Using radio and interactive ICTs to improve food security among smallholder farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa

2017 ◽  
Vol 41 (7-8) ◽  
pp. 670-684 ◽  
Author(s):  
Heather E. Hudson ◽  
Mark Leclair ◽  
Bernard Pelletier ◽  
Bartholomew Sullivan
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Smallholder Farmers ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Improve Food Security

scholarly journals Dilemma of nitrogen management for future food security in sub-Saharan Africa – a review

Soil Research ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 55 (6) ◽  
pp. 425 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cargele Masso ◽  
Fredrick Baijukya ◽  
Peter Ebanyat ◽  
Sifi Bouaziz ◽  
John Wendt ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Food Production ◽  
Smallholder Farmers ◽  
Lake Victoria ◽  
Research Capacity ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
N Recovery ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Other World ◽  
N Use

Food security entails having sufficient, safe, and nutritious food to meet dietary needs. The need to optimise nitrogen (N) use for nutrition security while minimising environmental risks in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) is overdue. Challenges related to managing N use in SSA can be associated with both insufficient use and excessive loss, and thus the continent must address the ‘too little’ and ‘too much’ paradox. Too little N is used in food production (80% of countries have N deficiencies), which has led to chronic food insecurity and malnutrition. Conversely, too much N load in water bodies due mainly to soil erosion, leaching, limited N recovery from wastewater, and atmospheric deposition contributes to eutrophication (152 Gg N year–1 in Lake Victoria, East Africa). Limited research has been conducted to improve N use for food production and adoption remains low, mainly because farming is generally practiced by resource-poor smallholder farmers. In addition, little has been done to effectively address the ‘too much’ issues, as a consequence of limited research capacity. This research gap must be addressed, and supportive policies operationalised, to maximise N benefits, while also minimising pollution. Innovation platforms involving key stakeholders are required to address N use efficiency along the food supply chain in SSA, as well as other world regions with similar challenges.

scholarly journals Preferences and crop choice during Zimbabwe’s macroeconomic crisis

2020 ◽  
pp. 260-287
Author(s):  
Anna Josephson ◽  
◽  
Jacob Ricker-Gilbert ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Market Failure ◽  
Smallholder Farmers ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Risk And Uncertainty ◽  
Crop Choice ◽  
Extreme Stress ◽  
Price Signals ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
The Relationship

Smallholder farmers face considerable risk and uncertainty, particularly when markets are incomplete or missing. We consider household crop diversity and crop choice in Zimbabwe, where output markets are largely absent and price signals are inaccurate. In this setting, considering preferences and tastes provides a deeper understanding of how households ensure food security in environments without robust markets. We use data that straddles the period of hyperinflation in Zimbabwe and the collapse of the country’s currency to study household cropping behaviour in a time of extreme stress. This allows us to better understand the relationship between market failure and crop choice in Sub-Saharan Africa.

scholarly journals Real time portable genome sequencing for global food security

F1000Research ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 1101 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Boykin ◽  
Ammar Ghalab ◽  
Bruno Rossitto De Marchi ◽  
Anders Savill ◽  
James M. Wainaina ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Smallholder Farmers ◽  
Crop Protection ◽  
Plant Viruses ◽  
Plant Diseases ◽  
Control Measures ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Crop Losses ◽  
Early Action ◽  
Sub Saharan

Crop losses due to viral diseases and pests are major constraints on food security and income for millions of households in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Such losses can be reduced if plant diseases and pests are correctly diagnosed and identified early. Currently, accurate diagnosis for definitive identification of plant viruses and their vectors in SSA mostly relies on standard PCR and next generation sequencing technologies (NGS). However, it can take up to 6 months before results generated using these approaches are available. The long time taken to detect or identify viruses impedes quick, within-season decision-making necessary for early action, crop protection advice and disease control measures by farmers. This ultimately compounds the magnitude of crop losses and food shortages suffered by farmers. The MinION portable pocket DNA sequencer was used, to our knowledge globally for the first time, to sequence whole plant virus genomes. We used this technology to identify the begomoviruses causing the devastating cassava mosaic virus, which is ravaging smallholder farmers’ crops in sub-Saharan Africa.

Hyper-resolution hydrological modelling to assess water and food security in Malawi

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniela Anghileri ◽  
Noemi Vergopolan ◽  
Solomon Gebrechorkos ◽  
Justin Sheffield
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Land Surface ◽  
Agricultural Landscape ◽  
Smallholder Farmers ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Smallholder Farming ◽  
Hydrological Variability ◽  
Research Activities ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Water And Food Security

<p>Agriculture is a key sector in fighting hunger in Sub Saharan Africa. Almost 95% of the agriculture in Africa is rain-fed and smallholder farmers play a crucial role as they produce most of the food consumed by local populations. These characteristics make the SSA agricultural landscape very diverse and particularly vulnerable to weather extremes. The ability of forecasting hydrological variability has increased in recent years due to advancements in the understanding of hydro-climatic processes, growing availability of high-resolution remote sensing datasets, and the increase of computational power, which has promoted the development of high-quality computer-based hydrological models. When adopted in data scarce regions, these models provide new insight into the hydrological budget and in characterizing the hydrological variability of these areas. In this work, we combine the hyper-resolution hydrological model HydroBlocks and the river routing model RAPID to simulate the spatial and temporal heterogeneity of the land surface processes in Malawi at 30 m resolution. The model simulations show high variability of the hydrological variables, particularly soil moisture, across the country. We use these results to further analyse water and food security indicators in the transboundary catchment of Lake Chilwa shared between Malawi and Mozambique. The start and duration of the maize cropping season and the lake level show a large interannual variability which allow us to quantify the weather-related vulnerability of the local smallholder farming system. This work is part of the research activities of the UKRI-GCRF funded project “Building research capacity for sustainable water and food security in drylands of sub-Saharan Africa” (BRECcIA - http://www.gcrf-breccia.com/).</p>

scholarly journals Curbing Post Harvest Losses for Food Security: A Survey of Smallholder Farmers in Ethiopia

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 51
Author(s):  
Robert Agunga ◽  
Ruth Sleshi
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Food Insecurity ◽  
World Bank ◽  
Smallholder Farmers ◽  
Agricultural Extension ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Great Promise ◽  
Post Harvest ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Grain Farmers

Reducing post harvest losses (PHL) offers great promise for curbing hunger and reducing food insecurity in Africa.A World Bank 2011 report on Missing Food estimated that if African farmers can reduce PHL by even one percentthat will be an annual savings of US$40 million for Sub-Saharan Africa alone. Our survey of 88 smallholderfarmers in the Gondar Region of Ethiopia found that farmers faced serious to most serious losses caused by rodents,birds and the weather. About 46% of the respondents, expressed serious problems with rodents; 54% had seriousproblems with birds and even higher numbers, 55% and 63% had serious problems with the weather and pests,respectively. Another 28.4% of the farmers complained of very serious problems with birds while half of them hadvery serious problems with rodents. Many of the PHL problems seem to emanate from poor storage. The Universityof Purdue, USA, has invented what it calls the “Purdue Improved Crop Storage Bag,” which is advertised as highlyefficient and relatively inexpensive. We urge agricultural extension systems in Africa to test the effectiveness of thisbag before recommending it to their grain farmers as a means of reducing PHL.

scholarly journals Sowing Seeds of Food Security in Africa

Eos ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 102 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine Nakalembe ◽  
Christina Justice ◽  
Hannah Kerner ◽  
Christopher Justice ◽  
Inbal Becker-Reshef
Keyword(s):  
Food Security ◽  
Food Insecurity ◽  
Capacity Building ◽  
Smallholder Farmers ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Innovative Program ◽  
Sub Saharan

An innovative program focused on collaboration and capacity building is looking to improve outcomes for smallholder farmers, reduce hunger, and alleviate food insecurity in sub-Saharan Africa.

scholarly journals Precision Agriculture for Resource Use Efficiency in Smallholder Farming Systems in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Systematic Review

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 1158
Author(s):  
Cecilia M. Onyango ◽  
Justine M. Nyaga ◽  
Johanna Wetterlind ◽  
Mats Söderström ◽  
Kristin Piikki
Keyword(s):  
Resource Use ◽  
Precision Agriculture ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
English Language ◽  
Management Practices ◽  
Smallholder Farmers ◽  
Management Strategies ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Smallholder Farming ◽  
Sub Saharan

Opportunities exist for adoption of precision agriculture technologies in all parts of the world. The form of precision agriculture may vary from region to region depending on technologies available, knowledge levels and mindsets. The current review examined research articles in the English language on precision agriculture practices for increased productivity among smallholder farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa. A total of 7715 articles were retrieved and after screening 128 were reviewed. The results indicate that a number of precision agriculture technologies have been tested under SSA conditions and show promising results. The most promising precision agriculture technologies identified were the use of soil and plant sensors for nutrient and water management, as well as use of satellite imagery, GIS and crop-soil simulation models for site-specific management. These technologies have been shown to be crucial in attainment of appropriate management strategies in terms of efficiency and effectiveness of resource use in SSA. These technologies are important in supporting sustainable agricultural development. Most of these technologies are, however, at the experimental stage, with only South Africa having applied them mainly in large-scale commercial farms. It is concluded that increased precision in input and management practices among SSA smallholder farmers can significantly improve productivity even without extra use of inputs.

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