American food writer and activist Michael Pollan (photo on Flickr by PopTech).

The meat market, says Bill Gates, is ripe for reinvention. The market is growing fast to meet rising demands for animal-source foods throughout much of the developing world, particularly China and India and other countries with fast-growing economies.

Food scientists are creating healthful plant-based alternatives that taste just like eggs, chicken, and other sources of protein.

Most of Gates’ fancy slide presentation cum video gallery addresses concerns about overconsumption of meat by the relatively rich, not under-nourished communities of the poor. Thus, while mock meat is not to be mocked, it is still more expensive, and less tasty, than real meat, and, until that changes, is unlikely to be a solution for many of the world’s poor who remain starved of protein. The same will probably also be true for some time to come for ‘lab-grown’ (or ‘in vitro’) meat. While biologists have long researched methods for growing muscle tissue in laboratory conditions, these products are still in experimental stages of development.

In a Q&A with Gates, food activist Michael Pollan offers an important caveat and raises a larger issue:

While mock meat is “a legitimate option for a conscious carnivore . . . it must be said that growing more soy is no boon to the landscape either. It won’t help us diversify our farms.”

Of course the traditional way of diversifying farms is to mix crop growing and livestock raising, with each enhancing the other in a fully integrated agricultural system. Such mixed farms remain the mainstay of small family farming throughout the developing world. Pollan’s point is well taken—monocropping soy, the basis of many mock meats, can be just as damaging to our environments as overstocking cattle. One answer is to diversify and integrate our food production methods.

Perhaps in this area, the world’s industrial farmers could profit from taking a leaf (bone?) from the world’s legions of small-scale farmers and consider putting farm animals back onto farms, where they provide, if not always meat, manure and a wealth of other inputs to whole, healthy farms.

Read the whole feature on The Gates Notes: The future of food, 2013.

Filed under: Consumption, Crop-Livestock, Environment, Farming Systems, Film and video, Interview, Opinion piece, PA, Presentation Tagged: Bill Gates, Lab-grown meat, Meat substitutes, Michael Pollan

Overcoming the threats to agriculture and food security in a changing climate requires a strong scientific evidence base to both help smallholder farmers choose resilient strategies and to guide development policy and investments.

Building on a Bioversity and CCAFS systematic review of the role of diversification in agricultural systems, the Platform for Agrobiodiversity Research is now hosting the ReFARM (the Resilience Framework for Agriculture and Risk Management) Database, to feature hundreds of reviewed case studies on these issues.

Case studies can be quickly screened according to a range of categories including region, scale, climate risks, diversification type and other management categories, along with other features of agricultural systems. Practitioners who would like to contribute their own work are invited to submit a case directly through the site.

So far the database has 37 case studies on diversification and livestock …

Follow the link to the web site ReFARM

Filed under: Agriculture, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Crop-Livestock, CRP7, Launch Tagged: Bioversity, ReFARM

The ultimate test: Do livestock eat this feed? Yes. (Photo on Flickr by Swathi Sridharan/ICRISAT).

In 2012, three CGIAR centres — the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), based in Africa; the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), based in Mexico; and the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), based in India — launched a joint project called ‘Integrating crops and livestock for improved food security and livelihoods in Zimbabwe, or ‘ZimCLIFS’ for short.

‘The goal of the project is to develop ways to increase agricultural production, improve household food security, alleviate poverty, and thereby reduce food-aid dependency in rural Zimbabwe through better integration of crop and livestock production and market participation. The inception workshop, held 17–19 October 2012, was attended by international project managers and local stakeholders, including research, extension, private-sector, and NGO personnel, and farmers, totaling 41 participants.’

This project has three big objectives:
(1) Increase the productivity of Zimbabwe’s many smallholder ‘mixed’ crop-and-livestock farmers in four districts and two very different regions, one with high potential for agriculture, the other with low potential.
(2) Increase access by these farmers to resources, technologies, information and markets by strengthening the value chains for cattle, goats, maize, sorghum and legumes in these two districts.
(3) Increase the knowledge and skills of Zimbabwe’s research, extension and agribusiness staff.

The ILRI coordinator for this multi-centre project on ‘Integrating crops and livestock for improved food security and livelihoods in rural Zimbabwe’ is Godfrey Manyawu (photo credit: ILRI).

Since its launch in late 2012, the project has established field trials on 102 farm sites and, in January of this year, conducted a data collection training workshop run by staff from ILRI and CIMMYT.

Also in January, project manager John Dixon, of the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) and a consultant visited ZimCLIFS the CIMMYT office in Harare and project sites to see how far the project had progressed.

They witnessed conservation agriculture trials in which maize is grown along with livestock-palatable and unpalatable legume species, with the palatable species used to feed livestock and the unpalatable species used to generate biomass for soil cover in the subsequent season, given that livestock graze communally in the area. . . . Dixon also visited a local abattoir and a goat market as part of appreciating the value chain in livestock production.’

The project runs until July 2015.

Read more about this project on the ILRI website, and on the CIMMYT Blog: ZimCLIFS integrate crop and livestock production research in Zimbabwe, 9 Apr 2013.

Filed under: Crop-Livestock, ILRI, PA, PLE, Project, Southern Africa Tagged: ACIAR, Cowpea, ICRISAT, Maize, Mucuna, Zimbabwe, ZimCLIFS

Ethel Makila writes in New Agriculturalist about an African fund that is leading to breakthroughs and opening new frontiers in the continent’s biosciences research (photo: ILRI/David White).

This month (Mar 2013), New Agriculturalist features an article on the Africa Biosciences Challenge Fund. This is a fund that is managed by a state-of-the-art biosciences initiative located in Nairobi, Kenya that is supporting African scientists in addressing key agricultural needs in the continent. This initiative is the Biosciences eastern and central Africa-International Livestock Research Institute Hub, better known as the BecA-ILRI Hub.

‘… [O]n average, only 0.3 per cent of GDP in African countries is dedicated to research and development, seven times less than the investment made in industrialized countries. . . . [S]ub-Saharan Africa (excluding South Africa) contributes only 0.6 per cent of the world’s researchers, a dismal representation from nearly 11 per cent of the global population.

‘Through this program, early career African scientists receive support for their research fellowships, pilot project grants and training developed in areas such as such as genomics, bioinformatics, diagnostics, molecular marker development and applications, DNA sequencing and genotyping, and technical and scientific writing.

Charles Masembe, a Ugandan, was able to explore new frontiers in microbial science in the world-class facility only 500 kilometres from his home.

‘Charles Masembe, from Makerere University in Uganda, is . . . one example of the enormous potential that is being exploited through this new approach . . .. Masembe has recently published breakthrough findings on the discovery of a potential zoonotic disease. As part of his research at the BecA-ILRI Hub, Masembe – working in collaboration with colleagues from the icipe, ILRI, BecA-ILRI Hub and the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences – demonstrated that domestic pigs are a potential reservoir for Ndumu virus. Previous studies have shown that the virus is transmitted by mosquitoes, but otherwise very little information is available on the virus. Masembe was able to explore new frontiers in microbial science in the world-class research facility only 500 kilometres from his home through support from [the fund].’

To date, the article goes on to say, ‘45 African scientists (14 female, 31 male) from 14 eastern and central African countries have benefited from this program.’

Read the whole article by Ethel Makila, Communication Officer at the BecA-ILRI Hub: Leading the Agricultural Revolution from Within Africa, New Agriculturalist, March 2013.

For more information, visit the Africa Biosciences Challenge Fund and the BecA-ILRI Hub websites.

Filed under: Agriculture, Article, BecA, Central Africa, Crop-Livestock, East Africa, Kenya, Research Tagged: ABCF, BecA, Ethel Makila, New Agriculturalist, New Agriculturalist (online magazine)

The Improving Productivity and Market Success (IPMS) of Ethiopian Farmers project is coming to an end.

IPMS aimed to transform agricultural productivity and rural development in Ethiopia through market-oriented agricultural development. Project staff worked with the Ethiopian Government to try new and innovative approaches and technologies. The team worked to achieve this objective through four main routes: participatory commodity development in a value chain setting; knowledge management for and by the actors; improved capacity to innovate, learn and link; and development of policies, strategies and approaches for scaling out successful interventions.

When the project was designed, ‘action-oriented research’ based on ‘value chain’ development interventions was relatively new to the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), which led the project, and the CGIAR system – hence, the project appeared to be a rather strange duckling in the research pond. Results of the project were shared during several events, including a major conference and value chain exhibition at the ILRI campus in 2011, which coincided with the end of activities in the project’s pilot learning districts in Ethiopia. A subsequent no-cost extension period for the project, which focused on scaling out and promoting the project’s successful interventions, gave us time to reflect on the project’s approaches, modus operandi and lessons learned. These may benefit other projects now starting up, such as the ‘Livestock and Irrigation Value chains for Ethiopian Smallholders’ (LIVES) and other R4D livestock value chain projects.

The lessons will be shared in ILRI’s next ‘livestock live talk’, to be held on 27 March 2013. Because this seminar will be held in the middle of a LIVES research planning workshop, it promises to attract over 70 participants and others beyond.

In this ‘livestock live talk’, the IPMS team invites everyone to reflect on:

• The IPMS commodity development approach in an agricultural research for development (AR4D) framework
• How IPMS implemented the AR4D approach in a research setting
• Achievements and lessons

The talk will be held at ILRI’s campus in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, from 1500–1600 hours.

Join the live presentation of this seminar online: http://www.ilri.org/livestream.

______________________________________________________________________________

‘Livestock live talks’ is a seminar series at ILRI that aims to address livestock-related issues, mobilize external as well as in-house expertise and audiences and engage the livestock community around interdisciplinary conversations that ask hard questions and seek to refine current research concepts and practices.

All ILRI staff, partners and donors, and interested outsiders are invited. Those non-staff who want to come, please contact Abeba Asmelash at a.asmelash[at]cgiar.org.

Filed under: Agriculture, Animal Production, Capacity Strengthening, Crop-Livestock, CRP12, CRP37, East Africa, Ethiopia, Event, Extension, Innovation Systems, Intensification, IPMS, Livestock, Markets, Research, Value Chains Tagged: Azage Tegegne, Berhanu Gebremedhin, Dirk Hoekstra, IPMS, LIVES, livestock live talks, livetalks

Alan Duncan Humidtropics program focal point at ILRI

The Humidtropics research program held a Strategic Research Theme (SRT) Meeting from 5 to 8 February, 2013 in Nairobi, Kenya.  The main objective of this meeting was to develop a research framework for each of the SRTs. After the meeting, the five SRT Leaders were interviewed. We asked Alan Duncan, ILRI focal point for the program and leader of the SRT on systems analysis and synthesis to share some insights about the workshop, its overall added value and how ILRI and Humidtropics are linkedr.

What did you expect to achieve with this workshop and how far have you managed to get?

We’ve talked a lot about the proposal development in an abstract sense. It’s time to get to implementation. That is much harder because we need to think carefully about what needs to be done where, by whom etc. My expectations for this workshop were to translate these considerations into practical ways. We have gone a long way. In strategic research theme 1, we have had a very good group, we have defined six major elements to that SRT. We did some good brainstorming about methods to use, contributions from different centres to that situational analysis and we have clearer ideas on the purpose of this situation analysis, which will guide other SRTs in the early phase of this program.

What have been the main decisions made or insights gathered throughout this workshop?

Despite the many conversations we haven’t yet reached the level of clarity needed.

There is a matrix structure with SRTs as vertical pillars and action areas as horizontal rows of the Humidtropics program. The practicalities of how those two mesh has not been fully worked out yet.

We’ve realized that there’s strong integration among all SRTs and early on in the program it’s likely that most activities contribute to this situational analysis (i.e. across SRTs). Until that is done we can’t go too far on developing research for development (R4D) platforms and research activities.

What are the crucial challenges that you think this program will be grappling with next?

We have realized that there are structural problems with how the program is structured: Each centre gets a budget related to a specific block in the program. It immediately creates silos and discourages integration of activities between centres. It is a serious issue – and one that is inherited in all CGIAR research programs but it is particularly problematic in the system ones (Drylands, Humidtropics and Aquatic agricultural systems) since these have to bring centres together but work against financial structures that can seem to prevent this integration.

What do you think is the added value of this program?

The added value of this program is its integrating function. In some ways the three system programs are really the flagships that try to break down the commodity thinking of CGIAR, without which sustainable intensification is not going to happen. We need to think about different system components (crop, livestock, trees) about the linkages between commodities and markets or policies. It’s exceedingly challenging but it is the way forward.

What is the role of ILRI in this program?

Our main role is in leading SRT 1. However, being a livestock-focused centre, we have strong incentives to contribute to livestock issues and discussions across the program.

One of the things ILRI brings is its ‘systems’ thinking and approach. ILRI always had to take a systems perspective because of the embedded role of livestock in agricultural systems. Crop systems can develop new varieties but livestock production is always closely related to crop production (nutrition for livestock, contribution to draft power, manure etc.). In this sense ILRI always had to work in a systems mode. This history is valuable to the Humidtropics program.

In terms of opportunities for ILRI, Humidtropics provides a great laboratory for our thinking, for the application of innovation theory; it offers us a lot of opportunities to test our household modeling approaches and a lot of scope to bring in a market perspective to this CRP. It is a lab for a lot of different areas we are working on.

This is a very challenging program but there’s huge potential in this program to get away from the old component-focused approach of CGIAR and to work in a much more integrated manner.

Filed under: Crop-Livestock, CRP12, Diagnostics, Humid Tropics, ILRI, Innovation Systems, Intensification, Interview, Livelihoods, PLE, Research Tagged: Alan Duncan

Participants in the field day (photo credit: ILRI/Zerihun Sewunet).

Last week a project to ‘enhance communities’ adaptive capacity to climate-change-induced water scarcity in drought-prone hotspots of the Blue Nile Basin, Ethiopia’ held a farmers’ field day at Kabe Watershed.

More than 90 farmers, researchers, extension experts, staff of non-governmental organizations and other stakeholders met to share lessons on what farmers have practiced and benefited from the project interventions. Kabe Watershed lies in the Amhara Region of the central highland plateau of Ethiopia, north of Addis Ababa, in a beautiful landscape reaching 3,996 metres at Mount Yewel.

The area is prone to drought because of erratic rainfall. The farmlands in the watershed and surrounding areas are less productive and do not provide what is expected from them, the rain is not as consistent as it used to be, and crops are not yielding enough to sustain the lives of the communities.

With funds from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), scientists from the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) in collaboration with Wollo University, Sirinka Agricultural Research Center, Woreilu Wereda Agricultural Office and the local administrations are working to bring a positive change on the life of the communities.

Farmers at Kabe Watershed are keen to adopt new technologies and find ways to fight poverty. Introduced climate change adaptation technologies have made significant impacts on the communities’ day to day lives.The project has introduced a number of climate change adaptation interventions, including:

Water:  Shallow wells, improved springs and water harvesting dams are major water related interventions. Shallow wells and water harvesting dams are used as sources of water when the rainy season is over. Through the installation of a rope and washer pumps on the top of shallow wells, and covering the dams with plastic sheets, farmers at a household level use the water from these two sources to irrigate high value vegetables, fruit trees and root crops. Improved springs are also playing a significant role on the health condition of the communities. Farmers, livestock and dogs used to drink water from the same sources before the project interventions.

Crops: An evaluation of improved crops (barley, wheat, faba bean and field peas) is helping to identify suitable varieties for the communities. Most of the improved crop varieties are released from Sirinka Research Center. Farmers were actively engaged in evaluating and selecting varieties that can meet their demands and be scaled up in similar localities.

Livestock:  The Awasi sheep breed (Israel originated) was introduced to farmers. Researchers and other partners have also worked with the communities on the management of grazing lands, forage development in backyards and soil and water conservation structures in the farmlands. Grazing lands are owned by individuals but collectively managed by groups of farmers. Communities have already formulated bylaws to control free livestock grazing on farmlands and grazing lands. These are also recognized and supported by the local administrations.

Soil and water conservation and tree plantation: The project has conducted awareness creation, community consensus meetings on collective action, and facilitated the formation of a watershed committee. The Woreda team together with other partners facilitated the implementation of different physical and biological soil and water conservation practices as well as tree and forage seedling planting on hillsides and farmlands and around the homesteads. The Sirinka researchers have already selected niche compatible potential tree species and screening them using different water harvesting techniques.

Home gardens: Home gardening at Kabe Watershed is important as it involves women and family members, is a source of income, improves nutrition, maintains soil fertility and directly and indirectly plays a role in climate adaptation. Highland fruits, potato varieties, garlic, carrot, spinach, shallot, and cabbage were part of the home garden intervention activities.

The ILRI communications team helped document the field day events and stories.

Photos can be seen here

Kindu Mekonnen contributed to this story

Filed under: Agriculture, Climate Change, Crop-Livestock, East Africa, Environment, Ethiopia, Event report, ILRI, Livestock, Livestock-Water, Sheep, Small Ruminants Tagged: Climate adaptation, field day, UNEP, Wollo

On 4 Nov 2012, an ILRI delegation of 28 visited the village of Araipura, in the Karnal District in the Indian state of Haryana, where they held discussions with dairy farm families. The ILRI management team and board of trustees also visited the National Dairy Research Institute. (Photo credit: ILRI)

‘Operation Flood in Gujarat is a lesson on how to connect the small farmers with the market, a top official from global research body International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) said Wednesday.

Operation Flood in Gujarat is one of the lessons we have learnt from India. The country can teach the world how to connect the small farmers with the market so that they can increase their incomes and quality of life,” ILRI Director General Jimmy Smith told reporters here.

‘The demand for livestock products is rising rapidly in India as well as globally and the country has the potential to rise up to meet this challenge, he added.

‘Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) Deputy Director General (Animal Science) K M L Pathak said India can seek ILRI’s help in developing its capacity to treat Peste des Petits Ruminants (PPR).

‘PPR, also known as goat plague, is a highly contagious viral disease affecting goats and sheep in Africa, Middle-East and the Indian subcontinent.’

Renowned agricultural scientist MS Swaminathan, father of India’s Green Revolution, inaugurated an all-day ILRI-ICAR Partnership Dialogue in New Delhi yesterday (7 Nov 2012), where these remarks were made. Swaminathan said that said that conservation of biodiversity and genetic resources in livestock is the foremost issue which needs to be addressed in view of the continuous threats and went on to recommend:

Development of an integrated crop livestock farming system and adoption of naturally bio-fortified foods for enhancing nutritional status of the Indian population. . . .’

Read the whole article at Zee News/Press Trust of India: India can teach world how to connect farmer with market, 7 Nov 2012.

Filed under: Crop-Livestock, Directorate, Event, ILRI, India, Markets, PA, Partnerships, PPR, South Asia Tagged: ILRI-ICAR Partnership Dialogue, Jimmy Smith, MS Swaminathan, Zee News/Press Trust of India

On  26 September 2012, animal nutritionist Michael Blümmel with the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) presented an ‘livestock live talk’ on Using crop by-products to intensify and sustain food production at the ILRI campus in Nairobi.

View the presentation:

 

‘Livestock live talks’ is a seminar series at ILRI that aims to address livestock-related issues, mobilize external as well as in-house expertise and audiences and engage the livestock community around interdisciplinary conversations that ask hard questions and seek to refine current research concepts and practices.

All ILRI staff, partners and donors, and interested outsiders are invited. Those non-staff wanting to come, please contact Angeline Nekesa at a.nekesa[at]cgiar.org (or via ILRI switchboard 422-3000) to let her know. If you would like to give one of these seminars, or have someone you would like to recommend, please contact Silvia Silvestri at s.silvestri[at]cgiar.org (or via ILRI switchboard 422-3000).

Filed under: Animal Feeding, Asia, Crop residues, Crop-Livestock, Event, Feeds, Fodder, Research, South Asia Tagged: livestock live talks, Michael Blummel

 Rice residues in southeast Punjab, India, prior to the wheat season (photo on Flickr by Neil Palmer).

Why are most poor farmers in developing countries not adopting ‘no-till agriculture’ (also called ‘conservation agriculture’)—an eco-friendly, natural-resource-conserving technology that helps conserve soil fertility by eliminating ploughing and keeping the remains of crops on the ground after harvest? The simple and straightforward answer stares one in the face on small farms worldwide, that would be the face of a cow, goat, sheep or other hungry farm animal that consumes the stubble as an essential part of its seasonal feed resources.

Nicholas Magnan, in the OUPblog, has an interesting review of the value of ‘stubble’—also know as ’crop by-products’, aka crop wastes’, aka ‘crop residues’, aka ‘stover’. As scientists such as Michael Blümmel and Diego Valbuena at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) and other organizations working in and for developing-country agriculture have been arguing for some time, the value of crop ‘wastes’—what remains of cereal and legume crops after their grains and pods have been harvested for human consumption—is invaluable for poor farmers raising farm animals as well as growing food crops.

‘No-till agriculture . . . offers many benefits to farmers and society. . . . [D]espite the benefits, small farmers in developing countries aren’t adopting no-till en masse. The potential explanations for the lack of no-till adoption are numerous. . . .

‘No-till requires farmers to keep stubble on the field after each harvest, so that it adds organic matter to the soil. But farmers in developing countries usually raise livestock in addition to cultivating crops, and stubble is an important source of livestock feed. The need to use the stubble for feed is particularly strong for small and isolated farmers without good alternatives. Farmers therefore face a tradeoff between leaving stubble in the field for no-till or feeding it to their livestock. The question then becomes, how steep is this tradeoff between the benefits of no-till agriculture and the cost of feeding one’s livestock?

‘Doug Larson, Ed Taylor, and I set out to quantify this tradeoff to see if small farmers are indeed stuck on stubble when it comes to no-till adoption in Morocco. In Morocco, Rachid Mrabet and others have shown no-till to perform as well as conventional methods when rainfall is good, and better than conventional methods when rainfall is poor (which occurs regularly in this drought-prone country). However, no-till adoption is scarce among small farmers, who almost always also raise sheep, goats, and cows. Employing unique livestock data gathered from the same farmers during a good rainfall year and a bad one, we found the economic value of stubble to farmers to be around one quarter of the total value of cereal production in a good year. In a drought year, when grain production was lower and livestock feed scarce, the value of crop stubble accounted for three quarters of the total value of cereal production.

In either case, the value of stubble as feed exceeded the upfront savings of no-till for most farmers.

‘. . . On a larger scale we also see evidence of the how differences in the availability of feed influences no-till adoption. Diego Valbuena and colleagues found that in multiple sites across Africa and South Asia demand for crop residues is higher where grazing land is poorer. And generally, no-till adoption is more common among small farmers in South America — where more plant matter is available as feed — than elsewhere. Understanding which farmers place the highest value on stubble as feed will help better target extension, and better design policies that improve access to alternative feed sources. . . .

‘Efforts to disseminate no-till and other technologies to small farmers in developing countries should therefore focus on identifying and alleviating the constraints that result in crop stubble being so valuable as feed to these farmers. Otherwise the cost of no-till adoption of no-till technology may simply be too high.

‘Nicholas Magnan recently joined the Department of Agricultural and Applied Economics at the University of Georgia, Athens. He was a research fellow at the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington, DC studying various aspects of agricultural technology adoption. He is the co-author of “Stuck on Stubble? The Non-market Value of Agricultural Byproducts for Diversified Farmers in Morocco” in the American Journal of Agricultural Economics, which is available to read for a limited time. It examines the value of agricultural byproducts, such as crop stubble, to crop-livestock farmers who produce both cereal and crop residue, where the latter can be used as livestock feed. To properly assess the cost of introducing new technologies into such systems, one must value the implicit cost of byproducts.’

Read the whole article by Nicholas Magnan on the Oxford University Press Blog (OUPblog): Are small farmers in developing countries stuck on stubble?, 7 Aug 2012.

Read a recent science article on this subject by ILRI scientists Diego Valbuena, Alan Duncan, Bruno Gérard, Mariana Rufino, Nils Teufel and colleagues from other institutes in the CGIAR Systemwide Livestock Programme: Conservation agriculture in mixed crop–livestock systems: Scoping crop residue trade-offs in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, published in Field Crops Research 132: 175–184, in June 2012.

Filed under: Animal Feeding, Article, Crop residues, Crop-Livestock, ILRI, PA, SLP, Soils Tagged: Alan Duncan, Bruno Gerard, Diego Valbuena, IFPRI, Mariana Rufino, Michael Blummel, Morocco, Nils Teufel, OUPblog, SLP

Last week the CGIAR Humid Tropics research program held a planning Workshop in Nairobi. Alan Duncan, ILRI’s contact person for the program shares his reflections on the design of the program:

One could argue that the ‘integrating’ systems research programs like this one are what CGIAR reform was meant to achieve: Different centers pooling expertise, thinking about links between different system components and fitting technical work such as crop breeding into a wider social and systems context. This integration is key to the sustainable intensification of mixed crop livestock systems which are home to the majority of the world’s poor. A successful Humid Tropics research program in the coming 15 years could have real impact on the livelihoods of millions of poor people.

The meeting was lively and there was some good thinking over the course of the week. Some highlights:

• We spent quite some time thinking about the core concept of the program: It is built around the idea that as systems intensify different locations follow different paths. In some places natural resources are heavily degraded but people have graduated out of poverty. In others, natural resources are still in reasonable condition but poverty is widespread. These different starting conditions require different interventions to move smallholders towards a ‘golden quadrant’ where poverty is overcome while natural resources are maintained. At the meeting we introduced a further variable into the core concept: Markets. These had previously been a bit of an add-on and their inclusion in the core concept brings much more coherence to the thinking.

• We also spent time working out a protocol for action site selection. We developed a draft study design and some criteria to select sites based on the three main variables in the core concept: natural resource condition, poverty rates and market access. This site selection protocol will allow a common approach to site selection across the four Tier 1 Action Areas (Central America, West Africa Humid Lowlands, East and Central Africa Highlands, Greater Mekong). A strong study design will make drawing lessons from the program about how to catalyse sustainable intensification of systems much more powerful.

• We had an excellent debate about the overall structure and content of the so-called SRTs (Strategic Research Themes). In the last iteration of the proposal, institutional issues had been lumped into SRT3 on Scaling Out. Many in the group argued that institutional issues needed to be much more embedded in SRT2 (production, NRM, markets) and this view prevailed. We rejigged the program by including institutional issues together with markets in SRT2.

• We talked a lot about ‘R4D platforms’ and what we really mean by this term – are they different to the ‘innovation platforms’ that ILRI often works with? These terms mean many different things to different people but by the end of the meeting we had come up with a concept that most were comfortable with. R4D platforms will be convened at various scales, notably at local ‘action site’ level. They will act as a forum to bring together relevant stakeholders to catalyze innovation around agreed ‘entry points’ toward sustainable intensification.

The Humid Tropics program has been ‘in the kitchen’ for quite a while but last week saw a good deal of progress. The team gelled well and there was a good sense that participants had signed up to revise the proposal and get it in good shape to be resubmitted to the CGIAR Fund Council in August 2012.

ILRI web page about this program

Humid Tropics web site

Africa RISING – IITA and ILRI-led projects on sustainable intensification in Africa

Filed under: Agriculture, Crop-Livestock, CRP12, Event, ILRI, Intensification, PLE

Last week, the Committee on Agriculture of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) discussed options for “stakeholder dialogue in support of sustainable livestock sector development” as a contribution to the so-called “Global Agenda of Action in Support of Sustainable Livestock Sector Development.

The Global Agenda of Action focuses on the improvement of resource-use efficiency in the livestock sector to support livelihoods, long-term food security and economic growth while safeguarding other environmental and public health outcomes.

Download the Committee document

Read a statement on the proposals by the League for Pastoral Peoples and Endogenous Livestock Development

Filed under: Agriculture, Animal Production, Climate Change, Crop-Livestock, Intensification, Livestock Tagged: FAO

Rice residues after harvest, near Sangrur, southeast Punjab, India (photo credit: Neil Palmer/CIAT).

There is a new report of mixed results about the viability of adopting ‘conservation agriculture’ to enhance soil health and sustain long-term crop productivity in the developing world, an approach advocated by many. The authors of the report work at five centres of the CGIAR and conducted this research under the CGIAR Systemwide Livestock Programme (SLP). The lead author is a scientist at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI). The following is based on the paper’s abstract.

One of the key principles of conservation agriculture is maintaining soil cover, often by depositing crop residues (the leaves, stems and stalks of crop plants after their grain or legumes have been harvested) on a crop field as mulch. Yet smallholder mixed crop-and-livestock farming systems across Africa and Asia face trade-offs among various options for crop residue use. This research assessed the trade-offs of using a proportion of a farm’s crop residues in contrasting settings on mixed crop-livestock farms. The paper draws from surveys in 12 villages and 9 countries across sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. Sites were clustered into three groups along the combined population and livestock density gradients to assess current crop residue management practices and to explore potential challenges to adopting mulching practices in different circumstances.

Results show that in sites with high densities of human and livestock populations, although livestock face high potential pressure on resources on an area basis, biomass production tends to be substantial, with enough residues to cover demands for both livestock feed and soil mulch. In sites where population and livestock densities are at medium levels, biomass is scarce and pressure on land and feed are high, increasing pressure to use crop residues for livestock feed, and increasing the opportunity costs of using the residues for mulch. Where population and livestock densities are low, communal feed and fuel resources typically reduce pressure on crop residues on an area basis, but biomass production is also low and farmers in such sites rely largely on crop residues to get their livestock through the long dry seasons, indicating that there are substantial opportunity costs to using crop residues as mulch for croplands rather than feed for animals.

Despite its potential benefit for smallholder farmers across the density gradient, therefore, the introduction of mulching practices based on conservation agriculture appears potentially easier in sites where biomass production is sufficiently high to fulfil demands for both feed and fuel. In sites with relatively high feed and fuel pressure, any introduction of conservation agriculture needs complementary research and development efforts to increase biomass production and/or develop alternative sources of biomass to alleviate the opportunity costs of using some crop residues as mulch rather than feed.

Read the whole paper (note there is restricted access): Conservation agriculture in mixed crop-livestock systems: Scoping crop residue trade-offs in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, written by Diego Valbuena (ILRI and SLP), Olaf Erenstein (CIMMYT), Sabine Homann-Kee Tui (ICRISAT), Tahirou Abdoulaye (IITA), Lieven Claessens (CIP, ICRISAT and Wageningen University), Alan J. Duncan (ILRI), Bruno Gérard (SLP and CIMMYT), Mariana C Rufino (ILRI), Nils Teufel (ILRI), André van Rooyen (ICRISAT), Mark T van Wijk (ILRI and Wageningen University) and published online as a corrected proof in Field Crops Research on 17 March 2012.

Filed under: Agriculture, Article, Crop residues, Crop-Livestock, ILRI, PA, SLP, Soils Tagged: Alan Duncan, Bruno Gerard, Conservation agriculture, Diego Valbuena, Field Crops Research, Mariana Rufino, Mark van Wijk, Nils Teufel

Groundnuts (photo on Flickr by Stephen Eustace).

Jerome Bossuet, of the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), based in Pantancheru, India, has an interesting article in the New Agriculturist last month about fodder innovations helping Indian dairy farmers.

Feed matters are big matters in this intensive dairy-producing country, because ‘Feed represents around 70 per cent of the cost of milk production . . . .’ But with most farm plots now too small to sustain both fodder and food crops and with areas of common grazing lands shrinking, milk prices have been rising.

Research groups are coming to the rescue by developing ‘dual-purpose’ varieties of sorghum, millet, pigeonpea and groundnut whose straw, leaves and stalks that remain after the grain or legume has been harvested are of higher-than-normal quality for feeding to farm animals and whose yields of grain for human consumption are also good.

‘Crop residues . . . are already an important source of fodder in India, providing more than 40 per cent of the available dry matter for feeding livestock; some experts estimate this could rise to 70 per cent by 2020. But residues, especially from cereals, are often of low nutritional quality, which affects the productivity of cattle and buffalo.’

The new dual-purpose crops manage to produce both high grain yields for people and nutritionally rich residues for their animal stock.

‘Anantapur district, in Andhra Pradesh, is a key groundnut producing region and also one of the most drought-prone areas in India. Seventy per cent of the agricultural land is planted with groundnut, supporting over 300,000 smallholders, therefore crop residues are mainly composed of groundnut stems, known as haulm. “Groundnut haulm’s energy and protein content, and its palatability and digestibility can vary significantly from one variety to another,” says Dr Michael Blummel, a scientist from the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI).

‘In 2002, ICRISAT introduced an early maturing, high yield and drought-tolerant groundnut variety (ICGV91114), which produced 15 per cent higher pod yields, 17 per cent more haulm and better quality fodder than the locally grown variety. After giving their cows and buffalo the improved fodder, dairy farmers noticed an immediate impact as their milk production increased by 11 per cent.

‘A recent participatory feeding trial found that 400 ml of extra milk was produced daily by animals that had been fed the improved variety. A separate impact study by ILRI also estimated that during the main growing season, adopters would earn about 48,000 rupees per hectare (US$970 from sales of groundnuts and milk)—four times more than from growing the local variety. . . .

‘Dual-purpose crops have also created new value chains for the animal feed sector. In Hyderabad, for example, sorghum stover-based feed blocks are being marketed by animal feed companies. One block feeds one dairy animal per day, ensuring a production level of eight to 12 litres of milk per day compared to an average of three to four. Traders are therefore beginning to pay sorghum farmers a premium for their crop residues.

‘Following on from ILRI and ICRISAT’s innovative crop breeding research, the IFAD-supported MilkIT project, led by ILRI, aims to improve access to animal feed for poor dairy farmers in India and Tanzania by using dual-purpose crops. The ILRI and ICRISAT researchers, and members of the CGIAR’s Systemwide Livestock Program, are also transferring the dual-purpose crop breeding approach to African countries, through improved sorghum varieties. They are also studying the trade-offs when crop residues are used to feed animals, including the consequences for soil fertility. . . .’

Read the whole article at the New Agriculturist: Fodder innovations to help Indian dairy farmers, Mar 2012.

For more information, visit the websites of ILRI and ICRISAT.

Filed under: Animal Feeding, Buffalo, Cattle, Crop residues, Crop-Livestock, East Africa, Fodder, ILRI, India, Intensification, PA, PLE, South Asia, Tanzania Tagged: ICRISAT, IFAD, Michael Blummel, MilkIT, New Agriculturist, SLP

Around 60 experts are meeting at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) in Addis Ababa on 30th and 31st January to plan an exciting new research project that aims to transform agricultural systems in the Highland of Ethiopia. As in many part of Africa, farming systems in the Ethiopian Highlands are a mix of crop and livestock enterprises. The key to improving the productivity of these mixed crop-livestock systems, to increase food production and improve the livelihoods of the 60 million people who depend on them is to produce more output from the same area of land or per animal while reducing the negative environmental impacts and at the same time increasing contributions to natural capital and the flow of environmental services, a process which has been called ‘sustainable intensification.’

ILRI staff led a consortium of research partners to produce a draft project design focused on the Ethiopian Highlands.  Dr Shirley Tarawali from ILRI explained that an important part of the design is to bring together crop scientists, animal scientists, environmental scientists and socio-economists to work together to tackle the complex challenges associated with these mixed farming systems.

“Often we find that scientists from different disciplines are working on different components of farming systems without taking account of the interlinkages between the different components,” she explained.

“For example, crop scientists don’t often take account that crop residues such as straw are an important component of animal feed and livestock scientists don’t necessarily take account of the environmental impact of livestock.  We aim to bring together a multi-disciplinary research team from international and Ethiopian organizations and link the project to development partners to undertake research that can help development organizations such as government agencies and non-governmental organizations design more effective programmes for development”.

View her introduction to the project:

The workshop provides an opportunity for a broad group of important stakeholders to learn about the project plans and to share their views on expectations from and opportunities for synergies with the project. It is attended by representatives from government, research organizations, donors and development organizations. Following the two day workshop the research consortium will refine the project design.

The project is part of the US government’s Feed the Future initiative (http://www.feedthefuture.gov/).  Feed the Future is the United States Government’s global hunger and food security initiative. It supports country-driven approaches to address the root causes of hunger and poverty and forge long-term solutions to chronic food insecurity and under-nutrition. Drawing upon resources and expertise of agencies across the U.S. Government, this Presidential Initiative is helping countries transform their own agriculture sectors to grow enough food sustainably to feed their people.  The US Agency for International Development (USAID) is supporting three multi-stakeholder agricultural research projects to sustainably intensify key African farming systems that overlap with and focus on the focus countries of Feed the Future.  These are intended to catalyze concerted research and action by governments and donor agencies around pressing issues.

The overall aim is to transform agricultural systems through sustainable intensification projects in three regions of Africa:

• the Sudano-Sahelian Zone of West Africa
• the Ethiopian highlands
• East and Southern Africa

The consortium in Ethiopia is led by the The International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI – www.ilri.org) and includes: The Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research (EIAR – www.eiar.gov.et), International Maize and Wheat Improvement Centre (CIMMYT – www.cimmyt.org), International Centre for Agricultural Research in Dry Areas (ICARDA – www.icarda.cgiar.org), International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT – www.icrisat.org), International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI – www.ifpri.org), and the International Water Management Institute (IWMI – www.iwmi.cgiar.org).

Information on the project and workshop is online at http://agintensificationafrica.wordpress.com

The project workspace, with event plans, reports, presentations etc is at: http://agintensificationafrica.wikispaces.com

Filed under: Africa, Agriculture, Crop residues, Crop-Livestock, CRP12, East Africa, Ethiopia, Event, ILRI, Intensification, Livestock, Livestock Systems, PLE, Project, Research, South Africa, West Africa Tagged: agintensificationafrica, USAID

As part of the US government’s Feed the Future initiative to address global hunger and food security issues in sub-Saharan Africa, the US Agency for International Development (USAID) is supporting three multi-stakeholder agricultural research projects to sustainably intensify key African farming systems. Based in three priority agro-ecological zones, the three projects are focused on sites in Ghana and Mali, Ethiopia and Tanzania.

The regions were chosen based on analysis of cropping systems, poverty, population, country development priorities, and the potential for successfully improving agricultural productivity.

On 9 January 2012, a design workshop for the West Africa project starts in Tamale, Ghana. Led by the International Institute for Tropical Agriculture (IITA), the ‘Sustainable Intensification of Cereal-based Farming Systems in the Sudano-Sahelian Zone of West Africa’ project aims to improve livelihoods through sustainable increased productivity of maize-legume and crop/tree/livestock systems in the northern Guinea and Sudan savanna zones of Ghana and Mali.

The second design workshop, from 30 January – 2 February 2012 in Addis Ababa, is hosted by the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI). This project – ‘Sustainable intensification of crop-livestock systems to improve food security and farm income diversification in the Ethiopian highlands‘ – aims to “identify options for sustainable intensification of mixed crop livestock systems in the Ethiopian highlands that will enable communities to participate in emerging market opportunities in environmentally friendly ways whilst improving resilience to risks.”

The third design workshop is in Dar es Salaam from 6-9 February 2012 will kick off the  ‘Sustainable intensification of maize-legume-livestock integrated farming systems in Eastern and Southern Africa’ project, also led by IITA.

The goal of this project is to “sustainably increase agricultural productivity growth, economic growth, food production, food and nutrition security and improve natural resource management in order to reduce poverty and hunger in the target areas in Tanzania and in the eastern and southern Africa region.” It will “increase the productivity of maize-legume-livestock production systems, system resilience and agro-ecosystem services including provisioning of food and feed; improved water and soil conservation, soil nutrient supply and cycling, soil health and soil structure; carbon sequestration and biodiversity; and adaptation to climate variability and change.”

ILRI is involved to various degrees in each of the projects, with a leadership role in the Ethiopian one. The projects each bring together a range of research for development expertise and partners, including US universities, international agricultural research centers, national agricultural research systems, the private sector, non-governmental organizations and local and international development donor communities.

———

In the project concept notes, sustainable agricultural intensification is defined as producing more output from the same area of land while reducing the negative environmental impacts, and at the same time increasing contributions to the natural capital and the flow of environmental services (Pretty et al. 2011).

Filed under: Africa, Agriculture, Crop-Livestock, CRP12, Farming Systems, Ghana, ILRI, Intensification, Mali, PLE, Project, Research, West Africa Tagged: agintensificationafrica, IITA, USAID

This new report from the ACIAR – the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research – argues that  the “improvement of production and profitability in smallholder beef enterprises is typically not limited by a lack of promising feeding and management technologies. It is more due to low access to, and uptake of, these technologies. There has generally been little understanding of how these technologies can be adapted to and integrated into smallholder systems.”

The case studies in this publication highlight approaches that have been taken by recent ACIAR-funded projects in Indonesia, Vietnam and China
to better understand the social, economic and technical drivers and inhibitors of uptake of these promising technologies.

 

Download the report …

Filed under: Animal Production, Asia, Books and chapters, China, Crop residues, Crop-Livestock, Indonesia, Livestock Systems, Southeast Asia, Value Chains, Vietnam Tagged: ACIAR, Beef

On 3 November 2011, Shirley Tarawali presented ILRI work on crop-livestock systems at the Wageningen symposium ‘Assessment for sustainable development of animal production systems.’

Watch the video of her presentation (Tarawali starts 40 minutes into the video)

View Tarawali’s presentation:

Filed under: Animal Production, Crop residues, Crop-Livestock, Farming Systems, Film and video, ILRI, Intensification, Livestock, PLE, Presentation, Pro-Poor Livestock Tagged: Shirley Tarawali, Wageningen

For the November 2011 ‘liveSTOCK Exchange’ event at ILRI, Alan Duncan, Bruno Gérard, Diego Valbuena, Michael Blümmel, and Shirley Tarawali prepared an issue brief on the contributions of crop residues to mixed crop and livestock systems in developing countries …

Contrary to the popular view that cereal crop residues are just a low quality by-product of arable production, crop residues are increasingly seen to play a critical role in smallholder mixed crop-livestock systems in the developing world. Crop residues represent biomass, an increasingly valuable resource as these systems evolve. In these systems, crops provide food for the household and the market as well as residues to feed livestock. Livestock provide traction for cultivation and transport as well as converting residues into manure. This interlinking of crop and livestock production is a central feature of mixed crop-livestock systems. However, the equilibrium is increasingly disturbed by various external drivers.

Worldwide, crop-livestock systems are in transition and we expect them to evolve differently in different places and contexts. The challenge is to make this transition a positive one for people, the environment and national economies.

This brief considers the growing pressures on crop residues in mixed systems and highlights ways that ILRI and its partners have developed our understanding of trade-offs and their implications for farm livelihoods and environmental sustainability.

Download Issue Brief 2.

On 9 and 10 November 2011, the ILRI Board of Trustees hosted a 2-day ‘liveSTOCK Exchange’ to discuss and reflect on livestock research for development. The event synthesized sector and ILRI learning and helped frame future livestock research for development directions.

The liveSTOCK Exchange also marked the leadership and contributions of Dr. Carlos Seré as ILRI Director General. See all posts in this series / Sign up for email alerts

Filed under: Animal Production, Crop residues, Crop-Livestock, Ethiopia, ILRI, Intensification, Livestock, Livestock Systems, PLE, Report, Research, SLP Tagged: livestockX, SLP

For the November 2011 ‘liveSTOCK Exchange’ event at ILRI, William Dar, of the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), reflects on ILRI-ICRISAT collaboration on crops-livestock integration in mixed systems …

When Michael Blümmel and team organized the inauguration of ILRI’s experimental feed processing unit in their field office at ICRISAT headquarters in Patancheru, India, it struck me that the ILRI-ICRISAT collaboration was truly a partnership with a purpose.

Three machines comprise the feed processing unit, which is designed and supported by the ICRISAT-led National Agricultural Innovation on Sweet Sorghum Bio-Ethanol Value Chain. The unit will enable exploration and work on optimizing usage of by-products from crops, particularly dryland crops, besides biofuel production, for livestock feeding. It will facilitate uptake of such by-products, create job opportunities in feed transaction and processing, and ultimately contribute to the mitigation of feed scarcity.

Feed scarcity and high feed costs are major constraints to benefits from livestock rearing. Crop residues are the single most important feed resource in India and several parts of the developing world, and predictions have it that their importance as feed will further increase. Therefore, improvement of crop residues through multidimensional crop improvement has become the focus of collaborative research between our two institutes.

ICRISAT has collaborated with ILRI (formerly ILCA) since 1982, and so far our institutes have successfully concluded 10 joint projects. In the last few years, with active support from Dr Carlos Seré, the collaboration has strengthened appreciably, and now ILRI and ICRISAT are working closely to maximize the benefits to poor farmers through better crop-livestock integration under mixed farming systems. At present we are collaborating on three projects :

1. Delivering new sorghum and millets innovations for food security and improving livelihoods in Eastern Africa” under Bio-Innovate program funded by Sida, Sweden.
2. Optimizing livelihood and environmental benefits from crop residues in small holder crop-livestock system in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia regional case study, and
3. ACIAR funded project: “Improving postrainy sorghum varieties to meet the growing grain and fodder demand in India”.

In the next few years we hope to see an upscaling of our efforts as we work closely with research partners and private feed producers to create crop cultivars that better match the needs of farmers, and to build bridges for marketing opportunities and commercial ventures that will eventually address food and feed security needs.

Contributed by William Dar, Director General of the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT).

On 9 and 10 November 2011, the ILRI Board of Trustees hosted a 2-day ‘liveSTOCK Exchange’ to discuss and reflect on livestock research for development. The event synthesized sector and ILRI learning and helped frame future livestock research for development directions.

The liveSTOCK Exchange also marked the leadership and contributions of Dr. Carlos Seré as ILRI Director General. See all posts in this series / Sign up for email alerts

Filed under: Animal Production, Crop residues, Crop-Livestock, CRP11, Drylands, ILRI, Intensification, Livestock, Opinion piece, PLE, Research Tagged: ICRISAT, livestockX, Wiliam Dar