East Africa’s bean industry adapts to climate change
Climate change is likely to have a severe impact on East Africa’s bean industry. Beans are a vital crop, with over 200 million people in Sub-Saharan Africa depending on them as their most important pulse.
PlantwisePlus training helps Kenya meet KS1758 food safety standard
CABI – through the PlantwisePlus programme and in partnership with the Fresh Produce Consortium of Kenya (FPC Kenya) – has delivered training to help Kenya meet the KS1758 food safety standard for its fruits, vegetables and flowers.
Mass rearing training strengthens papaya mealybug biocontrol programme in Kenya
PlantwisePlus has been working in collaboration with partners in Kenya to implement a classical biological control strategy to manage papaya mealybug (Paracoccus marginatus). The invasive pest has been devastating papaya crops in Kenya. A CABI study in 2019 found it caused an estimated 57% yield losses across five counties.
Consumer food safety perceptions, Kenya
Food safety is essential for food security. It is key to meeting many of the Sustainable Development Goals, particularly SDG2 ‘Zero Hunger’, SDG 3 ‘Good health and wellbeing’ and SDG 6 ‘Clean water and sanitation. Safe food is also critical for economic development. Food-borne diseases can keep people from working and prospering and can negatively…
PRISE pest alerts mean farmers and advisors have more time to prepare for pest infestations
This article was originally published on prise.org An estimated 40% of the world’s crops are lost to pests impacting on smallholder farmers’ ability to feed their families, on international trade and food supply chains and hampering the pursuit of Sustainable Development Goals 1 and 2. Pest outbreaks are devastating, respect no political boundaries and are…
Why it’s so critical to continuously monitor and manage plant diseases
This article was originally published on The Conversation. Most of us understand the critical importance of monitoring the spread of diseases. And it is as important for plant diseases as it is for humans. Plant disease epidemics are often hidden from view, unlike human viral disease outbreaks. Yet food and forest production systems, as well as native…
Education on safe pesticide use crucial for farmers in rural Kenya
A team from CABI, AMPATH and Corteva recently visited an area in the Rift Valley and discovered alarming evidence that farmers are unaware of the harmful effects of agricultural pesticides. Through indiscriminate use, poor handling, storage and application of pesticides, farmers in the area are harming consumers and themselves.
Microloans make farming profitable for Kenyan smallholders
This article was originally published on SciDev.Net This article is supported by the CASA programme. For 40-year-old Beatrice Mulwale, a smallholder farmer from western Kenya, poor yields and low income had been par for the course for most of her farming life.
More than advice: farmers say paid-for extension must provide a “bundle of services”
Agricultural advisory services are a critical factor to promoting agricultural development, and investments in extension services are potentially important tools for improving agricultural productivity and increasing farmers’ incomes, two desirable outcomes of food security and poverty reduction articulated in MDGs and SDGs.
Improving resistance of Kenya’s cabbage and kale crops to TuMV disease
A team of international scientists from CABI, the Kenyan Agricultural and Livestock Research Organisation (KALRO), NIAB EMR (UK), University of Warwick (UK) and Syngenta (Netherlands) are seeking to improve the resistance of Kenya’s cabbage and kale crops to Turnip mosaic virus (TuMV). In the distantly-related Chinese cabbage (Brassica rapa), a potentially durable TuMV disease resistance trait was identified by Professor John Walsh at the…