A prosperous and nutritionally secure drylands through demand-driven innovation Dr. David Bergvinson, DG, ICRISAT

2 November 2015 USA

SRF

17 Sustainable Development Goals with emphasis on sustainable and equitable food systems

We believe all people have a right to nutritious food and better livelihoods

ICRISAT works in the dryland tropics of sub-Saharan Africa and Asia to:

Our research activities are focused on crops of immense value to the nutrition and economics of the semi-arid tropics – dryland cereals (sorghum and millets) and grain legumes (chickpea, pigeonpea and groundnut).

ICRISAT - Our “Why”

WHY LEGUMES?

CLIMATE-HARDY, MICRONUTRIENT-DENSE CEREALS

ICRISAT’s holistic approach to the agricultural R4D value chain

Cross-cutting issues

Mainstreaming nutrition

Empowering women – women are consulted,

involved and supported to lead

Attracting youth to agriculture

Approach for Adoption

Participatory approach and partnering –

working side by side

Building capacity – at a national and local level

Integrating communications - to

build awareness and share knowledge

Monitoring and evaluation – for

feedback and adjustment

Policy support – work closely with

government to encourage the

needed policies

Developing

on-farm

practices and

technologies

Analyzing

key problems

and

opportunitiesManaging

soil and water

Crop

Improvement

& seed Access

Diversifying

Farms

Introducing

processing

Facilitating

market

access

Driving market

development

Managing and Sustaining Crop Collections (ICRISAT)

Morris et al., 2013. PNAS 110: 453-458

Population genomic and genome-wide association studies of agroclimatic traits in sorghum – 971 accessions

Unleashing Genomics to Accelerate Genetic Gain

8

International Pearl Millet Genome Sequencing Consortium

India

Revolving Seed Fund

Boundarypartners

Leadfarmers

Broadercommunity

ICRISAT has built a large network of delivery partners capable of identifying and equipping lead farmers …

… who rapidly mobilized others in their community to adopt new varieties, thereby motivating seed companies to produce, promote and distribute improved varieties

Science of Delivery and Adoption

Lead farmers have interest and capacity to assist others in community, are influential and trusted, and can take risk with testing new technologies

Boundary partners are community based NGOs & government extension system with aligned goals

Participatory Variety Selection – asking the farm family what they want in a new variety

Swarna-sub1

10

Crop

Improvement

& seed

Five new varieties including ICGV-SM 03517 now called Wamusanga (were released in September 2015.

Soil Mapping as an entry point under Bhoochetana: Our Watershed Story

Village1999

District2006

State2009

Nation2015

• All 37 functional wells• Water availability year • round

Partnering with corporates in various districts across different states in India.

Benefitting over 5 millions of farmers across Karnata

Genesis: Kothapally village, Telangana

ICRISAT is working closely with the Government of India to scale up its learnings

and water

Managing

soil and

water

http://annualreport.icrisat.org/