The study examines whether the goal of food security for the population of Sverdlovskaya oblast, one of the mostly industrial northern region in Russia, aiming agricultural productivity improvement and rural poverty reduction, could be achieved by the regional authorities within post-soviet type of agricultural policy. Results show that, the current trends of agricultural production and rural social development in Sverdlovskaya oblast are degrading.
This paper sets out to determine the impact of Integrated Agricultural Research for Development in three selected countries of Southern Africa. Agricultural productivity in Southern Africa faces several challenges, of which poor soil fertility strikes out as the priority problem inhibiting increased productivity in farmers’ fields. While several soil fertility management technologies are being promoted in the region, their uptake by smallholder farmers remains very low.
African agriculture is currently at a crossroads, at which persistent food shortages are compounded by threats from climate change. But, as this book argues, Africa can feed itself in a generation and help contribute to global food security. To achieve this Africa has to define agriculture as a force in economic growth by: advancing scientific and technological research; investing in infrastructure; fostering higher technical training; and creating regional markets.
This report provides a synthesis of all findings and information generated through a “stocktaking” process that involved a desk study of Prolinnova documents and evaluation reports, a questionnaire to 40 staff members of international organizations in agricultural research and development (ARD), self-assessment by the Country Platforms (CPs) and backstopping visits to five CPs. In 2014, the Prolinnova network saw a need to re-strategise in a changing context, and started this process by reviewing the activities it had undertaken and assessing its own functioning.
La conférence sur « Agriculture écologique : atténuer le changement climatique, assurer la sécurité alimentaire et l’autonomie pour les sources de revenus ruraux en Afrique » s’est tenue à Addis – Abéba (Ethiopie) du 26 au 28 novembre 2008.
This publication contains the compilation of different innovations generated on the plantain commodities from various Innovation Platforms. Its gives a succinct description of the commodity, its agronomy, production techniques, production trends, the role of the commodity in food chain and other traditional uses. The uses of the commodities and data on nutritional content etc. it also explicate the production processing and marketing constraints that could be manipulated to ensure increase in productivity and income.
The main goal of the study is to quantify the effects of a) change in nitrogen fertilization rate, b) adjustment of sowing date, c) implementation of new cultivars, and d) supplementary irrigation on maize cropping systems across six African countries including Ghana, Nigeria, Kenya, Malawi, Ethiopia and Burkina Faso. For this purpose, 30 years (1980-2010) of climate data are used as well as soil and management information obtained from global datasets at 0.5° x 0.5° spatial resolution.
Many indigenous vegetables are generally underutilized across different cultures, but they remain alternatives to exotic vegetables that often are expensive. This study investigated effects of participation in indigenous vegetable production on livelihood of farmers. Multistaged sampling was used to collect data from 222 vegetable farmers sampled from using a semi-structured questionnaire. Principal component analysis and endogenous switching regression (ESR) were employed for analysis
The findings of a Nigerian case study discussed in this paper indicate that the notion of wives of leisure is really not applicable to most women in Nigeria, as women have always worked. Even those in purdah engage in income generating activities within the confines of the compound. It is therefore wasteful to continue to by-pass or displace women in development. Selective mechanisation of difficult processes in agriculture could become a useful method of integrating women into, and enhancing their contributions to, development.
This study assessed the capacity for designing and implementing agricultural and rural development policies, strategies, and programs in Nigeria. Data for this study were derived from initial consultations at the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Water Resources (FMAWR), Federal Ministry of Women affairs and Social Development (FMWASD), and the Federal Ministry of Environment (FMEnv) early in 2008. Two consultation workshops were also held, one for relevant staff in the ministries, parastatals, and NGOs; and the other for relevant university professors and researchers.