Articles
Blog articles
Harnessing synergies of crop-livestock integration for climate-smart agriculture
Integrated crop-livestock systems that provide synergies towards more resilient climate-smart agricultural production systems are possible despite the recognised competition between crops and livestock enterprises. To make this work, it is necessary to understand the trade-offs and capitalise on the opportunities provided through integration.
Read MoreDelivering bundled digital products and services for climate-smart agriculture in Zimbabwe
by Prince Kuipa and Caroline Mozhendi
In Zimbabwe, climate change is emerging as the most serious threat to agriculture. To address the challenge, a leading farmers’ organisation has teamed up with a private sector telecoms company to provide bundled climate-smart agriculture products and services to farmers.
Read MoreThe Sun Exchange: Democratising energy
by Jaclyn Bolt and Osseni Senou
Founded by Abraham Cambridge in 2014, The Sun Exchange is based in South Africa where the company is working to address a huge gap in funding for solar projects. Today, their solution is helping to power factories, schools and wildlife. In this article, Cambridge details Sun Exchange’s experience with blockchain technology.
Read MoreInnovative partnerships based on shared value accelerate the upscaling of CSA solutions
by Oluyede Ajayi and Mariam Kadzamira
Many climate-smart agriculture (CSA) innovations have been developed to help farmers achieve the triple wins of adaptation, productivity and, where possible, reduced emissions. As efforts by different organisations move forward to improve adoption, it is clear that a wide range of factors influence uptake of CSA. Field experiences with CSA projects in three countries highlight how developing shared value among partners has supported the scaling up of CSA.
Read MoreWhy expanding value chain access is important for young agripreneurs
When engaging with youth agripreneurs in Africa on the challenges they face, access to finance emerges as a key concern. Closer scrutiny of their business models generally reveals that young entrepreneurs are often not deemed creditworthy, or suitable for investment, primarily because they lack consistent and deep access to their perceived target markets. In short, their order books are lean and their access to markets is limited.
Read MoreImpact Stories
Coping with climate change in Southern Africa
By the time CTA’s regional flagship project for Southern Africa comes to an end in 2020, around 140,000 small-scale farmers in Zambia, Zimbabwe and Malawi will have adopted a range of climate-smart strategies to help them cope with drought and erratic weather patterns. About 75,000 farmers are benefiting from the bundle of climate-smart agricultural solutions at the end of the first year of implementation.
Read MoreChampioning women and organic coffee farming in Jamaica
Vibrant reggae music, athletic prowess, flavoursome food and white sandy beaches are perhaps what Jamaica is best known for. Also coffee – but not so much the organic version. For over 20 years, Dorienne Rowan-Campbell has been working hard to change that.
Read MoreClimate change in Southern Africa: Information is power
Since becoming a farmer in 2001, Phineas Muyabi from Chibombo District in Zambia has struggled to produce enough food for his family to eat. Droughts have destroyed his crops and, as a result, his family has had to rely upon food aid. This year, however, Muyabi is benefiting from CTA’s regional flagship project for Southern Africa, ‘Scaling up Climate Smart Agricultural Solutions for Cereal and Livestock Farmers’.
Read MoreFor farming fortune, dial mAgri
A Botswanan start-up is breaking the barriers to digital technologies for rural smallholder farmers. Brastorne Enterprises, a winner of CTA’s 2016 Pitch AgriHack competition, operates a mobile platform called mAgri to improve farmers’ access to information, markets and finance.
Read MoreFarming by Phone to keep up with the Climate
A project known as MUIIS (Market-led, User-owned ICT4Ag-enabled Information Services), led by the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA), links farmers to satellite-based services that help them to increase crop yields. Tips and instructions sent to mobile devices get as specific as ‘spread fertilizer between 5 pm and 7 pm’ or ‘winds expected at 3 pm’. Something farmers say have increased crop yields and contributed to food security.
Read MorePress release
CTA awards grants to support blockchain use in agriculture across ACP
CTA has awarded four grants to support the use of blockchain in agriculture across Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific (ACP).
Read MoreProject increases Ugandan smallholder yields and incomes by 70%
Kampala, Uganda February 13. Leveraging big data, a CTA-led project has significantly increased crop yields and incomes for thousands of Ugandan smallholder farmers.
Read More20,000 Ethiopian Smallholders Targeted with Climate Smart Technology
CTA together with Farm Africa has launched a new project to promote the resilience of smallholder farmers against climate change in Ethiopia’s Southern Nations Nationalities and Peoples’ Region (SNNPR). The launch is the third and final of a CTA initiative that supports the scaling of proven climate smart agriculture technologies in Jamaica, Mali and now Ethiopia.
Read MoreNew index to tackle food safety scourge and threat to African health and trade
Dakar, Senegal, October 2. The African Food Safety Index (AFSI) launched today will help to tackle the burden of foodborne diseases that a recent global assessment found to be comparable to that of malaria, HIV/AIDs or tuberculosis.
Read MoreNew report highlights promising signs of export diversification in African agricultural trade
KIGALI, 6 September 2018 – A new report highlights the role agricultural trade plays in Africa and draws out important policy measures that African governments will need to take to benefit fully from intra-African trade as well as global trade in agricultural products.
Read MoreICT Update
IT solutions are disruptive: they change the way things are working
Interview with Martin Njeru, the Account Director for Cojengo in the East Africa region.
Read MoremAgri and the woman driving innovation
Naledi Magowe, a young female agri-tech entrepreneur, shares her experiences of building her start-up Brastorne Enterprises and the increasing impact her mobile app mAgri is making in Botswana and plans for expansion.
Read MoreDeveloping sustainable ICT driven solutions and agroecology
Ezinne Merianchris Emeana a researcher at Coventry University discussed how the SmartAgroecology app is promoting the sharing of agro-ecological knowledge and skills amongst women farmers and extension personnel in Nigeria in order to help them achieve sustainable production and livelihood.
Read MoreCan access to data really transform agriculture for smallholders?
by Yanick Bakker , Jasmien Bronckaers , Fatma Ben Rejeb and Chris Addison
In order to feed 9 billion people by 2050, sustainable agricultural growth in needed, supporting an agricultural sector which produces enough food, which is inclusive and resilient, and which makes optimal use of innovation and digital solutions. Smallholder and family farmers must play a key role in achieving this. A 80% of the world’s food supply is produced by small-scale and family farmers, yet their full production potential is hardly reached.
Read MoreFarmer registration and development – the SACAU experience in Lesotho and eSwatini
Dispersed smallholder farmers in Sub-Sahara Africa are at risk of social and economic exclusion. Digital innovation and an enabling policy environment can help smallholders to transition out of poverty. The Southern African Confederation of Agricultural Unions (SACAU) considers farmers’ organisations to be the key to drive this change.
Read MoreSpore
“African agricultural policies have to be climate proofed”
Zambia Country Director for the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), Nachilala Nkombo, discusses the role of both the public and private sectors in adapting agricultural value chains in response to the dual challenges of rapid population growth, and climate change.
Read MoreReaping the economic rewards of conservation
To overcome the issues of drought and extreme poverty in Zambia, smallholders are being rewarded for taking up climate-smart, conservation practices to increase productivity and protect their environment.
Read MoreIrrigating Mozambique’s vulnerable south
by Sam Price
A climate-smart agriculture initiative is boosting the productivity and food security of Mozambique’s smallholders by providing climate resilient farming infrastructure.
Read MorePublications
The next generation of farmers: successes and new opportunities
The global population is on track to surpass 9 billion by 2050 and exceed 11 billion by the end of the century. The world’s 500 million smallholder farms produce around 80% of our food and it is they who will have to carry the burden of increasing food production by over 70%. The information in this document was compiled as background reading material for the 53rd Brussels Briefing on The next generation of farmers: successes and opportunities.
Read MoreFood safety: a critical part of the food system in Africa
by Lebo Mofolo and Isolina Boto
Food safety is linked, directly or indirectly, to the achievement of many of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), especially those pertaining to ending hunger and poverty, and promoting good health and well-being. Food and nutritional security is realised only when essential elements of a healthy diet are safe to eat. The information in this document was compiled as background reading material for the 52nd Brussels Briefing on Food safety: a critical part of the food system in Africa.
Read MoreGrowing food in the cities: Successes and new opportunities
by Lebo Mofolo and Isolina Boto
Towns and cities in the world’s developing countries are growing on an unprecedented scale. In 1960, the global urban population was 34% of the total; by 2014 54% of the total and growing. By 2050, the proportion living in urban areas is expected to reach 66% (UNDESA). Sub-Saharan Africa’s annual urban growth rate is 3.6%, almost double the world average. The information in this document was compiled as background reading material for the 50th Brussels Development Briefing on Growing food in the cities: Successes and new opportunities.
Read MoreStrengthening rural livelihoods in the face of rapid urbanisation in Africa
by Lebo Mofolo and Isolina Boto
Globalization and urbanisation have transformed economies and social systems in countries around the world in the past decades. The information in this document was compiled as background reading material for the 48th Brussels Development Briefing on Strengthening rural livelihoods in the face of rapid urbanisation in Africa co-organised by CTA, BMZ/GIZ, ACP Secretariat, European Commission (DG DEVCO) and Concord.
Read MoreEvents
-
Jun 25
IBLI policy workshop for the Horn of Africa
ILRI, in collaboration with CTA, is organising a workshop on "IBLI sustainable scaling", targeting IGAD countries' policy makers, private industry actors and representatives of international organisations involved in disaster risk financing initiatives.
Location:Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
-
May 15
Policy workshop: Climate finance for agriculture in Zimbabwe
Agriculture is central to any debate on climate change given the enormous responsibility placed on the sector to produce 60% more food by 2050 despite changing climatic uncertainties. The case for increased investment in climate-smart agriculture has been articulated in different forums as a way to promote agricultural transformation and chart a path to scale up climate actions in agricu…Location:Harare, Zimbabwe
-
May 14
Project review and cross-country learning on climate-smart agriculture
The regional project to scale-up climate-smart agriculture (CSA) solutions in southern Africa is implemented by CTA in collaboration with a consortium of partners in southern Africa. The field implementation has been taking place in Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe to improve the resilience of smallholder farmers to climate change, with a reach targeting 140,000 farmers. …Location:Johannesburg, South Africa
-
Mar 11
Strengthening sustainable access and effective utilisation of open data in agriculture and nutrition initiatives
One of the persistent challenges facing various stakeholders in the agriculture and nutrition sector in Zimbabwe is physical and cognitive access to relevant credible evidence to use in identifying research priorities, doing the research, develop policy and in making programme interventions to ensure food and nutrition security. This workshop will target food and n…Location:Harare, Zimbabwe
-
Feb 25
VALUE4HER workshop: "Financial Management: Measuring and Growing Business Performance"
Under the VALUE4HER project, AWIEF is hosting a two-day free training workshop on “Financial Management: Measuring and Growing Business Performance” for women in tech and agribusiness, in partnership with Botswana Innovation Hub (BIH).
Location:Gaborone, Botswana