Nigeria has launched a "Soil Doctor" programme after decades of declining soil health and mounting malnutrition
Jun 17 2016   Africa’s most populous country has launched a long-overdue national program for its millions of small-scale family farmers: a soil test kit linked to the digital cloud. The program by the government of Nigeria follows decades of declining soil...

Are conservation agriculture (CA) systems productive and profitable options for smallholder farmers in different agro-ecoregions of Zimbabwe?
Jun 11 2016   Continuous conventional tillage coupled with unsystematic cereal/legume rotations has promoted low crop productivity on smallholder farms. A multi-locational study was established in three agro-ecoregions (AEs) of Zimbabwe. The aim of the study was...

Ten Truths About Conservation Agriculture and Smallholder Farmers
May 06 2016   There are growing numbers of smallholder farmers throughout the developing world who are successfully implementing conservation agriculture practices adapted to specific local conditions and existing crop and livestock production customs. As a...

Push-Pull Technology
Apr 14 2016   Consultative meeting on the implementation of "organic" push-pull based Conservation Agriculture technology in Zambia and Malawi in ICIPE Thomas Odhiambo Campus Over 60% of Africans depend on some form of farming for their sustenance and...

Zimbabwe’s farming wizard grows bumper crop in worst drought in years
Mar 24 2016   “The project teaches techniques to help farmers improve their harvests while cutting their costs. The methods include mulching fields to save water, planting crops in dug-out basins filled with manure, planting different types of crops together...

International Year of Pulses 2016
Mar 16 2016   International Year of Pulses 2016 The 68th UN General Assembly declared 2016 the International Year of Pulses (IYP) ( A/RES/68/231 )The Global Pulse Confederation and its IYP 2016 partners have identified a series of thematic areas that will be the...

Conservation Agriculture: for smallholder farmers in Africa?
Mar 16 2016   Conservation Agriculture (CA) increasingly dominates debates on agricultural development policy in Africa. Over the past decade lots of (donor) money has been spent on the promotion of CA to smallholder farmers and often such interventions have...

Farm Machinery for Conservation Agriculture
Feb 29 2016   Conservation Agriculture a farming strategy based on three principles of minimum soil disturbance (or direct seeding), permanent vegetative soil cover and crop rotation is seen as the alternative to tillage, with multiple benefits with regard to...

Break the chain of desperation that leads to emergencies, development leaders told
Feb 29 2016   Against a backdrop of new reports that show the number of refugees entering Europe has continued to skyrocket, senior government officials attending the final day of the International Fund for Agricultural Development’s 39th Governing Council,...

Study Finds that Smallholder Farmers Need More Support to Adopt Conservation Agriculture Practices
Feb 16 2016   Conservation agriculture can be economically beneficial for many countries, while also promoting restorative soil management by improving soil nutrition and fertility, according to the Conservation Agriculture Group at Cornell University. A recent...