Some ILRI crop-livestock work relevant to SIMLESA

Alan Duncan, Peter Thorne, Endalkachew Wolde-Meskel

SIMLESA planning meeting , Addis Ababa, 7-11 April 2014

Introduction

• Africa RISING = Africa Research In Sustainable Intensification for the Next Generation

• Three research-for-development projects supported by the United States Agency for International Development(USAID) as part of the U.S. government’s Feed the Future initiative (www.feedthefuture.gov).

• Create opportunities for smallholder farm households to move out of hunger and poverty through sustainably intensified farming systems that improve food, nutrition, and income security, particularly for women and children, and conserve or enhance the natural resource base.

Projects

Three project are located in the Ethiopian highlands, West Africa East and Southern Africa

Managed by ILRI and IITA Monitoring and Evaluation, IFPRI

Ethiopian Highlands

Africa RISING in Ethiopian highlands: improve food security and farm income diversification through sustainable intensification of crop-livestock systems

Integrated approach: strong participatory base to identify technologies and management practices that could work for farmers whilst accounting for the wider contexts in which these must operate (e.g. market access, effectiveness of institutions, policy environment).

Research Outline: Ethiopian Highlands

LegumeCHOICE: Realizing the underexploited potential of multi-purpose legumes towards improved livelihoods and a better

environment in crop-livestock systems in East & Central Africa

Donor: BMZDuration: April 2014 for Mar 2017Consortium

International Institute for Tropical Agriculture (IITA)Université Catholique de Bukavu (UCB), DR CongoKenya Agricultural Research Institute (KARI), KenyaEthiopian Institute for Agricultural Research (EIAR), EthiopiaUniversity of Hohenheim, GermanyInternational Livestock Research Institute (ILRI)World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF)

LegumeChoice problem tree

Figure 1: Problem tree defining the core problem addressed by the proposed research along with tracing selected causes to outputs and effects to SLO’s.

Putting nitrogen fixation to work for smallholder farmers in Africa

N2Africawww.N2Africa.org

Putting nitrogen fixation to work for smallholder farmers in Africa

Introduction to N2Africa

• Led by Wageningen University; main

partners IITA and ILRI; many national

partners

• Originally eight countries in 2009

• Extension in 2012 to Ethiopia,

Tanzania, Uganda

• Phase II five core countries and tier

countries

Putting nitrogen fixation to work for smallholder farmers in Africa

Main goal: increasing inputs from N2-fixation

Increase the area of land cropped with legumes (targeting of technologies)

• Increase legume productivity (agronomy, P-fertilizer)

• Select better legume varieties• Select better rhizobium strains

and inoculate• Link to markets and enterprises to

increase demand for legumes

Putting nitrogen fixation to work for smallholder farmers in Africa

N2Africa – target regions and legumes

West Africa• Cowpea, groundnut, soybean

East & Central Africa• Common bean, groundnut, soybean

Chickpea Faba bean

Southern Africa• Common bean, groundnut, soybean

Throughout all regions• Forage legumes

Putting nitrogen fixation to work for smallholder farmers in Africa

N2Africa is a development to research project

• Dissemination and Development are the core

• Monitoring & evaluation provides the learning

• Research analyses and feeds back

M&E

D&D

Research

Putting nitrogen fixation to work for smallholder farmers in Africa

Great potential to link to SIMLESA -CIMMYT

Putting nitrogen fixation to work for smallholder farmers in Africa

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+P

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Chickpea grain yield in control plot (t/ha)

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Farmers are missing out the benefit of applying P with out N being sufficient

Putting nitrogen fixation to work for smallholder farmers in Africa

Benefits (yield + soil fertility) maximized

FTC, intercropping of maize and common bean, at Dambi Dima, Bako tibe woreda (promoted by Bako ARC

Potential livestock activities in SIMLESA Phase II

Assessment of the Role of Livestock in Livestock-Maize-Legume systems

Participatory assessments, livelihoods analysis and qualitative and quantitative ex ante impact assessments (including modelling studies)Assessment of Demand for and Supply of FeedFEAST (Feed Assessment Tool) - analysing the seasonal dynamics of feed resource availability and use and their relationship to resource use issues in other components of the systemIdentification of potential feeding interventionsTechfit: Simple scoring tool for prioritizing feed interventionsCould be used by partners to identify a “basket” of viable interventions for testing and adaptation via SIMLESA II

Potential livestock activities in SIMLESA Phase II

Integration of forage and other legumes.the evaluation of the livestock feed ‘pull’ for forage, grain and multi-purpose legumes;the nutritive value of different legumes for livestock and their suitability and contribution to livestock feeding;Opportunities for optimising crop residue use.Choose with crop improvement/agronomy partner, cereal and leguminous cultivars that are better than currently available/used cultivars at matching farmers needs for food, feed and fodder, and other uses (fuel , construction etc.) where appropriate;Improve utilization of cereal and leguminous crop residues better through supplementation, on farm processing etc;Encourage small scale feed/fodder processing business around transit of crop residues .

Potential livestock activities in SIMLESA Phase II

Analysis of trade-offs (issues and potential solutions) in Livestock-Maize-Legume systems

Build on Systemwide Livestock Programme work on biomass trade-offs: feed vs. mulch and other uses. Some bio-economic modelling?

Innovation platform briefs

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