scholarly journals Strategies for the development of the sweetpotato early generation seed sector in eastern and southern Africa

2017 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Srinivasulu Rajendran ◽  
Lydia N. Kimenye ◽  
Margaret McEwan
Keyword(s):  
Southern Africa ◽  
Agricultural Research ◽  
Business Case ◽  
Business Environment ◽  
Public Institutions ◽  
Early Generation ◽  
Business Plans ◽  
Seed Supply ◽  
Business Opportunities ◽  
Eastern And Southern Africa

AbstractSmallholders in Eastern and Southern Africa(ESA) have limited access to timely availability of quality sweetpotato seed which contributes to sub-optimal root yields. To enhance availability and access to quality seed it is necessary to link formal plant breeding efforts to a sustainable seed supply system by means of identifying business opportunities for sweetpotato Early Generation Seed (EGS) producers. In most ESA countries, public institutions have the sole mandate for EGS production, but have not adopted an explicit business orientation. The study used primary information collected from business plans prepared by eight National Agricultural Research Institutions(NARIs) in seven countries in ESA. This study first analyzed the overall business opportunities for public institutions using a Strengths, Weaknesses Opportunities, and Threats(SWOT) tool and then a Threats, Opportunities, Weaknesses and Strengths (TOWS) approach was used to transform the SWOT results into strategies for the further development of the early generation seed sector. It was concluded that over a five to ten year period, the NARIs do have a business case for production of sweetpotato EGS. However, to capitalise on this NARIs and policy makers need to take up there commendations from the TOWS analysis to refine strategies for exploiting opportunities in the business environment and for mitigating weaknesses to reduce vulnerability to any identified threats to the potential business in EGS.

scholarly journals Understanding Adoption and Impacts of Conservation Agriculture in Eastern and Southern Africa: A Review

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hambulo Ngoma ◽  
Arild Angelsen ◽  
Thomas S. Jayne ◽  
Antony Chapoto
Keyword(s):  
Southern Africa ◽  
Agricultural Research ◽  
Farming Systems ◽  
Conservation Agriculture ◽  
Evidence Base ◽  
Smallholder Farming ◽  
Ecological Zones ◽  
Environmental Objectives ◽  
Eastern And Southern Africa ◽  
Capital Intensive

Conservation Agriculture (CA) aims to concurrently promote agricultural productivity, local livelihoods, climate resilience and other environmental objectives. We review the emerging evidence base in Eastern and Southern Africa to address whether CA is climate smart and why adoption rates by smallholders remain generally very low. We first develop an adoption framework that can be used to assess when and where the different components of CA are expected to be adopted under different conditioning factors and consider options to make CA climate smart. Our results suggest that CA can contribute positively to productivity and adaptation/resilience objectives, although the degree of success varies considerably by farm, household and regional characteristics. Overall, we find that capital-intensive (mechanized) CA is more likely to be adopted in areas of economic dynamism where capital is cheap relative to labor. Labor-intensive CA practices are more likely to be adopted in regions of economic stagnation where capital is expensive, and labor is abundant and cheap. A subnational focus is needed to identify economic conditions of different regions and agro-ecological zones and to test hypotheses derived from the framework in this paper and to propose the most appropriate CA packages for promotion. Our findings suggest that labor using variants of CA such as planting basins are more likely to be adopted than are capital using mechanized options in densely populated parts of Malawi, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe where labor is abundant, and presumably cheap, but capital is expensive. However, rising land scarcity (prices) and wages in the region present an opportunity for capital intensive, mechanized CA operations to be adopted if the cost of capital can be kept low and if there is a supportive environment for mechanization. We conclude that CA is climate smart and if adopted widely, it has the potential to help build resilience in smallholder farming systems. CA can be more climate smart, and its uptake can be enhanced by reframing, better targeting, adapting CA to location-specific economic and biophysical, and through greater and more effective public spending on agricultural research and development.

Agricultural Research in Eastern and Southern Africa

1970 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 288-293
Author(s):  
H. C. Pereira
Keyword(s):  
Natural Resources ◽  
Southern Africa ◽  
Agricultural Research ◽  
Major Change ◽  
African Unity ◽  
Research Committee ◽  
Technical Research ◽  
Eastern And Southern Africa

Before commenting on the situation in separate countries, it is useful to look briefly at the over-all state of natural resources science in Africa. This was reviewed in detail six years ago at a U.N.E.S.C.O. conference in Lagos and there has been no major change in the picture of fragmentation of effort, with as yet no effective machinery for co-operation. Some rather slow pro. gress was made by the C.C.T.A. among the countries south of the Sahara towards the co-ordination and sharing of scarce scientific resources, but this initiative has not yet been effectively regained by its successor organisation, the Scientific and Technical Research Committee of the Organisation of African Unity.

The Region-Sensitive Effect of Globalization on HIV in Eastern and Southern Africa: The Dual Role of Education

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Koen Stroeken ◽  
Cathy Abbo ◽  
Petra De Koker ◽  
Kristien Michielsen ◽  
Pieter Remes ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Southern Africa ◽  
Dual Role ◽  
Eastern And Southern Africa

scholarly journals Trends in Socioeconomic Inequalities in HIV Prevalence among Young People in Seven Countries in Eastern and Southern Africa

PLoS ONE ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. e0121775 ◽  
Author(s):  
James R. Hargreaves ◽  
Calum Davey ◽  
Elizabeth Fearon ◽  
Bernadette Hensen ◽  
Shari Krishnaratne
Keyword(s):  
Young People ◽  
Southern Africa ◽  
Socioeconomic Inequalities ◽  
Hiv Prevalence ◽  
Eastern And Southern Africa

Genetic polymorphism and population structure ofEchinococcus ortleppi

Parasitology ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 144 (4) ◽  
pp. 450-458 ◽  
Author(s):  
F. ADDY ◽  
M. WASSERMANN ◽  
F. BANDA ◽  
H. MBAYA ◽  
J. ASCHENBORN ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Genetic Polymorphism ◽  
South America ◽  
Southern Africa ◽  
Dna Sequences ◽  
Intraspecific Variability ◽  
Sensu Stricto ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Geographical Regions ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Eastern And Southern Africa

SUMMARYThe zoonotic cestodeEchinococcus ortleppi(Lopez-Neyra and Soler Planas, 1943) is mainly transmitted between dogs and cattle. It occurs worldwide but is only found sporadically in most regions, with the notable exception of parts of southern Africa and South America. Its epidemiology is little understood and the extent of intraspecific variability is unknown. We have analysed in the present study the genetic diversity among 178E. ortleppiisolates from sub-Saharan Africa, Europe and South America using the complete mitochondrialcox1(1608 bp) andnad1(894 bp) DNA sequences. Genetic polymorphism within the loci revealed 15cox1and sixnad1haplotypes, respectively, and 20 haplotypes of the concatenated genes. Presence of most haplotypes was correlated to geographical regions, and only one haplotype had a wider spread in both eastern and southern Africa. Intraspecific microvariance was low in comparison withEchinococcus granulosussensu stricto, despite the wide geographic range of examined isolates. In addition, the various sub-populations showed only subtle deviation from neutrality and were mostly genetically differentiated. This is the first insight into the population genetics of the enigmatic cattle adaptedEchinococcus ortleppi. It, therefore, provides baseline data for biogeographical comparison amongE. ortleppiendemic regions and for tracing its translocation paths.

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