The Newsletter of the Tropical Agriculture Platform (TAP) provides regular updates on activities by TAP and its partners, on the projects and on upcoming events. This issue specifically refers to the period from August 2023 to February 2024.
En la actualidad, las tecnologías digitales forman parte de nuestra vida cotidiana, y la constante búsqueda de factores innovadores se ha vuelto indispensable para adaptarse al futuro. La innovación involucra la creación de algo nuevo y diferente, ya sea resolver un problema preexistente de una manera original, enfrentar un desafío inexplorado utilizando una solución comprobada, o bien, aportar a una problemática completamente nueva con una respuesta novedosa (FAO, 2023a).
América Latina y el Caribe (ALC) se caracteriza por aplicar una estrategia de desarrollo que depende de manera notable de la explotación de sus recursos naturales. Debido a que la población de la región aumenta de forma sistemática, la presión sobre los recursos naturales ha tenido un incremento marcado.
The United Nations predicts that we need to increase food production globally by 70 percent to feed 9.6 billion people by 2050. But at the same time, given the climate crisis, we need to significantly reduce the use of energy, water, and land needed to produce food and lower its carbon footprint. In other words, we must figure out how to produce and distribute more food using fewer resources and emissions. We must learn to do farming better with less.
Limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius and transitioning the planet to an equitable climate and nature-positive future by 2050 will require systemic shifts in how food is produced and consumed.
With the current realities of the food systems, the fusion of innovation with purpose becomes not just a choice but a necessity.
Les politiques d'innovation sont en plein essor dans de nombreux pays du Sud. L'innovation est considérée comme un moyen de concevoir des solutions viables et adaptées aux défis économiques, environnementaux et sociaux de chaque pays. De par la nature incertaine et risquée de l’innovation, une politique adaptée est nécessaire pour la promouvoir.
Le diagnostic orienté-action du système national d’innovation agricole au Burkina Faso a été conduit conjointement par la FAO et le Ministère en charge de l’agriculture dans le but d’éclairer l’action politique à court terme tout en proposant un cadre stratégique global et de long terme pour renforcer les capacités des acteurs du système national d'innovation agricole.
Water is scarce and pivotal for the Sahel, not only for increasing the productivity for millions of small-scale farmers but also for countering loss of arable land resulting from erosion and warming temperatures. A major barrier to the use of water in the Sahel is the lack of infrastructure and technologies – 45 percent of the population do not have access to water, and only 2 percent of arable land is irrigated (OECD, 2022).
This collection of posters from the TAP-AIS project illustrates key achievements of the project towards strengthening national agricultural innovation systems (AIS) in Africa (Burkina Faso, Eritrea, Malawi, Rwanda, Senegal), Latin America (Colombia), Asia and the Pacific (Cambodia, Lao PDR, Pakistan). For each of these nine countries, and for their respective regions, the posters provide: i) thematic focus and context; ii) constraints in the AIS; iii) capacity development interventions; iv) outcomes; v) the way forward.
This research note explains the results of social experiment designed with three primary objectives. These include (1) to mitigate the digital divide concerning the accessibility of forecasted weather information and crop advisories for women farmers in Bangladesh and (2) to assess the potential impact of a digital climate advisory tool on the agricultural practices of climate-smart agriculture facilitated by digital advisory tools for stakeholders in the value chain, such as microfinance institutions offering crop loans in areas facing higher weather-related risks.