In the midst of a drought-induced food crisis affecting millions in the Horn of Africa, an innovative insurance program for poor livestock keepers is making its first payouts, providing compensation for some 650 insured herders in northern Kenya’s vast Marsabit District who have lost up to a third of their animals.

Known as index-based livestock insurance (IBLI), payouts are triggered when satellite images show that grazing lands in the region have deteriorated to the point that herders are expected to be losing more than 15% of their herd. The current readings for which indemnities are now being paid show that between 18 and 33% of livestock have been lost to drought this season.

The Marsabit District alone is home to some 86 thousand cattle and 2 million goats and sheep, which generate millions of dollars in milk and other products and serve as the herders’ main source of sustenance and income.

The International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) estimates that up to one-third of all livestock in the region has perished during the current drought.

The insurance project was developed by ILRI working in partnership with Cornell University and the Index Insurance Innovation Initiative program at the University of California at Davis.

“Drought insurance is one important way to help livestock keepers maintain food security even in very harsh environments,” said Andrew Mude, the IBLI project leader at ILRI. “Insurance is not by itself sufficient, but if it is accompanied by other risk-reducing strategies, such as better access to grazing lands and watering areas, then the pastoralist approach, which some people dismiss as a lifestyle of the past, emerges as a very effective way to meet future food needs.”

“This is all still a work in progress,” said Jimmy Smith, Director General of ILRI. “But the fact that our relatively inexpensive approach to estimating livestock deaths seems to be accurate, could open the door to making livestock insurance widely available in many parts of Africa.”

Read the full report on ILRI’s website.

Plant breeders are always looking for new genotypes with valuable traits, such as drought, salinity and disease resistance. But they often have a problem locating suitable material. The world’s genebanks contain about 7.2 million accessions, or seed samples. So if a breeder wants genotypes with a particular trait, where does he start? It is like looking for a needle in a haystack.

This is where the Focused Identification of Germplasm Strategy (FIGS) has a role to play. This new approach, which was developed by the International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas ICARDA in collaboration with an Australian–Russian team, gives researchers the ability to more easily locate specific traits in large germplasm collections.

Finding those elusive traits

Plants survive in harsh, hostile environments by developing adaptive traits that allow them to overcome environmental stresses. So to find genotypes with a specific trait, researchers need to first find environments where that particular trait is needed. This is the rationale behind FIGS.

FIGS creates ‘best-bet’ trait-specific subsets of material by passing accession-level information through a series of filters that increase the chances of finding the adaptive trait of interest.

Sunn pest resistance

The ICARDA genebank holds more than 133,000 accessions, including around 33,500 accessions of wheat and related species. FIGS was set to work in the genebank to find sources of resistance to Sunn pest (Eurygaster integriceps), the major pest of wheat in West and Central Asia and eastern Europe. FIGS identified 534 likely accessions. Initial field screening then reduced these to 57, and advanced screening resulted in nine entries with resistance to Sunn pest at the vegetative stage. They are now being used in ICARDA’s wheat breeding programs to develop wheat varieties resistant to Sunn pest feeding at the vegetative stage.

Recent FIGS successes

Powdery mildew resistance: A FIGS best-bet set of 1320 wheat accessions was supplied to Zurich University for powdery mildew screening. They found 211 accessions that were resistant to at least one of the four mildew isolates used in the screening. Later studies identified 15 new sequences and at least two new functional genes.

Resistance to Russian wheat aphid: In screening sets of 500 accessions for resistance to the Syrian Russian wheat aphid biotype (the most virulent version known), FIGS led to the identification of 12 resistant accessions. Subsequent analysis showed that a new source of resistance had been discovered.

Salinity tolerance: The FIGS approach was also used with a core set of bread wheats to identify a best-bet subset of 320 accessions for salinity tolerance. These accessions were exposed to salty water for 10 days, after which the sodium content of the leaves was measured. Researchers found that 21% had a desirable level of sodium. Yet only 3% of the accessions in the core set had such low levels – which shows just how effective FIGS can be in finding material that can overcome abiotic constraints.

Read the full story here

Photo credit: ICARDA

 

 

 

 

A simple sheet of plastic is proving to be an effective alternative to expensive, harmful insecticides for controlling a major potato pest.

Researchers at the International Potato Center (CIP) working in the high Andes have discovered that plastic barriers not only help farmers but also protect biodiversity and the environment.

Andean potato weevils (Premnotrypes suturicallus) are a major problem for farmers at altitudes of between 2,800 and 4,200 meters, where potato is an important staple and cash crop. The weevils, which are common at these altitudes, crawl into potato fields at the beginning of the season and breed. After hatching, the larvae move into the soil and feed underground on tubers. To date no crop resistance to the weevil has been detected. Farmers attempt to control weevils mainly by using 2-4 applications of insecticides, which are expensive, highly toxic, and often ineffective due to dosages are wrong or mistimed.

Despite pesticide usage, between 15 to 40% of tubers still get infested. When no control measures are taken, the weevil can destroy more than half of the crop.

But the Andean potato weevil has an Achilles heel: it is flightless.

“Erecting a simple plastic barrier just 30-50 centimeters high and 10 centimeters into the ground is very effective in stopping weevil migration to potato fields and consequently tuber damage,” explained CIP entomologist Jürgen Kroschel. “What’s more, it’s an idea that has been tested collaboratively with local farmers to assess its impact, ease of use and acceptability.”

Under CIP’s integrated pest management program, more than 60 individual field experiments were carried out over 4 years with farmers in the high Andean villages of Ñuñunhuayo and Aymara. The experiments set out to determine the efficiency of plastic barriers, farmer receptivity and the potential economic benefits to farmers.

The results have been positive. Barriers were found to be up to 70 percent more effective than insecticide applications in reducing Andean potato weevil damage. They were tested against other Andean weevil species in locations throughout Peru, Bolivia, and Ecuador and, in all cases, were found to be at least as equally as effective as insecticides.

Read more here.

Photo credit: KV Raman, CIP

 

All of his neighbors have dusty, unproductive land, but Victor Beltran has a field of maize over five feet high and another of sorghum swaying in the breeze. In the distance, a farm worker is preparing an area for beans.

In the 60 years he has been here, Beltran has never seen his farm like this – for very good reasons. Each year in Nicaragua, a punishing dry season makes the rivers run dry and crops fail. But during the country’s equally intense rainy season, when there is plenty of water, the skies are so dark there is barely enough sunlight to grow food.

The country’s many subsistence farmers have no option than to plant when there is water, and accept the poor yields that result. No one plants during the dry season – except Beltran.

A year ago Beltran volunteered to be part of a pilot project that takes the concept of water harvesting to a new level. Rather than simply collecting rainwater in buckets or tanks, the project makes use of the region’s hilly topography in the construction of whole reservoirs to collect and store rainwater.

Two steep-sided, interlocking hills that mark the boundary of Beltran’s land provide a perfect natural catchment area for excess rain during the wet season. A bulldozer, used to build a sturdy dam, compacted the earth on the reservoir floor to provide a natural seal.

Then all Beltran had to do was wait for the rain.

Now, when he opens the tap at the base of the dam, fresh water gushes out into a narrow gulley, and is transported to drip irrigation pipes in his fields. This is the first time he has ever used irrigation and he’s expecting a bumper harvest.

The combination of ample sunlight and abundant water has created the ideal conditions for food production. With a guaranteed source of water, Beltran is willing to take a gamble, and invest in much-needed fertilizer too. He is also stocking the reservoir with fish, as an additional source of protein and income.

The reservoir at Beltran’s farm is one of a number of pilot projects currently underway in Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Mexico supported by the Latin American Fund for Irrigated Rice (FLAR) and the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT), and financed by the Common Fund for Commodities (CFC). The projects follow in the footsteps of schemes in Brazil and Uruguay in the 1980s, which used similar water harvesting techniques to transform those countries into significant rice exporters.

The CIAT-FLAR project is finding ways of spreading the technology to smallholder farmers elsewhere – and not just for growing rice, but almost any other crop. One of Beltran’s neighbors now would like to grow watermelons.

The above AlertNet story was written by Neil Palmer, a communications officer at CIAT in Colombia

Modern agriculture generally focuses on the cultivation of three major staple crops (rice, maize and wheat), which provide about half the global human requirement for protein and calories.  However, around 7,000 other wild plant species around the world are cultivated or harvested for food. Yet the contribution to nutrition security of these species (often referred to as ‘neglected and underutilized species’ or ‘orphan crops’) is largely unappreciated.

These neglected and underutilized species (NUS) play a crucial role in the food security, income generation and food culture of the rural poor. They are also often more resilient than staple crops, because they are better adapted to grow in marginal areas, with little need for irrigation, pesticides and fertilizers. Yet the lack of attention by mainstream research and development programs means their potential value is under-estimated and under-exploited, with many under threat of disappearance. However, as Bioversity International discovered, rural women have an important role to play in the conservation of agricultural biodiversity for food security.

In 2001, Bioversity began implementing a project funded by the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD): “Enhancing the contribution of neglected and underutilized species to food security and to incomes of the rural poor.” The recently concluded project promoted the sustainable conservation and use of NUS in India and Bolivia and helped reduce processing times for quinoa and minor millets with the help of modern mechanical processing equipment, thereby encouraging women to reintroduce these nutritious crops into their families’ diets.

“Women have too often been marginalized by research and development,” said Stefano Padulosi, a Bioversity senior scientist. “So in this project we have tried to correct that.”

Following on from this research, Bioversity recently launched a 3 year project to enhance the on-farm conservation of NUS.

Indonesia is one of the biggest consumers of rice in Asia, making the availability of affordable rice of prime importance to the well being of the nation’s 235 million people. In a bid to avoid a recurrence of the rice crisis that took place in the country in 2008, the Indonesian government initiated a national program to increase annual rice production by 5%.

In March 2008, the Irrigated Rice Research Consortium (IRRC) led a project to raise rice productivity in South and Southeast Sulawesi. However, as Donna Casimero, an International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) scientist based in South Sulawesi, discovered, farmers in the area were using technology with limited information on how to use it correctly. For example, rice farmers in Southeast Sulawesi were not aware that one type of herbicide does not work for all species of weeds.

“They were spraying their fields with herbicide for broad-leaf weeds when the fields were actually infested with grassy weeds,” she said.

As a result, the farmers lost 20–30% of their yield to weeds, while continuing to use the wrong herbicide.

Introducing GAPs


Dr. Casimero introduced the farmers to GAPs (good agricultural practices), which promote the importance of integrated crop management and worker welfare. GAPs also address environmental, economic, and social sustainability for on-farm practices. She taught farmers how best to manage water, weeds, nutrients, and pests in four selected villages in the area.

Before the intervention, farmers were also more likely to apply too much fertilizer at the early stage of their crops – yet another expensive and wasteful practice resulting from insufficient knowledge. Through site-specific nutrient management (SSNM) in adaptive trials in farmers’ fields, Dr. Casimero was able to show proof that a more diligent application of fertilizer could result in higher yields.


Farmers were also introduced to alternate wetting and drying technology, a practice that reduces water use and pumping costs by allowing plots to dry for several days. Adopting farmers enjoyed yield increases of 0.2–0.6 ton per hectare. They were also able to reduce the number of irrigation periods by 10–30%.  Having seen the benefits of these practices, farmers are now testing two or more of these technologies together in their fields. “We are happy,” claims one farmer. “We got 3 tons per hectare in 2008 and 5 tons in 2010.”

Driven by the enthusiasm of the farmers and Indonesian partners, IRRI will continue to provide technical assistance to spread best practices to more districts. The adoption of GAPs will also enable farmers to develop opportunities for higher quality rice and help fill the gap between small-scale rice farmers and wealthier farmers.

Photo credit: Donna Casimero, IRRI. “Simple water tubes help farmers check the water level in a rice field as part of a  water-saving practice: alternate wetting and drying.”

 

Recent events in the Horn of Africa are a terrible reminder of the vulnerability of millions of poor around the world to weather and other shocks that interrupt their access to food. This humanitarian tragedy highlights the need for information and the need for action.

Addressing the problem of hunger requires information about where and why hunger is occurring. Whilst information will not fill people’s stomachs, policymakers and national and international agencies need it in order to take steps to ensure that people have access to sufficient and nutritious food. The broader task is then to take action to address the root causes of hunger and to reduce poor people’s vulnerability to shocks such as drought and food price spikes in the short, medium, and long term.

The Global Hunger Index (GHI) calculated each year by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) is designed to comprehensively measure and track hunger globally and by country and region. The GHI highlights successes and failures in hunger reduction and provides insights into the drivers of hunger. By raising awareness and understanding of regional and country differences in hunger, the GHI aims to trigger actions to reduce hunger.

This year’s GHI report, report, The Challenge of Hunger: Taming Price Spikes and Excessive Food Price Volatility shows that global hunger has declined since 1990, but not dramatically, and remains at a level characterized as “serious.” Across regions and countries, GHI scores vary greatly. The highest GHI scores occur in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. South Asia reduced its GHI score substantially between 1990 and 1996, but this fast progress could not be maintained. Though Sub-Saharan Africa made less progress than South Asia after 1990, it has caught up since the turn of the millennium.

“We already know a great deal about how to reduce vulnerability and effectively tackle poverty and hunger,” said Klaus von Grebmer, lead author of the report and IFPRI Communications Director. “Now is the time to apply this knowledge so that everyone, everywhere, has access to sufficient, safe, and nutritious food at all times so that they can live healthy and productive lives.”

Find out more by downloading a copy of the 2011 GHI.  Or use the widget below: click on a country for more data (created by HarvestChoice)

Photo credit: Thomas Lohnes, Welthungerhilfe

Southeast Asian rice farmers are harvesting an extra US$1.46 billion worth of rice a year as a result of rice breeding (the science that brings new rice varieties to farmers) by the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI), according to an Australian assessment report.

The Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) assessed the impact of IRRI’s research on rice varietal yield improvement between 1985 and 2009 and found a boost in rice yield of up to 13%.

“This means farmers are now harvesting more rice per hectare, which not only lifts them out of poverty, but it is contributing towards the world-wide challenge of feeding the estimated global population of 9 billion people in 2050,” said Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs Kevin Rudd.

“Ensuring an ample and affordable supply of Asia’s staple crop is critical to reducing poverty and increasing regional stability,” he added.

The assessment also showed that IRRI’s improved rice varieties increased farmers’ returns by US$127 a hectare in southern Vietnam, $76 a hectare in Indonesia, and $52 a hectare in the Philippines.

Dr. Robert Zeigler, Director General of IRRI, placed the magnitude of this impact in context when he said, “The annual impact of IRRI’s research in these three countries alone exceeded IRRI’s total budget since it was founded in 1960.”

IRRI, a global leader in rice science, has helped to avert famine, lift people out of poverty, and save millions of hectares of natural ecosystems from being turned into farmland.

“For national governments, philanthropists, and even just your average person on the street who wants to make a difference in people’s lives, then it’s worth considering donating to rice research,” said Dr. Zeigler.

Dr. Deborah Templeton, ACIAR’s Impact Assessment Research Program Manager, said that, apart from improved varieties, other IRRI activities not included in the study are likely to produce further significant benefits, such as improvements in eating quality and resistance to pests and diseases.

In 2010, the Australian Government contributed AUS$15.4 million towards the construction of a new state-of-the-art Plant Growth Centre and upgrades to IRRI’s experimental farm in the Philippines. These new facilities are enhancing IRRI’s capacity to increase rice yields against a backdrop of agricultural production pressures and a growing global population.

“IRRI’s high levels of return on investment, as found by the ACIAR study, shows how Australians can really make a difference by effectively targeting our aid dollars,” said Mr. Rudd.