IITA News

IITA banana breeder honored at international Musa meeting

On 3 May in Miami, Florida, IITA banana breeder Rony Swennen was honored with a prestigious award by the Association for Cooperation in Research and Integral Development of Banana and Plantains (ACORBAT). The award, which was presented by Dr Jorge Sandoval, President of ACORBAT, recognizes Swennen’s “unquantifiable contributions to the development of Musa research in…

Picture of US Ambassador H.E. Lucy Tamlyn (2nd from right) with IITA Biodiversity Center curator Georg Goergen, and US Embassy Political and Economic Section Chief Marisa N. Cohrs, IITA Emeritus Scientist Peter Neuenschwander, and USAID-Benin General Development Officer Geoffrey Minott.

US Ambassador to Benin visits IITA to learn more about the fall armyworm and the biodiversity center

On 7 May, the US Ambassador to Benin, H.E. Lucy Tamlyn, visited the IITA-Benin station accompanied by the US Embassy Political and Economic Section Chief Marisa N. Cohrs and USAID-Benin General Development Officer Geoffrey Minott.

Picture of Ranjana Bhattacharjee addressing farmers and other stakeholders

IITA participates in Farmers’ Day

On 19 April, IITA joined cocoa farmers in a Farmers’ Day at Akure, Ondo state.

Picture of Tonny Omwansa, IITA Director, Research Support services, discussing and enlightening the participants.

Research Support Services discuss achievements and way forward

The research support day held at IITA Conference Center, on 7 May, brought together staff members under the Research Support sub-directorate, including Communication Unit, Data and Information Management Unit (DIMU), Monitoring and Evaluation Unit (M&E), and Project Development and Administration Unit (PDAU).

Picture of Africa RISING in Zambia photobook

Photo reports: Africa RISING in Malawi and Zambia

The Africa RISING project management team recently visited different project sites in Malawi and Zambia.

Picture of Dr Allan Brown, IITA Banana Breeder

Musa project develops hybrids of local Tanzanian cooking banana “Mchare”

The banana breeding team at IITA in partnership with the national research team in Tanzania, has developed hybrids of one of the most popular cooking bananas in Tanzania and part of the East African Highland cooking banana called “Mchare.”

Picture of CIALCA introduced many AR4D technologies to farmers in Central Africa. Photo by P. Lepoint, Bioversity International.

Assessing impact of AR4D technologies on poverty reduction in farm households in Central Africa

A team of IITA socioeconomists carried out a study titled “Who benefits from which agricultural research-for-development technologies? Evidence from farm household poverty analysis in Central Africa, published in the World Development, ScienceDirect journal.

Picture of The Côte d’Ivoire Youth minister (second from left) listening to IITA Tanzania Youth representatives explaining aout their livestock feed production process.

Youth Minister from Côte d’Ivoire impressed with IITA Youth Agripreneurs

The Minister for Promotion of Youth, Youth Employment, and Civic Engagement of Côte d’Ivoire, The Hon. Sidi Tiémoko Toure, has remarked that the IITA Youth Agripreneur program in Tanzania is impressive and that he is convinced that agriculture holds great potential for tackling youth unemployment in Africa.

Picture of Dr Nzola Mahungu, Country Representative of IITA-DRC; Ir Augustin Kadima, delegate of USAID; Evariste Bushabu, General Secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture; Clement Kandu, Coordinator of SENASEM, at the workshop on CBSD.

Workshop on ‘’Validation of the revised and harmonized standards for seed system in DRC’’

IITA organized a workshop on validation of the revised and harmonized standards for healthy cassava plant materials production, control, and certification.

Picture of IITA Director General Nteranya Sanginga addressing Board members, German science and technology stakeholders, and other participants at a special session.

Board of Trustees meeting: IITA to transform into a project based institution

The IITA Board of Trustees (BoT) held its 2018 spring meeting in Bonn, Germany, 23–26 April.