs by up to 50%, and CSISA has initiated follow-up studies to develop recommendations for farmers.

Social interaction is necessary for purchasing fuel, transporting and installing pumps, or sharing irrigation equipment. These activities pose risks of COVID-19 exposure and transmission and therefore require farmers to follow increased safety and hygiene practices, which may cause further delays to irrigation. Raising awareness about the importance of timely irrigation therefore needs to go hand in hand with the promotion of safe and hygienic irrigation practices. This information has been streamlined into CSISA’s ongoing partnerships and FM broadcasts.

2. Improve community-level water markets through increased focus on drought preparedness and overcoming financial constraints

Farmers can save time by taking an anticipatory approach to the terms and conditions of rentals, instead of negotiating them when cracks in the soil are already large. Many farmers reported that pump owners are reluctant to rent out pumpsets if renters cannot pay up front. Given the seasonality of cash flows in agriculture, pro-poor and low interest credit provisions are likely to further smoothen community-level water markets.

Quantified ethnographic-decision tree based on households’ surveys of smallholder decision to use groundwater irrigation in Nepal’s Terai. (Graphic: Urfels et al. (2020)) — Quantified ethnographic-decision tree based on households’ surveys of smallholder decision to use groundwater irrigation in Nepal’s Terai. (Graphic: Urfels et al., 2020)

3. Prioritize regional investment

The study shows that delay factors differ across districts and that selectively targeted interventions will be most useful to provide high returns to investments. For example, farmers in Kailali reported that land access issues — due to use of large bullock carts to transport pumpsets — and fuel shortages constitute a barrier for 10% and 39% of the farmers, while in Rupandehi, maintenance and tubewell availability were reported to be of greater importance.

As drought is increasingly threatening paddy production in Nepal’s Terai region, CSISA’s research shows that several support pathways exist to support farmers in combatting droughts. Sustainable water use can only be brought up to a scale where it benefits most farmers if all available tools including electrification, solar pumps and improved water level monitoring are deployed to provide benefits to a wide range of farmers.

Read the study:
Drivers of groundwater utilization in water-limited rice production systems in Nepal

Floods highlight importance of food security

Written by Mary Donovan on July 22, 2020. Posted in In the media.

The floods in the southern parts of China have triggered fresh concerns about whether the country will face a food shortage and nutrition crisis.

Women farmers emerging as decision-makers, innovators in wheat-based systems: Study

Written by Mary Donovan on July 17, 2020. Posted in In the media.

Women in societies practicing wheat-based agriculture have started challenging the norm of men being sole decision-makers. They are transitioning from workers to innovators and managers, a recent study has found.

Women were adopting specific strategies to further their interests in the context of wheat-based livelihoods, the study found. The process, however, is far from straightforward.

Back to basics: COVID-19 labour crunch brings direct seeding of paddy in focus

Written by Mary Donovan on July 15, 2020. Posted in In the media.

There is no nationwide official data on how much rice in India is grown through DSR. M L Jat, principal scientist with Mexico-based CIMMYT (International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center), estimated that about 10 per cent of India’s 44 million ha under rice cultivation is through DSR.

In the past few decades, many state governments have been encouraging farmers to move to DSR because it is easier on the environment, but without much success.

New analysis to help in creating yellow rust resistant wheat

Written by Mary Donovan on July 15, 2020. Posted in In the media.

A new analysis by wheat scientists at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) published in Scientific Reports includes insights and genetic information that will help in the efforts to breed yellow rust resistant wheat.

Conservation agriculture for sustainable intensification in Eastern India

Written by Marcia MacNeil on July 13, 2020. Posted in Publications.

A new policy brief produced by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) lays out a clear case for the benefits and importance of conservation agriculture, and a road map for accelerating its adoption in Eastern India.

A collaborative effort by research and policy partners including ICAR, the National Academy of Agricultural Sciences (NAAS), The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), and national academic and policy institutions, the brief represents the outputs of years of both rigorous scientific research and stakeholder consultations.

Eastern India — an area comprising seven states — is one of the world’s most densely populated areas, and a crucial agricultural zone, feeding more than a third of India’s population. The vast majority — more than 80% — of its farmers are smallholders, earning on average, just over half the national per capita income.

Conservation agriculture (CA) consists of farming practices that aim to maintain and boost yields and increase profits while reversing land degradation, protecting the environment and responding to climate change. These practices include minimal mechanical soil disturbance, permanent soil cover with living or dead plant material, and crop diversification through rotation or intercropping. A number of studies have shown the success of conservation agriculture in combatting declining factor productivity, deteriorating soil health, water scarcity, labor shortages, and climate change in India.

The road map lists recommended steps for regional and national policy makers, including

establishing a database repository on conservation agriculture for eastern India,
setting up common learning platform and sites for science-based evidence on CA,
developing an effective and productive supply chain system for CA machinery,
offering subsidies for CA machinery as incentives to farmers,
adopting pricing strategies to encourage market demand for sustained adoption of CA,
developing synergies for effective coordination between NARS and CGIAR institutions, and
building capacity among stakeholders.

Read the full policy brief here:

Conservation Agriculture for Sustainable Intensification in Eastern India

A combine harvester equipped with the Super SMS (left) harvests rice while a tractor equipped with the Happy Seeder is used for direct seeding of wheat. (Photo: Sonalika Tractors)

Partners include the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), the National Academy of Agricultural Sciences (NAAS), the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), the Trust for Advancement of Agricultural Sciences (TAAS), the Borlaug Institute for South Asia (BISA), Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University, Bihar Agricultural University, and the Department of Agriculture of the state of Bihar.

Private seed companies bag maize for selfing new maize product. (Photo: Arun Thapa/CIMMYT)

Gauging the impact of COVID-19 lockdown on farming communities and agribusinesses in Nepal

Written by Alison Doody on July 8, 2020. Posted in Features. 1 Comment on Gauging the impact of COVID-19 lockdown on farming communities and agribusinesses in Nepal

The agricultural market has been suffering since the government of Nepal imposed a lockdown from March 23, 2020 to limit the spread of COVID-19 in the country. A month after the lockdown, the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) conducted a rapid assessment survey to gauge the extent of disruptions of the lockdown on households from farming communities and agribusinesses.

As part of the Nepal Seed and Fertilizer (NSAF) project, CIMMYT researchers surveyed over 200 key stakeholders by phone from 26 project districts. These included 103 agrovet owners and 105 cooperative managers who regularly interact with farming communities and provide agricultural inputs to farmers. The respondents served more than 300,000 households.

The researchers targeted maize growing communities for the survey since the survey period coincided with the primary maize season.

Seed company staff harvesting maize during the lockdown. (Photo: Darbin Joshi/CIMMYT)

Key insights from the survey

The survey showed that access to maize seed was a major problem that farmers experienced since the majority of agrovets were not open for business and those that were partially open — around 23% — did not have much customer flow due to mobility restrictions during the lockdown.

The stock of hybrid seed was found to be less than open pollinated varieties (OPVs) in most of the domains. Due to restrictions on movement during the entire maize-planting season, many farmers must have planted OPVs or saved seeds.

Access to fertilizers such as urea, DAP and MOP was another major problem for farmers since more than half of the cooperatives and agrovets reported absence of fertilizer stock in their area. The stock of recommended pesticides to control pests such as fall armyworm was reported to be limited or out of stock at the cooperatives and agrovets.

Labor availability and use of agricultural machineries was not seen as a huge problem during the lockdown in the surveyed districts.

It was evident that food has been a priority for all household expenses. More than half of the total households mentioned that they would face food shortages if the lockdown continues beyond a month.

During the survey, around 36% of households specified cash shortages to purchase agricultural inputs, given that a month had already passed since the lockdown began in the country. The majority of the respondents reported that the farm households were managing their cash requirements by borrowing from friends and relatives, local cooperatives or selling household assets such as livestock and agricultural produces.

Most of the households said that they received food rations from local units called Palikas, while a small number of Palikas also provided subsidized seeds and facilitated transport of agricultural produce to market during the lockdown. Meanwhile, the type of support preferred by farming communities to help cope with the COVID-19 disruptions — ranging from food rations, free or subsidized seed, transportation of fertilizers and agricultural produce, and provision of credit — varied across the different domains.

The survey also assessed the effect of lockdown on agribusinesses like agrovets who are major suppliers of seed, and in a few circumstances sell fertilizer to farmers in Nepal. As the lockdown enforced restrictions on movement, farmers could not purchase inputs from agrovets even when the agrovets had some stock available in their area. About 86% of agrovets spoke of the difficulty to obtain supplies from their suppliers due to the blockage of transportation and product unavailability, thereby causing a 50-90% dip in their agribusinesses.

Immediate actions to consider

Major takeaways from this survey are as follows:

Currently, food access is a priority and households are spending more money on food. However, as and when the lockdown eases, the need for cash to buy agricultural inputs and services is likely to emerge and may require attention.
Accessing maize seed and fertilizer was a problem in many communities during the maize season. Similarly, a shortage of rice seed, particularly hybrids, can be an issue for farmers unless efforts are made right away.
To help cope with the COVID-19 disruptions, a one-size-fits-all relief package would not be effective for farming communities living in different domains. Major support should be on facilitating transport and distribution of seed and fertilizers, access to food supplies through the local government’s schemes, and provision of soft loans.
Agrovets have an important contribution as the last mile service providers and they were hit hard by the lockdown. Therefore, facilitating agrovet businesses to operate and transport seeds, fertilizers, and pesticides from suppliers to agrovet business points will be essential to restore businesses and deliver agri-inputs to farmers.

The survey findings were presented and shared with the government, private sector, development partner organizations and project staff over a virtual meeting. This report will serve as a resource for the project and various stakeholders to design their COVID-19 response and recovery strategy development and planning.

A farmer in India uses a tractor fitted with a Happy Seeder. (Photo: Dakshinamurthy Vedachalam/CIMMYT)

Could coronavirus drive farmers to adopt sustainable practices in India’s breadbasket?

Written by Matthew O'Leary on July 7, 2020. Posted in Features.

June marks the start of the rice growing season in India’s breadbasket but on the quiet fields of Haryana and Punjab you wouldn’t know it.

Usually the northwestern Indian states are teeming with migrant laborers working to transplant rice paddies. However, the government’s swift COVID-19 lockdown measures in late March triggered reverse migration, with an estimated 1 million laborers returning to their home states.

The lack of migrant workers has raised alarms for the labor-dependent rice-wheat farms that feed the nation. Healthy harvests are driven by timely transplanting of rice and, consequently, by the timely sowing of the succeeding wheat crop in rotation.

Without political support for alternative farming practices, crop losses from COVID-19 labor disruptions could reach $1.5 billion and significantly diminish the country’s grain reserves, researchers from the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) warned.

Researchers also fear delayed rice transplanting could encourage unsustainable residue burning as farmers rush to clear land in the short window between rice harvest and wheat sowing. Increased burning in the fall will exacerbate the COVID-19 health risk by contributing to the blanket of thick air pollution that covers much of northwest India, including the densely populated capital region of New Delhi.

The burning of crop residue, or stubble, across millions of hectares of cropland between planting seasons is a visible contributor to air pollution in both rural and urban areas. (Photo: Dakshinamurthy Vedachalam/CIMMYT)

Both farmers and politicians are showing increased interest in farm mechanization and crop diversification as they respond to COVID-19 disruptions, said M.L. Jat, a CIMMYT scientist who coordinates sustainable intensification programs in northwestern India.

“Farmers know the time of planting wheat is extremely important for productivity. To avoid production losses and smog-inducing residue burning, alternative farm practices and technologies must be scaled up now,” Jat said.

The time it takes to manually transplant rice paddies is a particular worry. Manual transplanting accounts for 95% of rice grown in the northwestern regions. Rice seedlings grown in a nursery are pulled and transplanted into puddled and leveled fields — a process that takes up to 30 person-days per hectare, making it highly dependent on the availability of migrant laborers.

Even before COVID-19, a lack of labor was costing rice-wheat productivity and encouraging burning practices that contribute to India’s air pollution crisis, said CIMMYT scientist Balwinder Singh.

“Mechanized sowing and harvesting has been growing in recent years. The COVID-19 labor shortage presents a unique opportunity for policymakers to prioritize productive and environmentally-friendly farming practices as long term solutions,” Singh said.

Sustainable practices to cope with labor bottlenecks

CIMMYT researchers are working with national and state governments to get information and technologies to farmers, however, there are significant challenges to bringing solutions to scale in the very near term, Singh explained.

There is no silver bullet in the short term. However, researchers have outlined immediate and mid-term strategies to ensure crop productivity while avoiding residue burning:

Delayed or staggered nursery sowing of rice: By delaying nursery sowing to match delays in transplanting, yield potential can be conserved for rice. Any delay in transplanting rice due to labor shortage can reduce the productivity of seedlings. Seedling age at transplanting is an important factor for optimum growth and yield.

“Matching nursery sowing to meet delayed transplanting dates is an immediate action that farmers can take to ensure crop productivity in the short term. However, it’s important policymakers prioritize technologies, such as direct seeders, that contribute to long term solutions,” Singh said.

Direct drilling of wheat using the Happy Seeder: Direct seeding of wheat into rice residues using the Happy Seeder, a mechanized harvesting combine, can reduce the turnaround time between rice harvest and wheat sowing, potentially eliminating the temptation to burn residues.

“Identifying the areas with delayed transplanting well in advance should be a priority for effectively targeting the direct drilling of wheat using Happy Seeders,” said Jat. The average farmer who uses the Happy Seeder can generate up to 20% more profits than those who burn their fields, he explained. “Incentivizing farmers through a direct benefit transfer payment to adopt ‘no burn’ practices may help accelerate transitions.”

Directly sown rice: Timely planting of rice can also be achieved by adopting dry direct seeding of rice using mechanized seed-cum-fertilizer planters. In addition to reducing the labor requirement for crop establishment, dry direct seeding allows earlier rice planting due to its lower water requirement for establishment. Direct-seeded rice also matures earlier than puddled transplanted rice. Thus, earlier harvesting improves the chance to sow wheat on time.

“CIMMYT researchers are working with the local mechanical engineers on rolling out simple tweaks to enable the Happy Seeder to be used for direct rice seeding. The existing availability of Happy Seeders in the region will improve the speed direct rice sowing can be adopted,” Jat said.

Crop diversification with maize: Replacing rice with maize in the monsoon season is another option to alleviate the potential shortage of agricultural labor due to COVID-19, as the practice of establishing maize by machine is already common.

“Research evidence generated over the past decade demonstrates that maize along with modern agronomic management practices can provide a profitable and sustainable alternative to rice,” Jat explained. “The diversification of rice with maize can potentially contribute to sustainability that includes conserving groundwater, improving soil health and reducing air pollution through eliminating residue burning.”

Getting innovations into farmers’ fields

Rapid policy decisions by national and state governments on facilitating more mechanized operations in labor-intensive rice-wheat production regions will address labor availability issues while contributing to productivity enhancement of succeeding wheat crop in rotation, as well as overall system sustainability, said ICAR’s deputy director general for agricultural extension, AK Singh.

The government is providing advisories to farmers through multiple levels of communications, including extension services, messaging services and farmer collectives to raise awareness and encourage adoption.

Moving toward mechanization and crop diversity should not be viewed as a quick fix to COVID-19 related labor shortages, but as the foundation for long-term policies that help India in achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals, said ICAR’s deputy director general for Natural Research Management, SK Chaudhari.

“Policies encouraging farming practices that save resources and protect the environment will improve long term productivity of the nation,” he said.

Northwestern India is home to millions of smallholder farmers making it a breadbasket for grain staples. Since giving birth to the Green Revolution, the region has continued to increase its food production through rice and wheat farming providing bulk of food to the country.

This high production has not come without shortfalls, different problems like a lowering water table, scarcity of labor during peak periods, deteriorating soil health, and air pollution from crop residue burning demands some alternative methods to sustain productivity as well as natural resources.

Cover photo: A farmer uses a tractor fitted with a Happy Seeder. (Photo: Dakshinamurthy Vedachalam/CIMMYT)

A farmer uses a two-wheel tractor-mounted reaper to harvest wheat in Nepal. (Photo: Timothy J. Krupnik/CIMMYT)

Mechanized harvesting fuels rural prosperity in Nepal

Written by Matthew O'Leary on July 6, 2020. Posted in Features.

In response to increasing labor scarcity and costs, growth in mechanized wheat and rice harvesting has fueled farm prosperity and entrepreneurial opportunity in the poorest parts of Nepal, researchers from the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) have recorded.

Farmers are turning to two-wheeled tractor-mounted reaper-harvesters to make up for the lack of farm labor, caused by a significant number of rural Nepalese — especially men and youth — migrating out in search of employment opportunities.

For Nandalal Oli, a 35-year-old farmer from Bardiya in far-west Nepal, investing in a mechanized reaper not only allowed him to avoid expensive labor costs that have resulted from out-migration from his village, but it also provided a source of income offering wheat and rice harvesting services to his neighbors.

“The reaper easily attaches on my two-wheel tractor and means I can mechanically cut and lay the wheat and rice harvests,” said Oli, the father of two. “Hiring help to harvest by hand is expensive and can take days but with the reaper attachment it’s done in hours, saving time and money.”

Oli was first introduced to the small reaper attachment three years ago at a farmer exhibition hosted by Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia (CSISA), funded through USAID. He saw the reaper as an opportunity to add harvesting to his mechanization business, where he was already using his two-wheel tractor for tilling, planting and transportation services.

Prosperity powers up reaper adoption

Number of 2-wheel tractor-attachable reaper-harvesters operational through service providers in Nepal’s Terai, 2014–2019

Over 4,000 mechanized reapers have been sold in Nepal with more than 50% in far and mid-west Nepal since researchers first introduced the technology five years ago. The successful adoption — which is now led by agricultural machinery dealers that were established or improved with CSISA’s support — has led nearly 24,000 farmers to have regular access to affordable crop harvesting services, said CIMMYT agricultural economist Gokul Paudel.

“Reapers improve farm management, adding a new layer of precision farming and reducing grain loss. Compared to manual harvesting mechanized reapers improve farming productivity that has shown to significantly increase average farm profitability when used for harvesting both rice and wheat,” he explained.

Nearly 65% of Nepal’s population works in agriculture, yet this South Asian country struggles to produce an adequate and affordable supply of food. The research indicated increased farm precision through the use of mechanized reapers boosts farm profitability by $120 a year when used for both rice and wheat harvests.

Oli agreed farmers see the benefit of his harvesting service as he has had no trouble finding customers. On an average year he serves 100 wheat and rice farmers in a 15 kilometer radius of his home.

“Investing in the reaper harvester worked for me. I earn 1,000 NRs [about $8] per hour harvesting fields and was able to pay off the purchase in one season. The added income ensures I can stay on top of bills and pay my children’s school fees.”

Farmers who have purchased reapers operate as service providers to other farms in their community, Paudel said.

“This has the additional benefit of creating legitimate jobs in rural areas, particularly needed among both migrant returnees who are seeking productive uses for earnings gained overseas that, at present, are mostly used for consumptive and unproductive sectors.”

“This additional work can also contribute to jobs for youth keeping them home rather than migrating,” he said.

The adoption rate of the reaper harvester is projected to reach 68% in the rice-wheat systems in the region within the next three years if current trends continue, significantly increasing access and affordability to the service.

Private and public support for mechanized harvester key to strong adoption

Achieving buy-in from the private and public sector was essential to the successful introduction and uptake of reaper attachments in Nepal, said Scott Justice, an agricultural and rural mechanization expert with the CSISA project.

Off the back of the popularity of the two-wheel tractor for planting and tilling, 22 reaper attachments were introduced by the researchers in 2014. Partnering with government institutions, the researchers facilitated demonstrations led by the private sector in farmers’ fields successfully building farmer demand and market-led supply.

“The reapers were introduced at the right place, at the right time. While nearly all Terai farmers for years had used tractor-powered threshing services, the region was suffering from labor scarcity or labor spikes where it took 25 people all day to cut one hectare of grain by hand. Farmers were in search of an easier and faster way to cut their grain,” Justice explained.

“Engaging the private and public sector in demonstrating the functionality and benefits of the reaper across different districts sparked rapidly increasing demand among farmers and service providers,” he said.

Early sales of the reaper attachments have mostly been directly to farmers without the need for considerable government subsidy. Much of the success was due to the researchers’ approach engaging multiple private sector suppliers and the Nepal Agricultural Machinery Entrepreneurs’ Association (NAMEA) and networks of machinery importers, traders, and dealers to ensure stocks of reapers were available at local level. The resulting competition led to 30-40% reduction in price contributing to increasing sales.

“With the technical support of researchers through the CSISA project we were able to import reaper attachments and run demonstrations to promote the technology as a sure investment for farmers and rural entrepreneurs,” said Krishna Sharma from Nepal Agricultural Machinery Entrepreneurs’ Association (NAMEA).

From 2015, the private sector capitalized on farmers’ interest in mechanized harvesting by importing reapers and running their own demonstrations and several radio jingles and sales continued to increase into the thousands, said Justice.

Building entrepreneurial capacity along the value chain

Through the CSISA project private dealers and public extension agencies were supported in developing training courses on the use of the reaper and basic business skills to ensure long-term success for farmers and rural entrepreneurs.

Training was essential in encouraging the emergence of mechanized service provision models and the market-based supply and repair chains required to support them, said CIMMYT agricultural mechanization engineer Subash Adhikari.

“Basic operational and business training for farmers who purchased a reaper enabled them to become service providers and successfully increased the access to reaper services and the amount of farms under improved management,” he said.

As commonly occurs when machinery adoption spreads, the availability of spare parts and repairs for reapers lagged behind sales. Researchers facilitated reaper repair training for district sales agent mechanics, as well as providing small grants for spare parts to build the value chain, Adhikari added.

Apart from hire services, mechanization creates additional opportunities for new business with repair and maintenance of equipment, sales and dealership of related businesses including transport and agro-processing along the value chain.

The Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia (CSISA) aims to sustainably increase the productivity of cereal based cropping systems to improve food security and farmers’ livelihoods in Nepal. CSISA works with public and private partners to support the widespread adoption of affordable and climate-resilient farming technologies and practices, such as improved varieties of maize, wheat, rice and pulses, and mechanization.

Cover photo: A farmer uses a two-wheel tractor-mounted reaper to harvest wheat in Nepal. (Photo: Timothy J. Krupnik/CIMMYT)

Participants at a February 2020 maize working group meeting of the Pakistan Agricultural Innovation Program (AIP) with seed of maize parental lines shared by CIMMYT. (Photo: Awais Yaqub)

International program ushers in a new era of maize farming in Pakistan

Written by Mike Listman on June 30, 2020. Posted in Features.

A unique consortium of global and Pakistan scientists has helped to drive the country’s recent growth in annual maize output to 6.3 million tons — nearly double the 2010 output — and energized the domestic production of affordable, quality seed of more nutritious and climate-resilient maize varieties.

With funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), support from the Pakistan Agricultural Research Council (PARC) and other national experts, and coordination by the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), the seven-year Agricultural Innovation Program (AIP) for Pakistan has contributed to the dramatic growth in national maize productivity that began in the early 2000’s, when more farmers adopted hybrid seed and better management practices.

“A key AIP focus has been to reach smallholder and marginal farmers with affordable maize seed from domestic suppliers, thus reducing maize seed imports that cost Pakistan nearly $80 million in 2018-19,” said AbduRahman Beshir, CIMMYT maize seed system specialist for South Asia. “As part of this, the program has provided dozens of private companies with market-ready maize products and parental seed, as well as training in product marketing and business management and supporting the production and distribution of 175 tons of maize seed for on-farm demonstrations and promotion.”

“The testing of diversified maize products and release of new varieties represent encouraging progress,” said AbduRahman Beshir (foreground), CIMMYT maize seed system specialist, speaking during a traveling seminar, “but only advances in quality seed production and a competitive seed business at scale, with a strong case for investment by the private sector, will allow farmers to benefit.” (Photo: Waheed Anwar/CIMMYT)

Products from AIP have included more nutritious, diversified maize lines and varieties with tolerance to drought, infertile soils and insect pests, reducing the risk of smallholder farm families for whom losing a crop is catastrophic, according to Syed Khadem Jan, a farmer from Bajaur District of the tribal areas of Pakistan.

“Our area is very fragmented and maize yields have averaged less than 2 tons per hectare, due to the lack of improved varieties and management practices,” Jan said. “The new maize seed with drought-tolerance is what farmers are looking for and will help to secure our food and livelihoods.”

Pakistan farmers sow maize on 1.3 million hectares in diverse ecologies ranging from 30 meters above sea level on the arid plains of Sindh Province to nearly 3,000 meters in the Karakoram mountain range of Gilgit Baltistan Province and as part of complex, irrigated cropping rotations in Punjab Province and small-scale, rain-watered farms in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province. Yellow maize is used widely in poultry feed and white maize for various foods including unleavened roti. Despite rising domestic demand for maize, production in Pakistan faces challenges that include a lack of maize varieties for various uses and ecologies, a weak seed delivery system, high seed prices, and unpredictable weather.

Since 2014, AIP has supported the testing by public and private partners in Pakistan of more than 3,000 maize products from breeding programs of CIMMYT and partners such as the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA). The extensive testing resulted in the identification of 60 new maize hybrids and varieties which CIMMYT handed over, together with their parental lines and breeder seed, to 16 public and private partners, according to Beshir.

“The maize seed distributed through AIP is enough to sow some 9,000 hectares, potentially benefitting nearly 110,000 families,” he said. “Similarly, CIMMYT has shared over 150 elite maize lines that have various preferred traits to foster variety registration, on-farm demonstrations, high-volume seed production, and intensive marketing. These contributions have broadened the genetic diversity and resilience of Pakistan’s maize and, through fast-track testing, saved partners at least eight years and considerable money, over having to develop them on their own from scratch and to pass them through conventional adaptation trials.”

Syed Khadam Jan, maize farmer from Bajaur District, Pakistan, holds a box of seed of a new climate-resilient maize variety from CIMMYT and the Pakistan Maize and Millet Research Institute. (Photo: Khashif Syed/CIMMYT)

Biofortified varieties provide better nutrition

Through AIP and national partners such as the University of Agriculture Faisalabad, farmers are testing pro-vitamin-A-enriched maize hybrids that are also remarkably high-yielding, helping to address one of the country’s chronic nutritional deficiencies. With the same aim, in 2017 the national variety evaluation committee approved the release of two “quality protein maize” hybrids, whose grain has enhanced levels of the amino-acid building blocks for protein in humans and other monogastric animals.

Thanking USAID and the government of Pakistan, as well as 22 public and private partners across the maize value chain, Muhammed Imtiaz, CIMMYT country representative for Pakistan and AIP project leader, underscored the importance of specialty maize products for vulnerable communities.

“Strengthening ‘Agriculture-to-Nutrition Pathways’ is a centerpiece of AIP and part of CIMMYT efforts to provide nutritious food for the needy,” Imtiaz said. “The introduction and evaluation of quality protein, Provitamin A and zinc enriched maize products represent a significant contribution both for the maize seed sector and Pakistan’s agricultural transformation.”

Addressing a 2020 AIP meeting, Muhammad Azeem Khan, PARC Chairman, urged stakeholders to use the new maize varieties. “I want to reiterate the importance of collaboration among public and private stakeholders to produce seed at scale, so that the diverse maize varieties can make it to the farmers’ fields as quickly as possible,” he said.

Maize seed producers acknowledge the value of AIP training and support in new business models. “We are grateful to CIMMYT for reviving and helping the crawling maize seed industry to walk,” said Aslam Yousuf, Managing Director of HiSell Seeds Private Ltd. Company. “Now we need to learn to run.”

Dating back to the 1960s, the research partnership between Pakistan and CIMMYT has played a vital role in improving food security for Pakistanis and for the global spread of improved crop varieties and farming practices. Norman Borlaug, Nobel Peace laureate and first director of CIMMYT wheat research, kept a close relationship with the nation’s researchers and policymakers.

Cover photo: Participants at a February 2020 maize working group meeting of the Pakistan Agricultural Innovation Program (AIP) with seed of maize parental lines shared by CIMMYT. (Photo: Awais Yaqub)

Women harvest wheat in India. (Photo: J. Cumes/CIMMYT)

New publications: From working in the fields to taking control

Written by Alison Doody on June 24, 2020. Posted in Publications. 1 Comment on New publications: From working in the fields to taking control

Using data from 12 communities across four Indian states, an international team of researchers has shed new light on how women are gradually innovating and influencing decision-making in wheat-based systems.

The study, published this month in The European Journal of Development Research, challenges stereotypes of men being the sole decision-makers in wheat-based systems and performing all the work. The authors, which include researchers from the CGIAR Research Program on Wheat (WHEAT)-funded GENNOVATE initiative, show that women adopt specific strategies to further their interests in the context of wheat-based livelihoods.

In parts of India, agriculture has become increasingly feminized in response to rising migration of men from rural areas to cities. An increasing proportion of women, relative to men, are working in the fields. However, little is known about whether these women are actually taking key decisions.

The authors distinguish between high gender gap communities — identified as economically vibrant and highly male-dominant — and low gender gap communities, which are also economically vibrant but where women have a stronger say and more room to maneuver.

The study highlights six strategies women adopt to participate actively in decision-making. These range from less openly challenging strategies that the authors term acquiescence, murmuring, and quiet co-performance (typical of high gender gap communities), to more assertive ones like active consultation, women managing, and finally, women deciding (low gender gap communities).

In acquiescence, for example, women are fully conscious that men do not expect them to take part in agricultural decision-making, but do not articulate any overt forms of resistance.

In quiet co-performance, some middle-income women in high gender gap communities begin to quietly support men’s ability to innovate, for example by helping to finance the innovation, and through carefully nuanced ‘suggestions’ or ‘advice.’ They don’t openly question that men take decisions in wheat production. Rather, they appear to use male agency to support their personal and household level goals.

In the final strategy, women take all decisions in relation to farming and innovation. Their husbands recognize this process is happening and support it.

A wheat farmer in India. (Photo: J. Cumes/CIMMYT)

“One important factor in stronger women’s decision-making capacity is male outmigration. This is a reality in several of the low gender gap villages studied—and it is a reality in many other communities in India. Another is education—many women and their daughters talked about how empowering this is,” said gender researcher and lead-author Cathy Farnworth.

In some communities, the study shows, women and men are adapting by promoting women’s “managerial” decision-making. However, the study also shows that in most locations the extension services have failed to recognize the new reality of male absence and women decision-makers. This seriously hampers women, and is restricting agricultural progress.

Progressive village heads are critical to progress, too. In some communities, they are inclusive of women but in others, they marginalize women. Input suppliers — including machinery providers — also have a vested interest in supporting women farm managers. Unsurprisingly, without the support of extension services, village heads, and other important local actors, women’s ability to take effective decisions is reduced.

“The co-authors, partners at Glasgow Caledonian University and in India, were very important to both obtaining the fieldwork data, and the development of the typology” said Lone Badstue, researcher at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) and another co-author of the paper.

The new typology will allow researchers and development partners to better understand empowerment dynamics and women’s agency in agriculture. The authors argue that development partners should support these strategies but must ultimately leave them in the hands of women themselves to manage.

“It’s an exciting study because the typology can be used by anyone to distinguish between the ways women (and men) express their ideas and get to where they want”, concluded Farnworth.

Read the full article in The European Journal of Development Research:
From Working in the Fields to Taking Control. Towards a Typology of Women’s Decision-Making in Wheat in India

See more recent publications from CIMMYT researchers:

isqg: A Binary Framework for in Silico Quantitative Genetics. 2019. Toledo, F.H., Perez-Rodriguez, P., Crossa, J., Burgueño, J. In: G3: Genes, Genomes, Genetics v. 9, no. 8, pag. 2425-2428
Short-term impacts of conservation agriculture on soil physical properties and productivity in the midhills of Nepal. 2019. Laborde, J.P., Wortmann, C.S., Blanco-Canqui, H., McDonald, A., Baigorria, G.A., Lindquist, J.L. In: Agronomy Journal v.111, no. 4, pag. 2128-2139.
Meloidogyne arenaria attacking eggplant in Souss region, Morocco. 2019. Mokrini, F., El Aimani, A., Abdellah Houari, Bouharroud, R., Ahmed Wifaya, Dababat, A.A. In: Australasian Plant Disease Notes v. 14, no. 1, art. 30.
Differences in women’s and men’s conservation of cacao agroforests in coastal Ecuador. 2019. Blare, T., Useche, P. In: Environmental Conservation v. 46, no. 4, pag. 302-309.
Assessment of the individual and combined effects of Rht8 and Ppd-D1a on plant height, time to heading and yield traits in common wheat. 2019. Kunpu Zhang, Junjun Wang, Huanju Qin, Zhiying Wei, Libo Hang, Pengwei Zhang, Reynolds, M.P., Daowen Wang In: The Crop Journal v. 7, no. 6, pag. 845-856.
Quantifying carbon for agricultural soil management: from the current status toward a global soil information system. 2019. Paustian, K., Collier, S., Baldock, J., Burgess, R., Creque, J., DeLonge, M., Dungait, J., Ellert, B., Frank, S., Goddard, T., Govaerts, B., Grundy, M., Henning, M., Izaurralde, R.C., Madaras, M., McConkey, B., Porzig, E., Rice, C., Searle, R., Seavy, N., Skalsky, R., Mulhern, W., Jahn, M. In: Carbon Management v. 10, no. 6, pag. 567-587.
Factors contributing to maize and bean yield gaps in Central America vary with site and agroecological conditions. 2019. Eash, L., Fonte, S.J., Sonder, K., Honsdorf, N., Schmidt, A., Govaerts, B., Verhulst, N. In: Journal of Agricultural Science v. 157, no. 4, pag. 300-317.
Genome editing, gene drives, and synthetic biology: will they contribute to disease-resistance crops, and who will benefit?. 2019. Pixley, K.V., Falck-Zepeda, J.B., Giller, K.E., Glenna, L.L., Gould, F., Mallory-Smith, C., Stelly, D.M., Stewart Jr, C.N. In: Annual Review of Phytopathology v. 57, pag. 165-188.
Rice mealybug (Brevennia rehi): a potential threat to rice in a long-term rice-based conservation agriculture system in the middle Indo-Gangetic Plain. 2019. Mishra, J. S., Poonia, S. P., Choudhary, J.S., Kumar, R., Monobrullah, M., Verma, M., Malik, R.K., Bhatt, B. P. In: Current Science v. 117, no. 4, 566-568.
Trends in key soil parameters under conservation agriculture-based sustainable intensification farming practices in the Eastern Ganga Alluvial Plains. 2019. Sinha, A.K., Ghosh, A., Dhar, T., Bhattacharya, P.M., Mitra, B., Rakesh, S., Paneru, P., Shrestha, R., Manandhar, S., Beura, K., Dutta, S.K., Pradhan, A.K., Rao, K.K., Hossain, A., Siddquie, N., Molla, M.S.H., Chaki, A.K., Gathala, M.K., Saiful Islam., Dalal, R.C., Gaydon, D.S., Laing, A.M., Menzies, N.W. In: Soil Research v. 57, no. 8, Pag. 883-893.
Genetic contribution of synthetic hexaploid wheat to CIMMYT’s spring bread wheat breeding germplasm. 2019. Rosyara, U., Kishii, M., Payne, T.S., Sansaloni, C.P., Singh, R.P., Braun, HJ., Dreisigacker, S. In: Nature Scientific Reports v. 9, no. 1, art. 12355.
Joint use of genome, pedigree, and their interaction with environment for predicting the performance of wheat lines in new environments. 2019. Howard, R., Gianola, D., Montesinos-Lopez, O.A., Juliana, P., Singh, R.P., Poland, J.A., Shrestha, S., Perez-Rodriguez, P., Crossa, J., Jarquín, D. In: G3: Genes, Genomes, Genetics v. 9, no. 9 pag. 2925-2934.
Deep kernel for genomic and near infrared predictions in multi-environment breeding trials. 2019. Cuevas, J., Montesinos-Lopez, O.A., Juliana, P., Guzman, C., Perez-Rodriguez, P., González-Bucio, J., Burgueño, J., Montesinos-Lopez, A., Crossa, J. In: G3: Genes, Genomes, Genetics v. 9. No. 9, pag. 2913-2924.
Multi-environment QTL analysis using an updated genetic map of a widely distributed Seri × Babax spring wheat population. 2019. Caiyun Liu, Khodaee, M., Lopes, M.S., Sansaloni, C.P., Dreisigacker, S., Sukumaran, S., Reynolds, M.P. In: Molecular Breeding v. 39, no. 9, art. 134.
Characterization of Ethiopian wheat germplasm for resistance to four Puccinia graminis f. sp. tritici races facilitated by single-race nurseries. 2019. Hundie, B., Girma, B., Tadesse, Z., Edae, E., Olivera, P., Hailu, E., Worku Denbel Bulbula, Abeyo Bekele Geleta, Badebo, A., Cisar, G., Brown-Guedira, G., Gale, S., Yue Jin, Rouse, M.N. In: Plant Disease v. 103, no. 9, pag. 2359-2366.
Marker assisted transfer of stripe rust and stem rust resistance genes into four wheat cultivars. 2019. Randhawa, M.S., Bains, N., Sohu, V.S., Chhuneja Parveen, Trethowan, R.M., Bariana, H.S., Bansal, U. In: Agronomy v. 9, no. 9, art. 497.
Design and experiment of anti-vibrating and anti-wrapping rotary components for subsoiler cum rotary tiller. 2019. Kan Zheng, McHugh, A., Hongwen Li, Qingjie Wang, Caiyun Lu, Hongnan Hu, Wenzheng Liu, Zhiqiang Zhang, Peng Liu, Jin He In: International Journal of Agricultural and Biological Engineering v. 14, no. 4, pag. 47-55.
Hydrogen peroxide prompted lignification affects pathogenicity of hemi-bio-trophic pathogen Bipolaris sorokiniana to wheat. 2019. Poudel, A., Sudhir Navathe, Chand, R., Vinod Kumar Mishra, Singh, P.K., Joshi, A.K. In: Plant Pathology Journal v. 35, no. 4, pag. 287-300.
Population-dependent reproducible deviation from natural bread wheat genome in synthetic hexaploid wheat. 2019. Jighly, A., Joukhadar, R., Sehgal, D., Sukhwinder-Singh, Ogbonnaya, F.C., Daetwyler, H.D. In: Plant Journal v. 100, no, 4. Pag. 801-812.
How do informal farmland rental markets affect smallholders’ well-being? Evidence from a matched tenant–landlord survey in Malawi. 2019. Ricker-Gilbert, J., Chamberlin, J., Kanyamuka, J., Jumbe, C.B.L., Lunduka, R., Kaiyatsa, S. In: Agricultural Economics v. 50, no. 5, pag. 595-613.
Distribution and diversity of cyst nematode (Nematoda: Heteroderidae) populations in the Republic of Azerbaijan, and their molecular characterization using ITS-rDNA analysis. 2019. Dababat, A.A., Muminjanov, H., Erginbas-Orakci, G., Ahmadova Fakhraddin, G., Waeyenberge, L., Senol Yildiz, Duman, N., Imren, M. In: Nematropica v. 49, no. 1, pag. 18-30.
Response of IITA maize inbred lines bred for Striga hermonthica resistance to Striga asiatica and associated resistance mechanisms in southern Africa. 2019. Gasura, E., Setimela, P.S., Mabasa, S., Rwafa, R., Kageler, S., Nyakurwa, C. S. In: Euphytica v. 215, no. 10, art. 151.
QTL mapping and transcriptome analysis to identify differentially expressed genes induced by Septoria tritici blotch disease of wheat. 2019. Odilbekov, F., Xinyao He, Armoniené, R., Saripella, G.V., Henriksson, T., Singh, P.K., Chawade, A. In: Agronomy v. 9, no. 9, art. 510.
Molecular diversity and selective sweeps in maize inbred lines adapted to African highlands. 2019. Dagne Wegary Gissa, Chere, A.T., Prasanna, B.M., Berhanu Tadesse Ertiro, Alachiotis, N., Negera, D., Awas, G., Abakemal, D., Ogugo, V., Gowda, M., Fentaye Kassa Semagn In: Nature Scientific Reports v. 9, art. 13490.
The impact of salinity on paddy production and possible varietal portfolio transition: a Vietnamese case study. 2019. Dam, T.H.T., Amjath Babu, T.S., Bellingrath-Kimura, S., Zander, P. In: Paddy and Water Environment In: 17. No. 4, pag. 771-782.

A member of a women farmers group serves a platter of mung bean dishes in Suklaphanta, Nepal. (Photo: Merit Maharajan/Amuse Communication)

Small but mighty

Written by Alison Doody on June 16, 2020. Posted in Features.

Nearly 65,000 farmers in Nepal, 40% of which were women, have benefited from the Agronomy and Seed Systems Scaling project, according to a comprehensive new report. This project is part of the Cereals Systems Initiative for South Asia (CSISA), led by the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) and supported by USAID.

One of the project’s most recent successes has been in accelerating the adoption of the nutritious and stress-tolerant mung bean in rice-wheat farming systems.

Farmer Chhalu Bhattarai harvests her mung bean crop in Manikapur, Surkhet, Nepal. (Photo: P. Lowe/CIMMYT)

Rice-wheat is the dominant cropping system in the lowland region of Nepal. Farmers typically harvest wheat in March and transplant rice in July, leaving land fallow for up to 100 days. A growing body of evidence shows, however, that planting mung bean during this fallow period can assist in improving farmers’ farming systems and livelihoods.

“The mung bean has multiple benefits for farmers,” says Narayan Khanal, a researcher at CIMMYT. “The first benefit is nutrition: mung beans are very rich in iron, protein and are easily digestible. The second benefit is income: farmers can sell mung beans on the market for a higher price than most other legumes. The third benefit is improved soil health: mung beans fix the nitrogen from the atmosphere into the soil as well as improve soil organic content.”

Commonly used in dishes like dahl, soups and sprout, mung beans are a common ingredient in Asian cuisine. However, prior to the project, most farmers in Nepal had never seen the crop before and had no idea how to eat it. Encouraging them to grow the crop was not going to be an easy task.

Thanks to dedicated efforts by CIMMYT researchers, more than 8,000 farmers in Nepal are now cultivating mung bean on land that would otherwise be left fallow, producing over $1.75 million of mung bean per year.

The newfound enthusiasm for growing mung bean could not have been achieved without the help of local women’s farming groups, said Timothy J. Krupnik, CIMMYT senior scientist and CSISA project leader.

Employees select and clean mung beans at Poshan Foods in Butwal, Nepal. (Photo: Merit Maharajan/Amuse Communication)

An employee selects mung beans at Poshan Foods, in Butwal, Nepal. (Photo: Merit Maharajan/Amuse Communication)

After mung bean is toasted, employees at Poshan Foods select the beans. (Photo: Merit Maharajan/Amuse Communication)

Poshan Foods uses mung bean for a wide range of products but has been particularly successful with baby food, which includes important nutrition advice for parents. (Photo: Merit Maharajan/Amuse Communication)

Bringing research and innovations to farmers’ fields

Introducing the mung bean crop to farmers’ fields was just one of the successes of Agronomy and Seed Systems Scaling, which was an added investment by USAID in the wider CSISA project, which began in 2014. The project aims to move agronomic and crop varietal research into real-world impact. It has helped farmers get better access to improved seeds and machinery and strengthened partnerships with the private sector, according to Khanal.

CSISA support in business mentoring and capacity building of seed companies to popularize newly released, biofortified and stress-tolerant wheat varieties has led to seed sales volumes tripling between 2014 to 2019. The project also led to a 68% increase in the number of new improved wheat varieties since the inception of the project.

Nepal’s National Wheat Research Program was able to fast track the release of the early maturing variety BL 4341, by combining data generated by the project through seed companies and the Nepal Agricultural Research Council (NARC) research station. Other varieties, including Borlaug 100 and NL 1327, are now in the pipeline.

Empowering women and facilitating women’s groups have been critical components of the project. Nepal has seen a mass exodus of young men farmers leaving the countryside for the city, leaving women to work the farms. CIMMYT worked with women farmer groups to expand and commercialize simple to use and affordable technologies, like precision seed and fertilizer spreaders.

Over 13,000 farmers have gained affordable access to and benefited from precision agriculture machinery such as two-wheel ‘hand tractors’ and ‘mini tillers.’ This is a major change for small and medium-scale farmers in South Asia who typically rely on low horsepower four-wheel tractors. The project also introduced an attachment for tractors for harvesting rice and wheat called the ‘reaper.’ This equipment helps to reduce the costs and drudgery of manual harvesting. In 2019, Nepal’s Terai region had almost 3,500 reapers, versus 22 in 2014.

To ensure the long-term success of the project, CSISA researchers have trained over 2,000 individuals from the private and public sector, and over 1,000 private organizations including machinery manufacturers and agricultural input dealers.

Researchers have trained project collaborators in both the public and private sector in seed systems, resilient varieties, better farming practices and appropriate agricultural mechanization business models. These partners have in turn passed this knowledge on to farmers, with considerable impact.

“The project’s outcomes demonstrates the importance of multi-year and integrated agricultural development efforts that are science-based, but which are designed in such a way to move research into impact and benefit farmers, by leveraging the skills and interests of Nepal’s public and private sector in unison,” said Krupnik.

“The outcomes from this project will continue to sustain, as the seed and market systems developed and nurtured by the project are anticipated to have long-lasting impact in Nepal,” he said.

Download the full report:
Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia: Agronomy and Seed Systems Scaling. Final report (2014-2019)

The Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia (CSISA) is led by the International Maize and Wheat Center (CIMMYT), implemented jointly with the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI). CSISA is funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Cover photo: A member of a women farmers group serves a platter of mung bean dishes in Suklaphanta, Nepal. (Photo: Merit Maharajan/Amuse Communication)