East Africa – DeSIRA-LIFT Community

New videos from Women, Coffee and Climate project

Manon Koningstein — Thu, 29 Feb 2024 14:02:01 +0000

Find below the newest videos from Women, Coffee and Climate project

LCSI: Insights from sub-national LSC Hub workshops in Kenya

Manon Koningstein — Thu, 29 Feb 2024 13:56:53 +0000

This blog was originally published on the website of the LSC-hub

At the workshop, participants were introduced to the content, features, and interface of the LSC hub.

Participants drawing their current landscape during the workshop

KENYA: The Land Soil and Crop (LSC) Hubs project organised two sub-national workshops in early February of this year as a counterpart to the national workshop held in Nairobi in December 2023. The four-day workshops, part of the work package “LSC-hubs use at local level”, took place in the preselected areas of Voi, Taita Taveta county (30 January-2 February), and in Busia, Busia county (5-8 February). The workshops were led by M. Okoti of the Kenya Agriculture and Livestock Research Organisation (KALRO). Stakeholder representatives of the respective counties, along with farmer organisations, NGO workers, private sector actors and extension officers, were among the groups trained.

Participants engaging in a discussion during the workshop

The workshop aimed to acquaint participants with the LSC hub’s content, functionality, interface and relevance. In doing so, participants were first brought up to speed on the concept of climate smart agriculture, the related practices, and the relevance of using the LSC hub by J. Recha of the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI). Stakeholders were then trained on the Participatory Integrated Planning (PIP) approach by M. van der Poel of Wageningen Environmental Research (WEnR). The training emphasised the need for bottom-up empowerment to achieve long-term impact. Through a series of exercises, participants first analysed their current landscape, followed by an imagined future landscape, and were asked to draft an action plan to attain their visions.

“The most interesting part of the training we had was the PIP…. This model is capable of helping and changing our communities a lot,” said one participant.

The PIP approach is an inclusive, bottom-up approach that engages people in environmental stewardship through transitioning from short-term and individual thinking toward long-term integrated planning. Through a series of workshops and exercises, it motivates stakeholders to invest in the resilience of their landscape.

Participants involved in action planning

Addressing the Soil and Water Conservation (SWC) and Integrated Soil Fertility Management (ISFM) practices that were stipulated in their action plans, stakeholders were asked to consult the hub to find the necessary information for their implementation in an activity led by K. Were of KALRO. The information (sources) were evaluated according to certain criteria such as availability, format, and relevance. This evaluation was done in a final set of exercises. The analyses of information sources and the feedback on the hub interface were collected and processed to provide valuable inputs for further hub development.

WATDEV: CIHEAM Bari welcomes beneficiaries from study areas for the Course on Climate-Smart Agriculture

Manon Koningstein — Tue, 27 Feb 2024 18:05:22 +0000

This blog was originally posted on the website of WATDEV

From the 11th to the 16th of December 2023, the International Centre for Advanced Mediterranean Agronomic Studies (CIHEAM) Bari, the technical and scientific lead partner in the WATDEV project, organized and conducted the 1st Module of a significant Training of Trainers on “Water, Soil, and Crop Management in Climate-Smart Agriculture” on its Campus in Bari, Italy.

The entire course was underpinned by the WATDEV project, funded by the DeSIRA initiative of the European Union. This initiative aims to develop a profound understanding of water and agricultural dynamics and management, fostering resilience to climate change through innovative research, modeling, and capacity-building approaches.

The Course Programme is the result of the collaborative efforts among all project partners of the consortium who conceived and planned its structure, namely CIHEAM Bari, the Italian National Research Council (CNR), The Association for Strengthening Agricultural Research in Eastern and Central Africa (ASARECA), Heliopolis University (HU), Water and Land Resource Centre, Addis Ababa University (WLRC), WRC Water Resource Centre University of Khartoum, and Kenya Agricultural and Livestock Research Organization (KALRO).

Fifteen representatives from universities and local authorities from Kenya, Ethiopia and Egypt together with further five participants (on-line) from Sudan attended the 1st Module, after being selected by project partners. The objective of this 1st Module was to empower local actors based in the study areas in the effective implementation of the best management practices (BMPs) and Innovations within their communities.

Biagio Di Terlizzi, CIHEAM Bari Deputy Director, and Claudio Bogliotti, DeSIRA Programme Coordinator at CIHEAM Bari, welcomed participants, followed by a presentation of the week’s training programme by Gaetano Ladisa, CIHEAM Bari Scientific Administrator and WATDEV scientific team leader joined by Silvia Lecci, CIHEAM Bari coordination team member of WATDEV.

The Course’s lecturers were experienced soil scientists, geneticists, agronomists, engineers, and officials of organizations such as FAO. The beneficiaries of the Course were junior researchers, public officers, extensionists actively engaged in BMPs implementation and innovation projects in the study areas. The involvement of such a varied group underscored the Course’s mission to establish a robust network of expertise capable of fostering sustainable development among local communities.

The Course’s programme is available here.

On the 15th of December, participants embarked on a field visit to the Irrigation Scheme District 10 (San Ferdinando di Puglia, Foggia) managed by the Consorzio di Bonifica di Capitanata. This allowed for a firsthand understanding of the technical and institutional aspects related to the consortium, including presentations on new technologies and automations. The visit extended to Consorzio di Bonifica Montana del Gargano, where participants witnessed bio-engineering interventions in Rignano Garganico.

In the next few months, the trainers will organize the transfer of the newly acquired knowledge to local farming community. The 2nd Module of the Course is due in late Spring 2024.

Photo Album

Bi-Annual LEG4DEV Research Progress meetings bring together LEG4DEV research teams across all project Activity Areas

Manon Koningstein — Tue, 27 Feb 2024 17:50:56 +0000

This blog was originally published on the website of LEG4DEV

In December 2023, the LEG4DEV research project, funded through the EU Commission’s DeSIRA Initiative, concluded their second Research Progress Meeting for 2023, reviewing the ongoing progress by the LEG4DEV researchers across the project’s Activity Areas.

In addition to fortnightly progress meetings for each Activity Area research team, the LEG4DEV project also runs two internal LEG4DEV Research Progress Meetings per year, where the LEG4DEV researchers from across all Activity Areas present their latest findings and draft research outputs. The research underway focuses on intensification of legume-based systems, spanning agronomy, nutrition, water, labour, enterprise and policy research. There is a strong emphasis being placed on generation of research outputs that can be of use to next-users for scaling of legumes for development outcomes.

The LEG4DEV Research Progress Meetings are a platform for sharing of research ideas, approaches and for coordination across the partners and researchers. The thematic cross-cutting and participatory approach helps foster shared understanding across the research teams and is critical for the progress of the LEG4DEV initiative.

Research supervisors and scientists from across the LEG4DEV partner organisations also attended in relation to the research activities they are engaged in with the project. ILRI scientist, Dr. John Recha who is a key member of the LEG4DEV research team, gave a presentation on participatory approaches, highlighting the importance of stakeholder and scaling partner participation.

For 2024, the project has a strong focus on accelerating the shift to more extensive primary data collection through field trials and stakeholder surveys to critically evaluate the accuracy and reliability of current assumptions, models and methodologies. Recognizing the importance of engaging with scaling partners so that research outputs are of use for scaling legumes, the project is placing a renewed emphasis on more extensive scaling partner engagement.

Land Soil Crop Hubs carried out training on digital soil mapping in Musanze, Rwanda

Manon Koningstein — Thu, 18 Jan 2024 11:34:41 +0000

From November 21-23, the Land Soil Crop Hubs project carried out training on digital soil mapping in Musanze, Rwanda. Thirteen people attended the training delivered by project team members from ISRIC – World Soil Information delivered the training to Rwandan professionals with most coming from LSC Hubs project partner Rwanda Agriculture and Animal Resources Development Board (RAB). The primary focus of the training was the joint development of a new set of high-resolution digital soil maps of Rwanda. This was the fourth training provided by ISRIC – World Soil Information in Rwanda.

Thirteen people attended the training, coming from RAB, the Rwanda Ministry of Agriculture and Animal Resources, the Rwanda Space Agency and the International Union for Conservation of Nature. The training took place at the RAB station in Musanze. Participants dug deeper into the digital soil mapping workflow and practiced the process that will help them develop and update their digital soil maps using the statistical software R. Later they used the procedures learned to produce new gridded soil maps for Rwanda. In addition, trainers did an overview of Google’s Earth Engine Data Catalogue and demonstrated how imagery contained in that catalog can be obtained to support digital soil mapping

More here: https://lsc-hubs.org/2023/12/04/digital-soil-mapping-training-completed-in-rwanda/

LSC Hubs fieldwork research featured in the ISRIC World Soil Day celebration.

Manon Koningstein — Thu, 18 Jan 2024 11:32:36 +0000

Every year on December 5, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organizations supports worldwide celebrations of soil for World Soil Day. This year, Land Soil Crop Hubs project partner ISRIC – World Soil Information hosted a celebration in their World Soil Museum and featured PhD candidate Musefa Redis research which is undertaken through this project.

Musefa led participants on a virtual excursion of his fieldwork in Central Ethiopia which is producing new soil data to enable climate-smart fertilizer recommendations.

The goal of this fieldwork research is to measure rooted soil depth in the field as part of the Root Zone Plant Available Water Holding Capacity (RZ-PAWHC) and the individual rootability-limiting soil factors (constraints) for central Ethiopia.

More here: https://lsc-hubs.org/2023/12/07/world-soil-day-celebration-featured-lsc-hubs-research/

The Land, Soil, and Crop Information Services (LSC-IS) to support Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA) project organised a national workshop in Rwanda from 30th November to 1st December 2023

Manon Koningstein — Thu, 18 Jan 2024 11:31:12 +0000

The workshop was hosted by Rwanda Agriculture and Animal Resources Development Board (RAB) coordinated by the International Livestock Research Institute and supported by the staff of ISRIC – World Soil Information, Wageningen Centre for Development Innovation (WCDI), Wageningen Environmental Research, World Agroforestry (CIFOR-ICRAF) and the Association for Strengthening Agricultural Research in Eastern and Central Africa (ASARECA) and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

The workshop brought together 35 national users of land soil crop (LSC) data hubs in the agricultural knowledge and innovation system (AKIS) in Rwanda. The participants received hands-on training on how to access the LSC Hub, and how to use the information contained in the Hub.

More here: https://lsc-hubs.org/2023/12/07/national-training-workshop-on-lsc-hub-held-in-rwanda/

LSC Hubs project: Data management training in Kenya

Manon Koningstein — Thu, 18 Jan 2024 11:29:44 +0000

From 11-14, December, members of the Kenya Agriculture and Livestock Research Organization (KALRO), the Kenya Department of Remote Sensing and Resource Surveys, the Kenya Forest Service and the Kenya Met Department came together at a data management training led by ISRIC – World Soil Information as part of the Land Soil Crop Hubs (LSC Hubs) project. The purpose of the training included:

understanding FAIR (findable, accessible, interoperable, reusable) data principles
the benefit of relevant and standardised metadata
tools to create, import, convert, and validate metadata
and to set up automated workflows for data management.

The workshop is relevant to operators of spatial data infrastructures, data scientists and data custodians. Capacity training is part of the LSC Hubs project to develop the capacity of staff of the hub hosts in the routine operations, maintenance and facilitation of use of the LSC Hub. In Kenya, the hub host will be KALRO.

More here: https://lsc-hubs.org/2023/12/14/data-management-training-completed-in-kenya/

RAIZ Project partners convene a participatory workshop to amplify awareness and gather feedback

Manon Koningstein — Thu, 18 Jan 2024 11:20:38 +0000

Resilience Building through Agroecological Intensification in Zimbabwe (RAIZ) Project partners convened a participatory workshop on the 7th of November 2023 to amplify awareness of the RAIZ project and gather valuable feedback from key stakeholders in Mutoko District.

The workshop brought together a diverse range of participants, stemming from representatives from various Ministries that included: Women’s Affairs, Youth, Agriculture, Local Leadership; RDC; Extension Officers, RAIZ project students and farmers from Ward 10 and 13 (now referred to as ward 8).

Recognizing the strategic role of agroecological approaches in tackling climate change and enhancing sustainable agriculture in arid areas, the RAIZ project implemented by CIRAD, the University of Zimbabwe and CIMMYT, are undertaking research actions to produce scientific evidence to feed into agroecology policy.

Mutoko District is frequently affected by the impacts of climate change especially droughts; mid-season dry spells and rainfall variability – interventions that are focused on addressing climate change impacts whether through research as with this RAIZ project and/or development actions are important in the district.

More here https://raiz.org.zw/mutoko-district-stakeholder-engagement-action/

LIPS-ZIM Project enhanced disease surveillance and control in Mat South and Masvingo Provinces.

Manon Koningstein — Thu, 18 Jan 2024 11:15:55 +0000

In November 2023, the LIPS-ZIM project led by the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), in partnership with the Government of Zimbabwe launched new Gwanda and refurbished Masvingo Provincial Veterinary laboratories to address threats posed by livestock diseases to productivity. The two labs will improve veterinary service delivery and disease surveillance in their respective provinces, particularly for tick-borne diseases that cause high cattle mortality.

LIPS-ZIM project coordinator, Sikhalazo Dube, emphasized that the project employs a comprehensive, sustainable approach to increased livestock productivity that includes both enhancing the adoption of climate-relevant technologies and researching the epidemiology of diseases and efficient control mechanisms. Also, the project has facilitated training for veterinary epidemiologists and staff from animal research services on database management.

This government-led initiative is implemented in consortium with the University of Zimbabwe the International Livestock Research Institute, the CIMMYT research center, and the CIRAD research institute. Livestock rearing is one of the main economic activities in both Matabeleland South and Masvingo. However, since as far back as the 2000s animal diseases remain one of the biggest limitations to livestock production and trade in the country, with Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD), Rabies, Newcastle, African swine fever, Anthrax, tick-borne diseases, and trypanosomiasis posing major threats to the national herd livestock sector’s sustainability.

More here: https://lips-zim.org/news/lips-zim-project-enhances-disease-surveillance-and-control-mat-south-and-masvingo-provinces

Read more about LIPS-Zim: https://lips-zim.org/: https://hdl.handle.net/10568/119881