Through the Sustainable Wheat and Sustainable Maize projects, Bimbo strives to ensure the sustainability of Mexico’s agricultural sector, benefitting over 940 smallholder farmers through yield enhancement and cost reduction strategies.
Read more: https://www.milenio.com/content/bimbo-impulsa-agricultura-regenerativa-maiz-trigo-mexico
For several decades, the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) has worked with partners and farmers to improve maize and wheat varieties. Packed with âupgradesâ such as tolerance to environmental stresses, tolerance to diseases and pests, boosted nutrient content, higher yield potential and storage capabilities, and improved efficiency in using water and fertilizers, these seeds are rolled out by CIMMYT and its partners to create new opportunities for easier and better lives for farmers.
Together with national research partners, farmers, local governments and seed companies, CIMMYTâs work in seed systems has reaped results. Its experts are eager to put this experience into further action as CGIAR embarks on the next ten years of its journey to transform food, land, and water systems in a climate crisis. And rightly so: investments in CGIAR research â mainly through their contributions to enhancing yields of staple food crops â have returned ten-fold benefits and payoffs for poor people in terms of greater food abundance, lower prices of food, reduced food insecurity and poverty and reduced geographical footprint of agriculture. A large part of this impact is the result of CIMMYTâs day to day efforts to create a better world.
Replacing old varieties, not as easy as it sounds
Slow variety turnover â that of more than ten years â makes farmers vulnerable to risks such as climate change and emerging biotic threats. On the other hand, planting improved varieties that match farmersâ needs and the geography they work in, can increase productivity gains and improve the nutritional status of smallholders and their families. This, in turn, contributes to increased household incomes. Indirectly, the benefits can reach the surrounding community by providing increased employment opportunities, wage increases and affordable access to food.
Despite its tremendous benefits, varietal turnover is no small feat.
When it comes to seeds, detailed multi-disciplinary research is behind every new variety and its deployment to farmers. Just as the production of a new snack, beverage or a car requires an in-depth study of what the customer wants, seed systems also must be demand-driven.
Socioeconomists have to work hand-in-hand with breeders and seed system specialists to understand the drivers and bottlenecks for improved varietal adoption, market needs, and gender and social inclusion in seed delivery. Bottlenecks include the lack of access by farmers â especially for resource-poor, socially-excluded ones â to reliable information about the advantages of new varieties. Even if farmers are aware of new varieties, seeds might not be available for sale where they live or they might be too expensive.
Possibly the most complex reason for slow variety turnover is risk vulnerability: some farmers simply canât afford to take the risk of investing in something that might be good but could also disappoint. At the same time, seed companies also perceive a certain risk: they might not be interested in taking on an improved variety that trumps the seeds from older but more popular varieties they have on stock. For them, building and marketing a new brand of seeds requires significant investments.
New approaches are yielding results
Despite the complexity of the challenge, CIMMYT has been making progress, especially in Africa where slow variety turnover is creating roadblocks for increased food security and poverty alleviation.
Recent analysis of the weighted average age of CIMMYT-related improved maize varieties in 8 countries across eastern and southern Africa reveals that the overall weighted average age has decreased from 14.6 years in 2013 to 10.2 years in 2020. The remarkable progress in accelerating the rate of variety turnover and deploying the improved genetics â with climate resilience, nutritional-enhancement and grain yield â are benefiting more than eight million smallholders in Africa.
In Ethiopia, CIMMYT, EIAR and ICARDAâs work led to the adoption of improved rust-resistant varieties, corresponding productivity gains and economic benefits that, besides the urgent need to fight against the damaging rust epidemic, depended on a combination of enabling factors: pre-release seed multiplication, pro-active policies and rust awareness campaigns. The estimated income gain that farmers enjoyed due to adopting post-2010 varieties in 2016/2017 reached $48 million. For the country itself, the adoption of these varieties could save $65 million that otherwise would be spent on wheat imports.
Bill Gates echoes this in Chapter 9 of his new climate book, How to Avoid a Climate Disaster, as he describes CIMMYT and IITAâs drought-tolerant maize work: â[âŠ] experts at CGIAR developed dozens of new maize varieties that could withstand drought conditions, each adapted to grow in specific regions of Africa. At first, many smallholder farmers were afraid to try new crop varieties. Understandably so. If youâre eking out a living, you wonât be eager to take a risk on seeds youâve never planted before, because if they die, you have nothing to fall back on. But as experts worked with local farmers and seed dealers to explain the benefits of these new varieties, more and more people adopted them.â
Holistic action needed if we are to reach farmers with genetic innovations
Now more than ever, with increased frequency and intensification of erratic weather events on top of the complications of the COVID-19 pandemic, successful seed systems require the right investments, partnerships, efforts across disciplines, and enabling policies.
Varietal release and dissemination systems rely greatly on appropriate government policies and adoption of progressive seed laws and regulations. CGIARâs commitment to farmers and the success of national seed systems is described in the recently launched 10-year strategy: âCGIAR will support effective seed systems by helping national governments and private sector companies and regulators build their capacities to play their roles successfully. New initiatives will be jointly designed along the seed distribution chain, including for regional seed registration, import and export procedures, efficient in-country trialing, registration and release of new varieties, and seed quality promotion through fit-for-purpose certification.â
In line with CGIARâs ambitious goals, to provide farmers with a better service, small- and medium-size seed companies need to also be strengthened to become more market-oriented and dynamic. According to SPIA, helping local private seed dealers learn about new technology increases farm-level adoption by over 50% compared to the more commonly used approach, where public sector agricultural extension agents provide information about new seed to selected contact farmers.
CIMMYT socioeconomics and market experts are putting this in practice through working with agrodealers to develop retail strategies, such as targeted marketing materials, provision of in-store seed decision support and price incentives, to help both female and male farmers get the inputs that work best.
Within the new CGIAR, CIMMYT scientists will continue to work with partners to strongly improve the performance of wheat and maize in smallholder farmersâ fields. Concerted efforts from all actors conforming the entire seed system are essential to achieve our vision: to transform food systems for affordable, sufficient and healthy diets produced within planetary boundaries. Wheat and maize seed systems will form the basis to fulfill that vision and provide a tried and tested roadmap for other crops, including legumes, vegetables and fruits. Together, we can keep a finger on the pulse of farmersâ needs and build healthy diets for a better tomorrow from the ground up.
The food security and livelihoods of smallholder farming families in sub-Saharan Africa depend on maize production. The region accounts for up to two-thirds of global maize production, but is facing challenges related to extreme weather events, climate-induced stresses, pests and diseases, and deteriorating soil quality. These require swift interventions and innovations to safeguard maize yields and quality.
In this Q&A, we reflect on the results and impact of the long-term collaborative work on drought-tolerant maize innovations spearheaded by two CGIAR Research Centers: the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) and International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA). This innovative work has changed guises over the years, from the early work of the Drought Tolerant Maize for Africa (DTMA) and Drought Tolerant Maize for Africa Seed Scaling (DTMASS) projects through later iterations such as Stress Tolerant Maize for Africa (STMA) and the newest project, Accelerating Genetic Gains in Maize and Wheat (AGG).
In this Q&A, three leaders of this collaborative research reflect on the challenges their work has faced, the innovations and impact it has generated for smallholder farmers, and possible directions for future research. They are: B.M Prasanna, director of CIMMYTâs Global Maize Program and of the CGIAR Research Program on Maize (MAIZE); Abebe Menkir, a maize breeder and maize improvement lead at IITA; and Cosmos Magorokosho, project lead for AGG-Maize at CIMMYT.
Briefly describe the challenges confronting small-scale farmers prior to the introduction of drought-tolerant maize and how CIMMYT and IITA responded to these challenges?
B.M.P.: Maize is grown on over 38 million hectares in sub-Saharan Africa, accounting for 40% of cereal production in the region and providing at least 30% of the populationâs total calorie intake. The crop is predominantly grown under rainfed conditions by resource-constrained smallholder farmers who often face erratic rainfall, poor soil fertility, increasing incidence of climatic extremes â especially drought and heat â and the threat of devastating diseases and insect pests.
Around 40% of maize-growing areas in sub-Saharan Africa face occasional drought stress with a yield loss of 10â25%. An additional 25% of the maize crop suffers frequent drought, with yield losses of up to 50%. Climate change is further exacerbating the situation, with devastating effects on the food security and livelihoods of the millions of smallholder farmers and their families who depend on maize in sub-Saharan Africa. Therefore, the improved maize varieties with drought tolerance, disease resistance and other farmer-preferred traits developed and deployed by CIMMYT and IITA over the last ten years in partnership with an array of national partners and seed companies across sub-Saharan Africa are critical in effectively tackling this major challenge.
A.M.: Consumption of maize as food varies considerably across sub-Saharan Africa, exceeding 100 kg per capita per year in many countries in southern Africa. In years when rainfall is adequate, virtually all maize consumed for food is grown in sub-Saharan Africa, with a minimal dependence on imported grain. Maize production, however, is highly variable from year to year due to the occurrence of drought and the dependence of national maize yields on seasonal rainfall. One consequence has been widespread famine occurring every five to ten years in sub-Saharan Africa, accompanied by large volumes of imported maize grain as food aid or direct imports.
This places a significant strain on resources of the World Food Programme and on national foreign exchange. It also disincentivizes local food production and may not prevent or address cyclical famine. It also leaves countries ill-equipped to address famine conditions in the period between the onset of the crisis and the arrival of food aid. Investment in local production, which would strengthen the resilience and self-sufficiency in food production of smallholder farming families, is a far better option to mitigate food shortages than relying on food aid and grain imports.
C.M.: Smallholder farmers in sub-Saharan Africa face innumerable natural and socioeconomic constraints. CIMMYT, in partnership with IITA and national agricultural research system partners, responded by developing and catalyzing the commercialization of new maize varieties that produce reasonable maize yields under unpredictable rainfall-dependent growing season.
Over the life of the partnership, more than 300 new climate-adaptive maize varieties were developed and released in more than 20 countries across sub-Saharan Africa where maize is a major staple food crop. Certified seed of over 100 stress-tolerant improved maize varieties have been produced by seed company partners, reaching more than 110,000 tons in 2019. The seeds of these drought-tolerant maize varieties have benefited more than 8 million households and were estimated to be grown on more than 5 million hectares in eastern, southern and west Africa in 2020.
In what ways did the drought-tolerant maize innovation transform small-scale farmersâ ability to respond to climate-induced risks? Are there any additional impacts on small scale farmers in addition to climate adaptation?
B.M.P.: The elite drought-tolerant maize varieties can not only provide increased yield in drought-stressed crop seasons, they also offer much needed yield stability. This means better performance than non-drought-tolerant varieties in both good years and bad years to a smallholder farmer.
Drought-tolerant maize varieties developed by CIMMYT and IITA demonstrate at least 25-30% grain yield advantage over non-drought-tolerant maize varieties in sub-Saharan Africa under drought stress at flowering. This translates into at least a 1 ton per hectare enhanced grain yield on average, as well as reduced downside risk in terms of lost income, food insecurity and other risks associated with crop yield variability. In addition to climate adaptation, smallholder farmers benefit from these varieties due to improved resistance to major diseases like maize lethal necrosis and parasitic weeds like Striga. We have also developed drought-tolerant maize varieties with enhanced protein quality â such as Quality Protein Maize or QPM â and provitamin A, which improve nutritional outcomes.
We must also note that drought risk in sub-Saharan Africa has multiple and far-reaching consequences. It reduces incentives for smallholder farmers to intensify maize-based systems and for commercial seed companies to invest and evolve due to a limited seed market.
Drought-tolerant maize is, therefore, a game changer as it reduces the downside risk for both farmers and seed companies and increases demand for improved maize seed, thus strengthening the commercial seed market in sub-Saharan Africa. Extensive public-private partnerships around drought-tolerant maize varieties supported the nascent seed sector in sub-Saharan Africa and has enabled maize-based seed companies to significantly grow over the last decade. Seed companies in turn are investing in marketing drought-tolerant maize varieties and taking the products to scale.
A.M.: The DTMA and STMA projects were jointly implemented by CIMMYT and IITA in partnership with diverse national and private sector partners in major maize producing countries in eastern, southern and western Africa to develop and deploy multiple stress-tolerant and productive maize varieties to help farmers adapt to recurrent droughts and other stresses including climate change.
These projects catalyzed the release and commercialization of numerous stress-resilient new maize varieties in target countries across Africa. Increasing the resilience of farming systems means that smallholder farmers need guaranteed access to good quality stress resilient maize seeds. To this end, the two projects worked with public and private sector partners to produce large quantities of certified seeds with a continual supply of breeder seeds from CIMMYT and IITA. The availability of considerable amount of certified seeds of resilient maize varieties has enabled partners to reach farmers producing maize under stressful conditions, thus contributing to the mitigation of food shortages that affect poor people the most in both rural and urban areas.
C.M.: The drought-tolerant maize innovation stabilized maize production under drought stress conditions in sub-Saharan Africa countries. Recent study results showed that households that grew drought-tolerant maize varieties had at least half a ton more maize harvest than the households that did not grow the drought-tolerant maize varieties, thus curbing food insecurity while simultaneously increasing farmersâ economic benefits. Besides the benefit from drought-tolerant innovation, the new maize varieties developed through the partnership also stabilized farmersâ yields under major diseases, Striga infestation, and poor soil fertility prevalent in sub-Saharan Africa.
How is the project addressing emerging challenges in breeding for drought-tolerant maize and what opportunities are available to address these challenges in the future?Â
B.M.P.: A strong pipeline of elite, multiple-stress-tolerant maize varieties â combining other relevant adaptive and farmer-preferred traits â has been built in sub-Saharan Africa through a strong germplasm base, partnerships with national research partners and small- and medium-sized seed companies, an extensive phenotyping and multi-location testing network, and engagement with farming communities through regional on-farm trials for the identification of relevant farmer-preferred products.
CGIAR maize breeding in sub-Saharan Africa continues to evolve in order to more effectively and efficiently create value for the farmers we serve. We are now intensively working on several areas: (a) increasing genetic gains (both on-station and on-farm) through maize breeding in the stress-prone environments of sub-Saharan Africa by optimizing our breeding pipelines and effectively integrating novel tools, technologies and strategies (e.g., doubled haploids, genomics-assisted breeding, high-throughput and precise phenotyping, improved breeding data management system, etc.); (b) targeted replacement of old or obsolete maize varieties in sub-Saharan Africa with climate-adaptive and new varieties; (c) developing next-generation climate-adaptive maize varieties with traits such as native genetic resistance to fall armyworm, and introgressed nutritional quality traits (e.g., provitamin A, high Zinc) to make a positive impact on the nutritional well-being of consumers; and (d) further strengthening the breeding capacity of national partners and small and medium-sized seed companies in sub-Saharan Africa for a sustainable way forward.
A.M.:Â The DTMA and STMA projects established effective product pipelines integrating cutting-edge phenotyping and molecular tools to develop stress-resilient maize varieties that are also resistant or tolerant to MLN disease and fall armyworm. These new varieties are awaiting release and commercialization. Increased investment in strengthening public and private sector partnerships is needed to speed up the uptake and commercialization of new multiple stress-resilient maize varieties that can replace the old ones in farmersâ fields and help achieve higher yield gains.
Farmersâ access to new multiple-stress-tolerant maize varieties will have a significant impact on productivity at the farm level. This will largely be due to new varietiesâ improved response to fertilizer and favorable growing environments as well as their resilience to stressful production conditions. Studies show that the adoption of drought-tolerant maize varieties increased maize productivity, reduced exposure to farming risk among adopters and led to a decline in poverty among adopters. The availability of enough grain from highly productive and stress-resilient maize varieties can be the cheapest source of food and release land to expand the cultivation of other crops to facilitate increased access to diversified and healthy diets.
C.M.: Â The project is tackling emerging challenges posed by new diseases and pests by building upon the successful genetic base of drought-tolerant maize. This is being done by breeding new varieties that add tolerance to the emerging disease and pest challenges onto the existing drought-tolerant maize backgrounds. Successes have already been registered in breeding new varieties that have high levels of resistance to MLN disease and the fall armyworm pest.
Opportunities are also available to address new challenges including: pre-emptively breeding for threats to maize production challenges that exist in other regions of the world before these threats reach sub-Saharan Africa; enhancing the capacity of national partners to build strong breeding programs that can address new threats once they emerge in sub-Saharan Africa; and sharing knowledge and novel high-value breeding materials across different geographies to immediately address new threats once they emerge.
Cover photo: Alice Nasiyimu stands in front of a drought-tolerant maize plot at her family farm in Bungoma County, in western Kenya. (Photo: Joshua Masinde/CIMMYT)
When we talk about the impact of agricultural research we often rely on numerical metrics: percent increase in yield, percent decrease in crop loss, adoption rates, etcetera. For farmers on the ground, however, the impact can be much harder to boil down to a few numbers. Hiding behind every statistical table are real stories of dreams dashed or fulfilled, of everyday people trying to survive and flourish.
A new educational video powerfully dramatizes this point through the story of Jamal Mia and his daughter Rupa. Jamalâs dreams to own a house and see Rupa enroll in college are threatened when his maize crop is attacked by fall armyworm. An encounter with an agricultural extension officer puts Jamal on track to tackle the infestation, save his crop and secure his familyâs wellbeing.
The video was developed by CIMMYT with support from Bangladeshâs Department of Agricultural Extension and the Bangladesh Wheat and Maize Research Institute (BWMRI), as part of a project titled “Fighting back against fall armyworm in Bangladesh.â Supported by USAID’s Feed the Future Initiative and Michigan State University, this CIMMYT-led project works in synergy with the Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia (CSISA) and with national partners to mitigate the impact of this invasive pest on smallholder farmers’ livelihoods.
The video was filmed in Dinajpur district, Bangladesh, and is available in Bangla with English captions.
Researchers from the Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia (CSISA) project have been exploring the drivers of smallholder farmersâ underuse of groundwater wells to combat in-season drought during the monsoon rice season in Nepalâs breadbasket â 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 farmersâ 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 CSISAâs 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.
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 Nepalâs Terai region, CSISAâs 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
The pursuit for higher and more stable yields, alongside better stress tolerance, has dominated maize breeding in Africa for a long time. Such attributes have been, and still are, essential in safeguarding the food security and livelihoods of smallholder farmers. However, other essential traits have not been the main priority of breeding strategies: how a variety tastes when cooked, its smell, its texture or its appearance.
They are now gradually coming into the mainstream of maize breeding. Researchers are exploring the sensory characteristics consumers prefer and identifying the varieties under development which have the desired qualities. Breeders may then choose to incorporate specific traits that farmers or consumers value in future breeding work. This research is also helping to accelerate varietal turnover in the last mile, as farmers have additional reasons to adopt newer varieties.
In the last five years, the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) has been conducting participatory variety evaluations across East Africa. First, researchers invited farmers and purchasers of improved seed in specific agro-ecologies to visit demonstration plots and share their preferences for plant traits they would like to grow in their own farms.
In 2019 and 2020, researchers also started to facilitate evaluations of the sensory aspects of varieties.
Fresh samples of green maize, from early- to late-maturing maize varieties, were boiled and roasted. Then, people assessed their taste and other qualities. The first evaluations of this kind were conducted in Kenya and Uganda in August and September 2019, and another exercise in Kenyaâs Machakos County took place in January 2020.
Similar evaluations have looked at the sensory qualities of maize flour. In March 2020, up to 300 farmers in Kenyaâs Kakamega County participated in an evaluation of ugali, or maize flour porridge. Participants assessed a wider range of factors, including the aroma, appearance, taste, texture on the hand, texture in the mouth and overall impression. After tasting each variety, they indicated how likely they would be to buy it.
Tastes differ
âFarmers not only consume maize in various forms but also sell the maize either at green or dry grain markets. What we initially found is green maize consumers prefer varieties that are sweet when roasted. We also noted that seed companies were including the sensory characteristics in the maize varietiesâ product profiles,â explained Bernard Munyua, Research Associate with the Socioeconomics program at CIMMYT. âAs breeders and socioeconomists engage more and more with farmers, consumers or end-users, it is apparent that varietal profiles for both plant and sensory aspects have become more significant than ever before, and have a role to play in the successful turnover of new varieties.â
For researchers, this is very useful information, to help determine if it is viable to bring a certain variety to market. The varieties shared in these evaluations include those that have passed through CIMMYTâs breeding pipeline and are allocated to partners for potential release after national performance trials, as well as CIMMYT varieties marketed by various seed companies. Popular commercial varieties regions were also included in the evaluations, for comparison.
A total of 819 people participated in the evaluation exercises in Kenya and Uganda, 54% of them female.
âCurrently, there is increasing demand by breeders, donors, and other agricultural scientists to understand the modalities of trait preferences of crops by women and men farmers,â said Rahma Adam, Gender and Development Specialist at CIMMYT.
Thatâs the way I like it
For Gentrix Ligare, from Kakamega County, maize has always been a staple food in her family. They eat ugali almost daily. The one-acre farm that she and her husband own was one of the sites used to plant the varieties ahead of the evaluation exercise. Just like her husband, Fred Ligare, she prefers ugali that is soft but absorbs more water during preparation. âI also prefer ugali that is neither very sticky nor very sweet. Such ugali would be appropriate to eat with any type of vegetable or sauce,â she said.
Fernandes Ambani prefers ugali that emits a distinct aroma while being cooked and should neither be very sweet nor plain tasting. For him, ugali should not be too soft or too hard. While it should not be very sticky, it should also not have dark spots in it. âWhen I like the taste, smell, texture and appearance of a particular variety when cooked, I would definitely purchase it if I found it on the market,â he said.
While the task of incorporating all the desired or multiple traits in the breeding pipeline could prove complex and costly, giving consumers what they like is one of the essential steps in enhancing a varietyâs commercial success in the market, argues Ludovicus Okitoi, Director of Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Organizationâs (KALRO) Kakamega Center.
âDespite continuously breeding and releasing varieties every year, some farmers still buy some older varieties, possibly because they have a preference for a particular taste in some of the varieties they keep buying,â Okitoi said. âIt is a good thing that socioeconomists and breeders are talking more and more with the farmers.â
Advancements in breeding techniques may help accelerate the integration of multiple traits, which could eventually contribute to quicker varietal turnover.
âPreviously, we did not conduct this type of varietal evaluations at the consumer level. A breeder would, for instance, just breed on-station and conduct national performance trials at specific sites. The relevant authorities would then grant their approval and a variety would be released. Things are different now, as you have to go back to the farmer as an essential part of incorporating end-user feedback in a varietyâs breeding process,â explained Hugo de Groote, Agricultural Economist at CIMMYT.
When farmers in rural Kasungu, Malawi, are asked to list some of the challenges they face, much of what they say is to be expected. Crop pests, climate change, low soil fertility, and lack of improved seed and purchasing power â these are faced by smallholders across districts and the country as a whole.
But there is one surprising response. âSometimes itâs difficult to get feedback from research centers on what does and doesnât work,â says Maxwell Phiri.
Capacity building and knowledge transfer are key elements of agricultural development work, but there is often a gap between research, outreach and extension to farmers. New techniques and crop varieties tested at experimental stations can take a while to reach rural communities, who want solutions to the challenges they are facing in real time.
âBut now itâs easier for us because the research is being done here.â Phiri points to the farmer field school in Msambafumu, a few hectares of communal land where 23 smallholders from the surrounding area meet regularly to learn about new technologies and farming techniques.
At the school they have been able to learn first-hand about improved and new agricultural practices and technologies. Following an introduction to climate-smart agriculture practices, they have moved on to agroforestry, learning about the benefits of intercropping drought-tolerant maize with pigeon peas and fruit trees. âWeâve even started practicing climate-smart agriculture in our own fields and planting agroforestry trees,â says Ntendeleza Mwale, a member of the field school in Msambafumu and chair of a network of 17 schools in the district. âNow everybody is growing fruit trees at home.â
Back to school
A farmer field school is a group of 25-30 farmers, led by a master trainer, who come together to solve common challenges faced in their local area, such as soil degradation or poor water availability. Since 2014, the Government of Malawi has been using this innovative approach to help farmers learn about and improve their production systems through the KULIMA project. With support from a CGIAR consortium led by the International Potato Center (CIP), 15 schools have been established across the districts of Kasungu, Mulanje and Mzuzu, including master training hubs and outreach centers run by NGOs.
The overall objective is to increase agricultural productivity and diversification by upscaling climate-smart technologies,â explains Mathinda Sopo, a monitoring and evaluation specialist and project manager at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT). âMaster trainer candidates are selected in each district and then invited to sit down with researchers and identify their core production challenges. The plans are then developed collaboratively and based on agroecological zone.â
In February 2020, a new cohort of trainees arrived at the Lisasadizi Regional Training Center in Kasungu, where the Ministry of Agriculture coordinates trainings on four key topics â soil health, climate change, pests and diseases and nutrition â in collaboration with the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the CGIAR consortium, supported by the German development agency GIZ.
The 13-week residential course is mostly practical but does include some classroom-based study and a community outreach component. Guided by a facilitator â usually a researcher or extension worker â participants are encouraged to learn from their experiences as they conduct experiments in their own fields, make observations and evaluate results throughout the cropping season. Outside of the core curriculum, they are free to investigate additional topics of their own choice.
After completing the course, master trainers move back to their respective areas to help train facilitators, who are ultimately responsible for running the field schools with support from NGO extension staff.
âThe CGIAR centers bring in technologies they want to promote like improved crop varieties, but there are ongoing evaluations throughout the process to respond to newly emerging challenges such as fall armyworm,â says Sopo. âThereâs also a review at the end of each season to discuss lessons learned and knowledge gaps.â
CIMMYT, for example, is focusing on promoting drought-tolerant, quality protein maize (QPM), and provitamin A maize, as well as climate-smart agriculture practices. At Msambafumu, the group have been comparing five improved maize varieties with local ones. âSo far weâve seen that the new varieties have bigger yields and cob sizes,â says Mwale. âVarieties like Chitedze 2 QPM and MH43A are also early maturing and are more nutritious.â
Learning by doing
A few kilometers down the road, in Galika village, members of the Tiyese field school have been learning how to control a variety of pests and diseases. So far, they have been taught about different pesticides and the benefits of using inoculant on soya beans and ground nuts to improve soil fertility, and how to identify and mitigate disease in susceptible potato varieties. They have also been learning how to apply Aflasafe while crops are still in the field to reduce aflatoxins in maize and groundnuts.
But the most pressing challenge is fall armyworm, says Matolino Zimba, a member of the Tiyese field school. âWeâve been trying new methods for controlling it,â he explains. âLast year we planted mucuna beans in our banana orchard as a cover crop. Later we soaked mucuna leaves in water and poured the solution on the infested maize and noticed that the worms were dying.â
Zimba is satisfied with the learning methods at the field school. âThis approach is better for us because we get to see the process, rather than just receiving an explanation.â
Emily Kaponda agrees. She first joined the group after noticing that participating farmers were getting higher yields by using new planting methods. âThe school has a smaller plot of land than I do, but their bundles of maize were much larger,â she explains.
Since joining the field school, she has learned how to increase her yields, how to conserve moisture in the soil using zero-tillage farming and the importance of diversifying her familyâs diets. âWeâre learning how we can use cassava or sweet potato as a starch, instead of only using maize.â
Zimba and Kaponda are both excited to be trying out QPM and provitamin A maize varieties, as well as new varieties of cassava, orange-fleshed sweet potato, improved groundnuts, biofortified beans and bananas. Much like their peers at Msambafumu, they had not known that many of these could be grown in the area, and the group has already started planning to multiply planting materials to use in their own fields next year.
âThese groups are really inspirational,â says Sopo. âMost members are already practicing things theyâve learned at their school and are getting positive results.â
Sopo is already seeing success stories from schools established one year ago, but collaboration will need to be sustained to ensure lasting progress. A new research initiative, Development-Smart Innovations through Research in Agriculture (DeSIRA), will help to maintain the positive feedback loop by investigating emerging issues raised during on-farm experiments. âWe can take farmer observations from the study plots to DeSIRA for further research, and the outputs from that will complement KULIMA.â
Because of unpredictable climate conditions, agricultural production in Ethiopia faces uncertainties during both the growing and harvesting seasons. The risk and uncertainty are bigger for smallholder farmers, as they canât protect themselves from climate-related asset losses. Access to insurance schemes, climate information and other tools could help to minimize climate risks for smallholder farmers.
A new collaborative project launched in Ethiopia aims to reduce agricultural investment risk. The Capacitating African Stakeholders with Climate Advisories and Insurance Development (CASCAID-II) project builds on learnings from the CASCAID-I project in West Africa. It will target Ethiopia, Ghana and Senegal, focusing not only on smallholder farmers but on the food value chain as a whole. In a context of increasing integration of farmers into urban markets, the project will improve agricultural productivity, food security and profitability of agricultural enterprises.
The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) will partner with the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) and the University of Florida, with the support of the CGIAR research program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS).
Physical and digital tools across the value chain
In October 2019, thirty partners gathered for the CASCAID-II project launch and meeting in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. They agreed on the project goals, a set of priority research questions and a schedule of activities for the next two years.
Partners also reviewed the tools that could be used to deliver climate advisories and agricultural insurance products, ensuring that all the actors in the value chain are engaged from the start. Team members aim to embed services in existing physical and digital (âphygitalâ) data infrastructures and to collect user feedback, so performance can be improved. Users will be segmented according to advanced socioeconomic and agro-ecological factors, so they can be targeted more efficiently with appropriate services and climate-smart agriculture options. The project will draw on real-time and multi-scale yield forecasting for better preparedness and decision-making.
Project partners agreed to start with the CCAFS Regional Agricultural Forecasting Tool (CRAFT) for sub-national yield forecasting in Ethiopia and to develop climate advisories and insurance services in line with the needs of the Ministry of Agriculture.
Precise data from scientists to farmers
In a related development, Ethiopia recently launched a digital agro-climate advisory platform, which offers great potential to improve farmersâ management of climate-induced risks, facilitate technology adoption and improve livelihoods.
Speaking at the platformâs launch ceremony, Eyasu Abraha, advisor to the Minister of Agriculture, thanked development partners for supporting the establishment of the platform in the timely move towards digitalization and use of precise data.
The platform incorporates location-specific climate information, as well as soil- and crop-specific best-bet agronomic management recommendations for farmers, development agents and extension officers. It automates crop-climate modeling and uses technologies such as text messaging, interactive voice response (IVRS) and smartphone apps for dissemination.
On March 8, the world celebrates International Womenâs Day, and the 25th anniversary of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, the most progressive roadmap for the empowerment of women and girls, everywhere. In an op-ed in The Independent, Claudia Sadoff, CGIAR Gender Champion and Director General of the International Water Management Institute (IWMI), declares that our climate change-ravaged food systems cannot wait for the gradual progress of gender quality.
From locust swarms, hurricanes, wildfires and emerging famines, climate-related disasters are taking place around the world and our fragile food systems are on the front line.
Our food systems are in need of urgent support, and rural women play a critical role in reversing the problem. Research has found that rural women are disproportionately impacted by the effects of climate change, yet their significant contributions to food systems receive only a fraction of the focus they deserve.
Rural women are hamstrung by gender bias in food systems, home life, economics and culture. Barriers to accessing finance, insurance, high-quality seed, fertilizer, additional labor and markets result in women producing 20-30% less per hectare than men.
Womenâs unpaid daily household tasks are often backbreaking and time-consuming. Women are responsible for collecting water and fuel for cooking and tending kitchen gardens and family-owned livestock. With African women producing up to 80% of food for their household, these women have less opportunity to grow and sell foods at market to improve their financial position.
Breaking free of this gender bias requires a rethink on how rural women are reflected in, and participate in, society at large, says Sadoff in her op-ed, published in The Independent on March 7, 2020.
So, what does this rethink look like? How can we enable women and, in the process, strengthen our food systems?
Sadoff has summarized this huge undertaking into three key steps: (1) Ensure rural women can invest in productivity in their farms, (2) ease the burden of daily household tasks, and (3) build research systems and cultures to be more gender equitable in the long run.
Through One CGIAR and the Generating Evidence and New Directors for Equitable Results (GENDER) Platform, we are proud to say that we are working together to achieve these three objectives. Closing the gender gap completely will not happen in a generation but taking steps towards achieving greater gender equality will help to build the resilience of our food systems, bolster rural economies and improve rural livelihoods.
With UN Women, One CGIAR supports #GenerationEquality, for the benefit of all.
Read Claudia Sadoff’s article on The Independent:
Unless we empower women farmers, we may not have enough to feed the planet.
This summary was originally published on the CGIAR website:
For a food system at risk, women are key yet often overlooked.
Cover photo: C. de Bode/CGIAR.
Sixteen years of consistent learning and practice of climate-smart agriculture, led by the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), are paying off for Luganu Mwangonde. Together with her husband Kenson, she has established herself as a successful smallholder farmer in Malawiâs Balaka district. She enjoys the multiple benefits of high yields from diverse crops, surplus to sell at the markets and improved soil quality.
âI started practicing the farming that does not demand too much labor back in 2004,â she explains at her 2.5-acre farm. âOver the years the process has become easier, because I have a full understanding of the benefits of techniques introduced through the project.â
In Malawiâs family farms, women often carry the burden of land preparation and weeding  in the fields while juggling household responsibilities, contributing to widen gender differences already prevalent in the community.
Mwangonde observes that learning climate-smart techniques â such as minimum tillage, mulching and planting on flat land surfaces â has given her an advantage over other farmers practicing conventional agriculture.
Better off
At the beginning, like other farmers in the area, Mwangonde thought conservation agriculture and climate-smart techniques required a lot of work, or even hiring extra labor. As she tried this new approach, however, weed pressure in her plot decreased gradually, with the help of mulching and other techniques, and the labor required to maintain the fields reduced significantly. This allowed her to have extra time to add value to her products and sell them on the markets â and to rest.
The best gain for her is knowing that her family always has enough to eat. âI have enough grain to last until the next harvest,â she says. âMy husband and I can provide for our seven children and four grandchildren.â During the 2018/19 season, Mwangondeâs family harvested six bags of maize, two bags of pigeon pea and four bags of groundnuts. The surplus from the harvest is reserved for later, when prices are more competitive.
âI am an equal partner in the farming activities. That means I can make decisions about how we work on our plot, distribute crops and apply everything that I have learnt about conservation agriculture,â Mwangonde explains. She has participated in CIMMYT activities where she could share her experiences on climate-smart agriculture with other women. As a lead farmer, she notes, she can confidently inspire the next generation of smallholders because of the empowering knowledge she has acquired.
Out of the 3,538 smallholder farmers from Balaka, Machinga and Zomba districts, up to 2,218 are women smallholder farmers who have successfully adopted climate-smart technologies.
Mwangonde is one of the beneficiaries of the Africa Research in Sustainable Intensification for the Next Generation (Africa RISING) project. She also benefitted from the support of the German Development Agency (GIZ), the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), Total Land Care (TLC) and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
Mary Twaya is an exemplary farmer in Lemu, a rural drought-prone community in southern Malawi, near Lake Malombe. On her one-hectare farm she grows cotton, maize, and legumes like groundnut and cowpea, which she just picked from her fields. Since agriculture is Twayaâs sole livelihood, it is important for her to get good harvests, so she can support her three children and her elderly mother. She is the only breadwinner since her husband left to sell coffee in the city and never returned.
Agriculture is critically important to the economy and social fabric of Malawi, one of the poorest countries in the World. Up to 84% of Malawian households own or cultivate land. Yet, gender disparities mean that farmland managed by women are on average 25% less productive than men. Constraints include limited access to inputs and opportunities for capacity building in farming.
Climate change may worsen this gender gap. Research from the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) shows that there are multidimensional benefits for women farmers to switch to climate-smart agriculture practices, such as planting drought-tolerant maize varieties and conservation agriculture with no tillage, soil cover and crop diversification.
Twaya was part of a CIMMYT project that brought climate-smart agriculture practices to smallholder farmers in Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
She was enthusiastic about adopting climate-smart agriculture practices and conservation agriculture strategies in her plot. âI have always considered myself an active farmer, and when my husband left, I continued in the project around 2007 as part of the six lead âmother farmersâ with about 30 more âbaby farmersâ learning through our field trials,â Twaya explained.
âWe worked in Lemu since 2007 with Patrick Stanford, a very active and dedicated extension officer who introduced conservation agriculture to the village,â said CIMMYT agronomist Christian Thierfelder. âFarmers highlighted declining yields. The Lemu community was keen to transform their farming system, from conventional ridge tillage to more sustainable and climate-adapted cropping systems.â This was an ideal breeding ground for new ideas and the development of climate-smart solutions, according to Thierfelder.
Mulching, spacing and legume diversification
Showing her demonstration plot, which covers a third of her farm, Twaya highlights some of the climate-smart practices she adopted.
âMulching was an entirely new concept to me. I noticed that it helps with moisture retention allowing my crops to survive for longer during the periods of dry spells. Compared to the crops without mulching, one could easily tell the difference in the health of the crop.â
âThanks to mulching and no tillage, a beneficial soil structure is developed over time that enables more sustained water infiltration into the soilââ, explained Thierfelder. âAnother advantage of mulching is that it controls the presence of weeds because the mulch smothers weeds unlike in conventional systems where the soil is bare.â
Research shows that conservation agriculture practices like mulching, combined with direct seeding and improved weed control practices, can reduce an average of 25-45 labor days per hectare for women and children in manual farming systems in eastern Zambia and Malawi. This time could be used more productively at the market, at home or in other income-generating activities.
After 12 years of practicing conservation agriculture, Twaya confirms that she does not spend too much time in the field because she just uproots the weeds with no need for using a hoe. This makes the weeding task less laborious and allows her to spend her time on other chores such as fetching water, washing laundry or cleaning her homestead. âI have time to also go to the village banking and loan savings club to meet with othersâ.
Adopting optimum plant density, instead of throwing in three seeds in each planting hole was another transformational change. The âSasakawa spacingâ â where maize seeds are planted 25 centimeters apart in rows spaced every 75 centimeters â saves seed and boosts yields, as each plant receives adequate fertilizer, light and water without competing with the other seeds. This practice was introduced in Malawi in the year 2000 by Sasakawa Global.
Twaya pays more attention to the benefits of planting nitrogen-fixing crops alongside her maize, as she learned that âthrough crop rotation, legumes like pigeon pea improve the nutrition of my soil.â In the past she threw pigeon pea seeds loosely over her maize field and let it grow without any order, but now she practices a âdouble-up legume system,â where groundnut and pigeon pea are cropped at the same time. Pigeon peas develop slowly, so they can grow for three months without competition after groundnut is harvested. This system was introduced by the Africa RISING project, funded by USAID.
A mother farmer shows the way
Switching to climate-smart agriculture requires a long-term commitment and knowledge. Some farmers may resist to the changes because they initially find it new and tedious but, like Twaya observed, âit may be because they have not given themselves enough time to see the long-term benefits of some of these practices.â
With all these innovations â introduced in her farm over the years with the support of CIMMYT and the Ministry of Agriculture, Irrigation and Water Development of Malawi â Twaya reaped important economic and social benefits.
When Twaya rotates maize and pigeon pea, the maize stalks are healthy and the cobs are big, giving her higher yields. Passing-by neighbors will often exclaim ââIs this your maize?ââ because they can tell it looks much more vigorous and healthier than what they see in other fields.
For the last season, Twaya harvested 15 bags of 50kg of maize from her demo plot, the equivalent of five tons per hectare. In addition to her pigeon pea and groundnut crops, she was able to feed her family well and earned enough to renovate her family home this year.
This new way of managing her fields has gained Twaya more respect and has improved her status in the community.
This year opens the Decade of Family Farming (#FamilyFarmingDecade), which aims to improve the life of family farmers around the world. In an earnest discussion, two leaders in the global agriculture community reflect on the challenges facing family farmers, the promises of high- and low-tech solutions, and their hopes for the future.
A conversation between Martin Kropff, Director General of the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre (CIMMYT) and Trevor Nicholls, CEO of CABI.
Trevor Nicholls (CABI): Family farmers come in many shapes and sizes but for me, the words âfamily farmerâ bring a focus on smallholders and people who are starting on a journey of making a farming business. It depends on which part of the world youâre talking about; a family farm in the UK is perhaps very different to a small family farm in Ethiopia. And family farms can grow from just a small plot to being quite large commercial enterprises.
Martin Kropff (CIMMYT): All agriculture started with family farms. Fifty years ago in my home country, the Netherlands, farms were almost all family farms. When we look globally, farms in places like India, Pakistan, and Kenya are very often small, and the whole family is involved.
KROPFF: When the whole family is involved, gender dynamics come out. In a way, family farming is very often the farming done by women. This makes women the most important players in agriculture in many developing countries. Itâs crucial to recognize this and understand their decision-making. For example, our research shows that men and women value different traits in crop varieties. We need to understand this to have successful interventions.
NICHOLLS: Weâve seen something similar through our Plantwise plant clinics, where farmers come for practical plant health advice. We see a definite pattern of men bringing in cash crops for advice, and women looking more at fruits and vegetables to feed their family. But overall, mostly men come into our clinics, particularly in certain parts of the world. Weâre trying to encourage more female participation by timing the clinics so that they fit into womenâs routines without getting in the way of taking care of elderly relatives or getting kids off to school. Sometimes really simple things can open up access and improve the gender balance.
KROPFF: When the whole family is involved, there are also downsides. In Africa, young people do much of the weeding.
NICHOLLS: Thatâs right, they may be pulled out of school for weeding.
KROPFF: This really worries me. Hand weeding is such hard labor, such an intensive use of energy; it seems like it should be something of the past. Children donât want to do it anymore. My wife is from the generation where children still did weeding in the Netherlands. She remembers standing in the fields weeding when the sun was extremely warm while her friends were out doing other things.
NICHOLLS: It starts kids off on the wrong path, doesnât it? If their experience of farming is backbreaking weeding from the age of 8 onwards, itâs highly unlikely to attract them into farming as a career.
NICHOLLS: We need to look at things like weed control as a social issue. Itâs possible, for example, to use beneficial insects to limit the spread of certain weeds that infest farmland. Biocontrol and Integrated Pest Management should be seen as ways of reducing the spread of certain weeds, and also as ways to reduce the burden on women and youth.
KROPFF: I agree. Similarly, weâre finding that small-scale mechanization is making a difference for youth, and also womenâs labor in Latin America, Africa and Asia, where CIMMYT has been introducing two-wheel tractors that can be engineered in local workshops. Suddenly, smallholders can harvest the entire wheat crop of 20 families in one day. This saves so much time, money, and effort, eliminating some of the âbadâ labor that may discourage youth and unfairly burden women. Farmers can focus on the âniceâ aspects of the business. Itâs a real game changer for family farming.
NICHOLLS: Yes and this can also be amplified through digital technology. People refer to the âUber-izationâ of tractors, where farmers are able to hire a piece of mechanical equipment for a very short space of time, and maybe it even comes with an experienced driver or operator. Weâre finding that digital tools like artificial intelligence, satellite imaging, smartphones, and other modern technologies, will intrigue youth anywhere in the world. These will hopefully have an impact on bringing more youth back into farming, as they start to see it as technologically enabled rather than straightforward muscle power.
On the transformations that need to happenKROPFF: If we want to keep youth engaged, and improve farmersâ livelihoods, I think farming needs to become more entrepreneurial. Many family farms are only half a hectare. I think this has to grow somehow, though land rights and ownership are a challenge
NICHOLLS: As farming becomes more business-like in Africa then weâre going to see the same sort of consolidation that we saw in the United States and Europe, whereby farm sizes do get larger even if land ownership remains fragmented.
This could happen through cooperatives, which offer economies of scale and also help farmers spread the costs of things like access to inputs, advice, weather insurance and crop insurance. But we need to view cooperatives as more than a way to infuse new technologies into the farming system. They are in fact a channel for helping farmers gain stronger business skills, so they can get a better bargain for themselves.
KROPFF: In Mexico we are working with 300,000 smallholder farmers in a sustainable maize and wheat sourcing initiative. Rather than âpushingâ new varieties and technologies at farmers, we help them partner with maize and wheat companies to create a local demand for high quality, sustainable products. Real scaling up, especially for wheat and maize, needs more than extension. Farmers need better links to the market.
NICHOLLS: If farms get larger and more mechanized, it means fewer people are involved in the business of farming. This shift means that people will need other rural occupations, so that they donât just leave the land and move to the city. We need investments in other productive activities in rural areas. This could be around post-harvest processing of crops: adding value locally rather than shipping the raw materials elsewhere.
KROPFF: Exactly. Weâve been doing more work on this in the last ten years. CIMMYT works on wheat and maize, and these are products that need to be processed. Doing this locally would also help people save food in the future for more difficult times, instead of selling to someone from the city who may buy it for an unfair price. Farmers these days have access via smartphones to market information, which is empowering. We see it happening in Africa. Itâs really crucial.
NICHOLLS: Weâre certainly seeing the power of digital technologies, which are also helping us move beyond just responding to crop pests and diseases to being able to get better at predicting outbreaks on a micro-scale. By linking ground observations through our Plantwise clinics with satellite observation technology and data, weâve developed a program called PRISE (Pest Risk Information SErvice), which provides farmers with alerts before a pest is likely to reach its peak point, so that they can be prepared and take preventative measures.
KROPFF: Without a doubt, smallholder farmer communities are rapidly entering the digital age, and tools on weather prediction, selection of varieties, market information are very important and transforming the way people farm.
KROPFF: Climate change is going to be the issue affecting family farmers, especially in Asia and Africa where the population will grow by 2 billion people who need food that has been produced on their own continents. Yields have to rise and climate change brings yields down. We have to help smallholder family farmers keep doing their job and ensure crop yields, which is why climate change is embedded into 70% of our work at CIMMYT. One major area is developing and testing heat- and drought-tolerant varieties that suit local climates. Last year I was in Zimbabwe, which was experiencing El Niño, and I was very impressed by the difference in maize yields from drought and heat-tolerant varieties compared to the normal varieties.
NICHOLLS: Thatâs very good. In addition to drought and heat, we see pests and diseases appearing in new places as a result of climate change. Pests and diseases will cause crop losses of up to 40% on average. Stemming those losses is critical. Weâre seeing invasive species, such as fall armyworm, and many invasive weeds and trees that are effectively stealing arable and pastoral land from farmers, as well as water resources.
Pest-resistant crops have great long-term potential, but farmers also need short-term solutions while they wait for new varieties to become available. One of CABIâs strengths is scanning for solutions from other parts of the world. With fall armyworm, we are looking to South America, where the pest originates, for solutions and natural enemies. Weâre also scanning our fungal culture collection for samples that may have properties that can form the basis for biopesticides, and therefore open up a program of biological control.
NICHOLLS: Iâm very optimistic for family farmers. They are incredibly resilient and resourceful people, and they survive and thrive in pretty difficult circumstances. But the world is getting more challenging for them by the day. I think the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have framed many of the issues very well, in terms of food security and livelihoods, sustainable consumption and production, and this will help to focus attention on family farmers.
I do see some quite encouraging signs, particularly in Africa, where the CAADP (Comprehensive Africa Agricultural Development Programme) has brought much greater coordination among countries. Weâre seeing more unity in the requests we receive from our member countries to help them address the issues that are in the SDGs. That makes the work of our organizations easier, because weâre addressing a broader set of demands. And in turn, that will benefit family farmers.
Technology, be it biotechnology or telecommunications and ICTs, is becoming so much more affordable over time. The rate that smartphone usage is spreading in Africa and Asia is incredible. In many areas we actually have most of the technology we need today. Itâs about getting it put into practice effectively with large numbers of farmers. So I remain very optimistic about the future.
KROPFF: Iâm an optimist by nature. Thatâs also why Iâm in this job: itâs not easy, but I really believe that change is possible if we have our act together and collaborate with CABI and other international research partners, national systems and the private sector. For a long time, people said that there was no Green Revolution in Africa, where yields remained one ton per hectare. But today we see yields increasing in countries like Nigeria, and in Ethiopia, where maize yields are 3.5 tons per hectare. Good things are happening because of family farming.
I believe that to increase yields you need three components: better seeds for more resilient crop varieties; sustainable intensification to grow more nutritious food per unit of water, land and soil; and good governance, to properly manage resources. We need to invest in all of these areas.
NICHOLLS: I fully agree. We need to work on all these areas, and harness the power of modern technology to help family farmers thrive now, and in the future.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Learn more about key actions needed to support family farmers: CIMMYT and family farming
Join the conversation at #FamilyFarmingDecade.
The development community is introducing increasingly complex and systemic technological designs for sustainable improvements to agriculture. Yet, a systemic perspective is hard to find in “adoption-outcome” focused analyses of technological change processes. In order to improve development interventions, it is necessary not only to analyze both successes and failures, but also the process and impacts of technological change.
Researchers at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) and the Institute of Development Studies (IDS) recently published a paper on rethinking technological change in smallholder agriculture, arguing against the conventional approach to studying technology adoption.
The problem with the concept of technology adoption
While the adoption rate of newly introduced technologies is still used in the evaluation of agricultural research and development, the theory of technology adoption is an insufficient framework for understanding technological change. It is too linear, too binary, too focused on individual decisions and gives an inaccurate and misleading picture to researchers.
The theory of adoption treats technology like a âblack boxâ that is transferred smoothly from one setting to another, following a linear progression of old and inferior tools and methods to new improved ones. This theory is too simplistic to align with the complex realities of the capabilities and agency of multiple actors. In addition, in cases of participatory technology development, where intended users are involved in the creation of innovations, adoption rates are often limited due to the relatively small scale of the project.
Using adoption rate as the only indicator of success or failure can lead researchers to ignore wider impacts of the introduction of a new technology. Adoption rates could go up, but use of a new technology could cause harm to social relations, the local environment, or its resilience. Low adoption rates could classify a program as a failure, while farmers benefited substantially in undetected ways, for example forming networks or acquiring new skills and knowledge. A singular focus on adoption rates thus limits our understanding of what happens in processes of technological change.
An alternative conceptual framework
In addition to the introduction of a new technology to small-scale farming systems, technological change involves the agency of many social actors. The agency of farmers, scientists, project managers and extension officers is key to understand whether a new technology is perceived to be useful, accessible or realistic, as well as how it is adjusted and changing social relations.
A new framework is needed to capture this reconfiguration of social and technological components that result from the introduction of a new technology to a community.
The authors of this paper propose an alternative conceptual framework with an agent-, practice- and process-oriented approach to better understand technological change. The framework is composed of four key components: propositions, encounters, dispositions and responses.
Propositions are composed of artefacts, methods, techniques and practices and a proposed mode of engagement in agricultural production. Encounters can be deliberately organized, for example a field day, or spontaneous, when a farmer sees a neighbor using a new tool. Intended users of technology may be disposed to respond in a variety of different ways, and dispositions may change over time. Finally, responses are a process or pathway that is likely to involve adjustment or recalibration to make the new technology work for the farmer.
Further work to operationalize this framework is needed. The authors suggest a next step of developing indicators to measure learning, experimentation and behavioral change as part of analyzing technological change processes.
Family farmers produce more than 80% of the worldâs food, but often have the least amount of access to support.
As the UN Decade of Family Farming launched on May 29, 2019, I talked with Trevor Nicholls, CEO of the Centre for Agriculture and Bioscience International (CABI), on this topic.
On an article published on the Economist Intelligence Unit’s Food Sustainability Index blog, we propose six key actions that can help family farmers thrive in the coming decade:
International scientists are working with regional and national partners in sub-Saharan Africa to catalyze local wheat farming and help meet the rapidly rising regional demand for this crop.
The specialists are focusing on smallholder farmers in Rwanda and Zambia, offering them technical and institutional support, better links to markets, and the sharing of successful practices across regions and borders, as part of the project âEnhancing smallholder wheat productivity through sustainable intensification of wheat-based farming systems in Rwanda and Zambia.â
âWork started in 2016 and has included varietal selection, seed multiplication, and sharing of high-yielding, locally adapted, disease-resistant wheat varieties,â said Moti Jaleta, a socioeconomist at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) who leads the project. âOur knowledge and successes in smallholder wheat production and marketing will also be applicable in Madagascar, Mozambique, and Tanzania.â
Maize is by far the number-one food crop in sub-Saharan Africa but wheat consumption is increasing fast, driven in part by rapid urbanization and life-style changes. The region annually imports more than 15 million tons of wheat grain, worth some US$ 3.6 billion at current prices. Only Ethiopia, Kenya, and South Africa grow significant amounts of wheat and they are still net importers of the grain.
âGrowing more wheat where it makes sense to do so can help safeguard food security for people who prefer wheat and reduce dependence on risky wheat grain markets,â Jaleta explained. âWeâre working in areas where thereâs biophysical potential for the crop in rain-fed farming, to increase domestic wheat production and productivity through use of improved varieties and cropping practices.â
In addition to the above, participants are supporting the regionâs wheat production in diverse ways:
Innocent Habarurema, wheat breeder in the Rwanda Agriculture and Animal Resources Development Board (RAB), cited recent successes in the release of improved, disease resistant wheat varieties, as well as engaging smallholder farmers in seed multiplication and marketing to improve their access to quality seed of those varieties.
âThe main challenge in wheat production is the short window of time between wheat seasons, which doesnât allow complete drying of harvested plants for proper threshing,â Habarurema explained. âSuitable machinery to dry and thresh the wheat would remove the drudgery of hand threshing and improve the quality of the grain, so that it fetches better prices in markets.â
Critical wheat diseases in Zambia include spot blotch, a leaf disease caused by the fungus Cochliobolus sativus, and head blight caused by Fusarium spp., which can leave carcinogenic toxins in the grain, according to Batiseba Tembo, wheat breeder at the Zambian Agricultural Research Institute (ZARI).
âDeveloping and disseminating varieties resistant to these diseases is a priority in the wheat breeding program at Mt. Makulu Agricultural Research Center,â said Tembo. âWeâre also promoting appropriate mechanization for smallholder farmers, to improve wheat production and reduce the enormous drudgery of preparing the soil with hand hoes.â
Participants in the project, which runs to 2020, met at Musanze, in Rwandaâs Northern Province, during February 5-7 to review progress and plan remaining activities, which include more widespread sharing of seed, improved practices, and other useful outcomes.
âThere was interest in trying smallholder winter wheat production under irrigation in Zambia to reduce the disease effects normally experienced in rainfed cropping,â said Jaleta, adding that the costs and benefits of irrigation, which is rarely used in the region, need to be assessed.
Project participants may also include in selection trials wheat varieties that have been bred to contain enhanced grain levels of zinc, a key micronutrient missing in the diets of many rural Africa households.
âThe project will also push for the fast-track release and seed multiplication of the best varieties, to get them into farmersâ hands as quickly as possible,â Jaleta said.
In addition to CIMMYT, RAB, and ZARI, implementing partners include the Center for Coordination of Agricultural Research and Development for Southern Africa (CCARDESA). Generous funding for the work comes from the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and the CGIAR Research Program on Wheat.