Innovation for climate-smart agric key to ending hunger.

Innovation for climate-smart agric key to ending hunger. Rising temperatures and unpredictable rainy seasons could destroy crop yield gains made in the recent past, and the threats of extreme weather such as flooding, drought and pests becoming more real. These will make production more difficult and spike food prices, hurting the prospects of reaching Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 2 on ending hunger. Already, many countries in Africa have seen a decline in food security, with other key factors contributing to this deterioration being urban growth, greater household expenditures on food and decrease in international food aid programmes. The recent drought across Eastern and Southern Africa has slowed down programmes for adaptation and resilience-building, forcing a shift towards alleviating hunger and malnutrition-related crises.

Farm experts take stock to tackle food security in Nigeria.

Farm experts take stock to tackle food security in Nigeria. Farm experts drawn from the diverse field of the country’s agricultural value chain rose from a two-day meeting, at the Reiz continental hotel Abuja, on Tuesday, hearing how a German development initiative, the Green Innovations Centres for the Agriculture and Food Sector in Nigeria, has trained over 27,000 farmers and is setting sail to create partnership with rice, cassava, maize and potatoes processors and input dealers to secure the country’s food future. The coordinator for the Green Innovations Centre in Nigeria, Annemarie Matthess, who organized the meeting, said while “the purpose of this meeting is to have a stock taking of what has been achieved in the last 27 months and create partnership with rice, cassava, maize and potatoes processors and input dealers,” the centre’s strategic goal is to train over 200,000 smallholders and processing companies, boost employment growth with at least 1000 new jobs, and increase in income by an average of 20 per cent for 170,000 smallholder farms. The Green Innovations Center, GIZ, is an initiative commissioned by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), and has the additional mandate of taking innovation centers to Institutions across Nigeria, said Ms. Matthess who doubles in her role as the head of programme of the Sustainable Smallholders Agricultural business programme in the country.

International Seminar on Comprehensive Local Agriculture Plan, #C-LAP .

Nigeria’s 774 local governments under the auspices of the All Local Governments Association of Nigeria, ALGON, is hosting an international seminar on developing agricultural assets of their respective areas. Tagged “International Seminar on Comprehensive Local Agriculture Plan, C-LAP” the event is co-hosted by a number of local companies and international institutions and agro-allied companies. The event will engage stakeholders into building Comprehensive Local Agriculture Plan, C-LAP as a blueprint for agricultural revolution in Nigeria using the top to up approach. The document will aid local governments to explore the hidden potentials of their areas and how to leverage on those resources for economic development. The seminar will therefore bring together stakeholders in the agricultural value chain from all over the world and the country to brainstorm on how to help local governments benefit from their agricultural advantages. Also, the promoters of the new scheme envision the establishment of demonstration farms of between five and 20 hectares each in each of the 774 local governments of the country. For sustainability and improvements on the value chain, the 774 farms will be linked to national retain chain, wholesale markets and mega food parks.

Investors turn to Israeli agritech as demand for food swells.

Investors turn to Israeli agritech as demand for food swells.Israel tech aimed at farmers has drawn 7% of global investment in on-farm technologies, raising $80m in the first half of the year, report says. Israeli agriculture technologies for farmers have attracted some seven percent of global investment in the first half of 2017, a new report shows. Israeli agritech firms, whose technologies are used by farmers to improve the yield of crops and better monitor produce — called on-farm technologies — raised $80 million in the first half of the year, according to data released by Start-Up Nation Central, a nonprofit organization that connects companies and organizations to Israeli technology firms. The amount raised by the whole agritech sector — which includes on-farm technologies and other products such as supply chain monitoring — totaled $131 million in the first nine months of the year, 35 percent higher than the amount raised in the full year of 2016, when the sector raised $97 million. In 2016, Israel placed among the top five countries in terms of number of investment rounds in agritech, and the amount raised in the sector per capita was double that raised by US firms, the report said.

SafeTraces and traceability technology.

SafeTraces and Trace-ability Technology.

Safe Traces manufactures biological tracers, or invisible, edible, odorless, and tasteless bar  codes that food producers and processors can apply directly to food.

The technology, which was developed at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, a US Department of Energy-sponsored research facility, was originally used as a bio-stimulant to enhance our response capability following an intentional or accidental release of a biological agent.

 Food processors and other parties handling food in the supply chain can spray SafeTraces’ seaweed-based DNA tag on individual food items so that their provenance and qualities can be traced and verified throughout the supply chain.

 The markers can be read with specific bar code readers, providing a traceability tool, but also a food safety tool as they will be able to detect some pathogens too.

 So far the technology is being used by a handful of food and farming customers across varying industries from apples to chocolate.

The invisible tagging system makes the tags themselves virtually tamper-proof and the tags can serve as verification for various qualities like geographical provenance, organic status, sustainable sourcing, or varietal.

How Can Farmers Benefit from Blockchain?.

From Bitcoin to Agriculture: How Can Farmers Benefit from Blockchain? We have all seen the use of (and hype about) blockchain in the context of bitcoin, the digital currency that first brought blockchain to mainstream media and investors.


 While bitcoin remains in the news, the applications and potential of blockchain are spreading well beyond cryptocurrency.

 Before we take a look at how the agriculture industry is using blockchain, let’s do a quick blockchain 101. 

 What is Blockchain? One way to think of blockchain is as a technology that allows users to transfer value, or assets, between each other without the need for a trusted intermediary. The exchange is recorded in a ledger that is shared by all users of that blockchain.

 Users rely on this shared, or “distributed,” ledger to provide a transparent view into the details of the assets, including who owns the asset, as well as descriptive information such as quality or location.
The running history of the transaction is called the blockchain, and each transaction is called a block.

Today, when you hear about blockchain, what most really mean is ‘blockchains.’ There exist multiple different forms of this distributed ledger technology, each suited to distinct use cases.

 One popular blockchain technology is Ethereum, which its founders launched around the idea that blockchains can do more than simply record information.

 This concept, called ‘smart contracts,’ is central to Ethereum and allows users to codify significant parts of a workflow process, agreement, or task.

 

When a transaction occurs, the software automatically executes an action, or set of actions, according to the specifications in the smart contract. One example is smart locks; locks that automatically open after receiving the correct fee.

Feed the Future Malawi Mobile Money Project uses DFS to advance their economy.

Feed the Future Malawi Mobile Money Project. Malawi's economy is built on the backbone of the smallholder farmer. Many farmers, however face obstacles in growing their businesses. They lack access to bank accounts, and cash is risky. Feed the Future Malawi Mobile Project uses digital financial services to improve the Malawi agriculture value chain and farmers' economic resilience. USAID can help missions and partners identify specific challenges in value chains and corresponding DFS solutions to increase digital financial inclusion for smallholder farmers. Digital financial services help USAID projects run more efficiently and allow farmers to connect to the financial ecosystem, giving them tools to support their economic livelihoods long after the projects have ended.