PRISE Quarterly progress report – June 2017
PRISE inception workshops were held in Kenya, Ghana, and Zambia in March 2017. In the workshops it was recognised by partners that PRISE is a five year project and that the full benefits will only be fully available at the end. However to ensure that we deliver value in the interim we asked partners to…
Frosty Pod Rot announced on Caribbean Cocoa
Frosty Pod Rot, a potentially devastating disease of cocoa caused by the fungus Moniliophthora roreri, has been reported for the first time in Jamaica. First discovered in Ecuador in 1917, Frosty Pod Rot has since spread to many other Latin American countries including Colombia, Venezuela, Panama, Costa Rica, Peru, Nicaragua, Honduras and Guatemala. Until now, countries in the…
Cassava viruses threaten food security
Written by Joao Junior, Plantwise Knowledge Bank Intern. Known as the poor people’s crop, cassava (Manihot esculenta Crantz) is one of the most important subsistence crops in Africa, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa and West Africa being consumed fresh, cooked or processed. It is estimated that cassava contributes to nearly 40% of the total daily calories…
Plantwise celebrates helping farmers with more than 150,000 plant health queries
Plantwise is thrilled to announce over 150 000 records of visits by farmers to plant clinics have now been stored on the secure part of the Knowledge Bank site, the Plantwise Online Management System (POMS). Plant doctors are diagnosing pests and diseases and providing recommendations to help farmers reduce crop losses.
Plant doctors share their experience of e-plant clinics
Plantwise held an e-plant clinics review workshop on September 8th-9th in Machakos, Kenya. This workshop brought together the 30 plant doctors who, with funds from Dow AgroSciences, are now equipped with tablets and have been running e-plant clinics since their training in June 2015. The plant doctors are using the tablets in their clinics to…
A Leap from an ‘Analogue’ to a Digital Platform: The Story of Kenyan Plant Doctors
A blog written by Willis Ochilo The stage is set and all the participants are sitting. Beneath the veneer of silence that pervades the workshop room are deep-seated fears. And it does not take long for the same to come out to the fore. The setting is in Maanzoni Lodge in Machakos County. Here, the…
Take a look at SciDev.Net’s scoop on what Plantwise is doing with mobile
SciDev.Net, an online magazine aiming to ‘bring science and development together through news and analysis’, covers the work that Plantwise are doing with mobile in Kenya. It reports on how Plantwise’s mobile initiative is using new technologies to deliver good scientific information to agricultural extension workers in developing countries. This information aims to assist extension workers as they advice farmers…
Plantwise develops new app for farmers
CABI’s Plantwise team along with App development specialists White October have designed an app which provides in country extension workers with a portable electronic library of pest management factsheets. These factsheets are designed to help extension workers give farmers the most appropriate, effective and safe recommendations they can. The app, that aims to improve world food security, has already received…
Plantwise Factsheets App gets the attention of BBC radio [Video]
Plantwise and White October met up for an interview on BBC Radio Oxford’s Kat Orman show to talk about how the new Plantwise Factsheets Library app will help get good crop information out to local extension workers, helping them to help farmers.
The world’s last meal- what does a homogenous global diet mean for food security?
You’d think, from the vast variety of international cuisines that line our high streets and supermarket shelves, that globalisation was widening the global palate. Recent evidence suggests it’s just not the case. As the global diet narrows, concerns are growing for the world’s food security and the ecological implications of setting up a ‘global monoculture’. A recent PNAS study found that…