Chapters authored
A New Paradigm in the Delivery of Modernizing Agricultural Technologies across Africa
This Chapter describes the approach and impacts of the Technologies for African Agricultural Transformation (TAAT) Program. TAAT is an operational framework based upon collaboration between the African Development Bank, the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, and many other partners. This Program is designed to deliver modernizing agricultural technologies as a means of achieving food and nutritional security, and to boost employment and agricultural exports across Africa. TAAT consists of nine Commodity Compacts that have assembled technology toolkits for use in development programs and six specialized Enablers that help them to do so. These commodities are rice, maize, wheat, sorghum, millet, cassava, sweet potato, common beans, fish, and small livestock. The Enablers provide policy support, youth empowerment, capacity development, irrigation and soil fertility expertise, and control of invasive pests. Together these Compacts and Enablers design and conduct collaborative agricultural development projects in partnership with national counterparts. To date, TAAT has staged 88 interventions in 31 African countries, including the incorporation of customized technology toolkits within country loan projects of major development banks. Over three years, these efforts have reached about 10.6 million adopter households and increased food supply by 12 million tons worth over US $763 million, resulting in substantial improvements in smallholder farmer’s food supply (0.75 MT yr.−1) or income ($128 yr.−1). Environmental gains in terms of carbon offset average 0.74 MT CO2e yr.−1 per adopter household, an outcome indicative of positive combined rural development and climate actions. This Chapter describes how these technology toolkits are designed, deployed and evaluated, and how TAAT is becoming a leading mechanism for agricultural innovation delivery across Africa. This evaluation is limited to eight critical field crops and does not consider animal enterprises or the strategic roles of TAAT Enablers, two other important activities within the larger Program.
Part of the book: Technology in Agriculture
Blending Climate Action and Rural Development in Africa’s Sahel
This paper describes the opportunity for combining climate action and improved food and nutritional security as mutual elements of rural development projects, with particular reference to the situation in the African Sahel. This progress is achieved by identifying climate-smart agricultural production technologies and bundling them into solutions for inclusion within larger projects and programs. Seventeen (17) such technologies are offered in this chapter that represent genetic innovations, improved soil and water management, and directed improvement across landscapes. Examples of the efficacy of these technologies are presented based on results from the African Agricultural Transformation Program (TAAT) with specific reference to improved cereal production. An example of the deployment of TAAT technologies for millet and sorghum involving 83,620 households managing 123,863 ha led to nearly 200,000 MT of increased food production worth about $42 million. This effort led to an estimated annual increase of 177,279 MT CO2e in biomass and soil worth $3.9 million, assuming buyers could be found. The relationship between three principal drivers of agricultural transformation, the public, private, and farming sectors, is considered in terms of how these different technologies are mobilized and deployed. The potential for increasing food supply and carbon gains under current agricultural investment levels across the Sahel by International Financial Institutions, about $683 million per year, is described. This chapter then offers recommendations in how improved rural development projects combining climate action and food security in the Sahel may be designed in the future.
Part of the book: Sustainable Rural Development Perspective and Global Challenges