Hope for the next generation of bean varieties

Dirt can shine – Diagnosing and addressing land degradation

Getting it to market

You’ve seen it – The women actually do this!

In Central America more than one million smallholder families depend on the cultivation of maize and/or beans for their subsistence. Vulnerability to extended drought periods and extreme weather events in the region is a harsh reality. To soothe the threats of future climatic changes to food security and national economies, effective and timely adaptation interventions must be developed, putting communities at the centre of such strategies.

Combining scientific research with community knowledge, CIAT, CIMMYT and CRS have recently joined forces to analyze the impact of future climate conditions on crop production in Central America. More specifically, scientists sought to predict climate-change impacts on maize-bean production systems in four Central American countries (El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua). The research also analyzes socio-economic implications and puts forward adaptation- and mitigation strategies for smallholder farmers in the region. The results of the “Tortillas on the Roaster” study will be presented during a high-level CRS-sponsored event held in San Salvador this Thursday, 11 October 2012.

The study shows that parts of Central America are highly vulnerable to climate change: increases in temperatures (more than 1 degree Celsius by 2020 and more than 2 degree Celsius by 2050), less annual rainfall and prolonged drought. For maize and beans in particular, this means increased evapotranspiration, less water available, increased plant stress and thus lower yields. For maize/bean farmers, this may represent a serious threat to food security.

But behind this gray scenario there lays a massive window of opportunities. The study shows that with sufficient and adequate knowledge, stakeholders at all levels – from smallholder farmers to national authorities – can start investing in adaptation strategies. Several options can mitigate the risk of predicted yield declines and economic losses: extending production into drought seasons in regions where there is sufficient annual precipitation (irrigation and water- catchment); prioritizing soil management and water harvesting practices; converting grazing land into cropland (by improved forages) so as to avoid deforestation by a moving agriculture frontier; or investing in improved varieties with more resistance to heat stress. Whichever the response, it is important that it answers to the local needs and reflects the urgency of the measures to be taken.

See the CIAT Policy Brief on ToR in English and in Spanish

See the final technical report – “Tortillas on the Roaster” .

See also Central America photo stream of Neil Palmer (CIAT)

Joking apart, this means that the adaptation entry points for beans and cassava are vastly different.  For beans, we need to find ways of making the crop, and the farming system it is grown in, less exposed to changes in climate.  That might be through improved management, or through the development of climate smart crops which are far more resistant to the likely climatic constraints that are going to be experienced in the future.  For cassava, the crop has great potential to BE an adaptation strategy.  It could be a fallback option on a farm, one that will produce even if all other crops fail.  It may also be a substation crop in marginal areas, which gains ground when all other staples gradually become unsustainable.  So the very fact that it is not particularly vulnerable does not mean that we should not concentrate on it.  Quite the opposite, we need more cassava in order to adapt.

But it might be too early to claim victory.  Our paper highlighted two big research issues that we must address.  First, cassava is blighted by pests and diseases, be it viruses in Africa or insects in Asia.  There’s still a lot of work to be done to understand if climate change will exacerbate these problems.  We think they might, but we need better models on pest and disease interactions with climate and host plants.  The second issue was the need for better models of cassava growth and production.  In the paper we used a simple niche-based model, largely because a robust mechanistic model is not available for cassava.  So whilst we rely on very advanced physiological models for many other crops, for cassava we do not have that luxury.  This needs to change.

And so that is where we are heading now.  Improving the models to allow us not only to say that cassava is or is not vulnerable to climate change, but to understand better the physiology of the plant, and explore avenues for improving its management and delivering better varieties to farmers.  This week we are presenting (see slides at the bottom of this post) these results in the Global Cassava Partnership Second Scientific Conference (GCP21-II) in Kampala, Uganda.   The highlight of the presentation is a call for action to improve our knowledge about cassava growth and its relationships with climate and pests and diseases.  We are hoping to pull together an (informal) consortium of researchers interested in developing better trial and on-farm data for cassava, and the generation of a solid mechanistic model for cassava.  And our doors are open, so take this as an invitation to contribute data and knowledge to this initiative.  We hope within a year to have a functioning cassava model under the DSSAT umbrella of crop models, so that we may really test cassava’s biology and its capacity to be THE adaptation option for Africa.  Drop us a line if interested by leaving a comment and we’ll be in touch.

From 6 to 8 December, CCAFS theme 1 organized a workshop staged on the Addis Ababa campus of the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI). The workshop titled ‘Developing climate-smart crops for 2030 world’ involved over 40 participants from 16 countries, broadly divided along either side of the breeding / modeling continuum.

At the onset of the workshop, that continuum looked more like a chasm.  Modelers and breeders have long been operating indifferently to one another. But climate variations are perhaps urging a change in perspectives and relations with one another. Breeders seem to have dismissed models – whether for climate-change or other issues – for their breeding work with respect to their absence of context and attention for the reality of breeding crops. In turn, modelers have found it difficult to get breeding strategies to consider the pertinence of their own models, to look outside the breeding box. The only cases known of interactions between the two communities around climate change seem to have focused on the symptoms (e.g. dealing with drought) rather than a strategy to mitigate climate change and develop climate-smart crops.

The 2030 climate-smart crops workshop was a first attempt in the CCAFS programme to try and collectively develop a broader picture of the challenges of breeding in an increasingly climate-uncertain future by bringing together members from these two communities from East and West Africa. During three days collective discussions identified the broad challenges of a 2030 world for breeding strategies, the regional issues that affect breeding and ultimately the specific challenges for each of the four key crops in consideration in the CCAFS programme: Bananas, beans, rice and sorghum.

It seems obvious that crop breeders have to be involved in developing climate-smart crop strategies. Indeed, only breeders really understand the long term process of breeding (over ten years for bananas and generally rather long periods for better quality crops). Modelers may come up with valid conceptual frameworks but implementation rests with breeders. However, the imminence of novel climates and the increasing recognition of the complexity surrounding climate change calls for a different approach to ‘breeding business as usual’.

Breeding can no longer be restricted to one location. Multiple locations allow a better understanding of the climate variations affecting their crops, their livelihood and beyond. Breeding also needs to consider various other aspects: the (changing) needs and demands of the population in the target environment, the crop quality and its constraints, the likelihood of various climate scenarios that might affect breeding, the importance of developing drought tolerant crops etc.

Why did this not happen before? Breeders are sometimes isolated, as illustrated by the chasm mentioned above; also among breeders there seems to be little interaction and limited options for training. Yet, the workshop participants highlighted a variety of options to work together for climate-smart crops – one that relies on more cooperation with modelers and other actors. How can that cooperation take shape?

Ways forward for climate-smart breeding strategies?

More interaction is required at all levels: among breeders, with modelers, but also with a wider variety of specialists that all have a role to play in developing robust breeding strategies: farmers, climatologists, traders, consumers, nutritionists, pathologists, entomologists, agronomists, physiologists, soil scientists etc.

This interaction can take various shapes:

• Interaction via information-sharing platforms or workshops like this one;
• Developing incentives for breeders to consider modeling inputs;
• Additional funding to develop smarter breeding programmes;
• Involving breeders in the development of new agro-climatic analysis and modeling tools;
• Crucially, breeders should be included from the start of any modeling initiative that concerns them, as was repeatedly pleaded throughout the workshop.

These solutions came up as only one set of answers (among others) within each crop group. The workshop brought breeders and modelers together in those crop groups and each of them managed to develop: a vision for how their crop should evolve by 2030, an idea about the approach they would follow to achieve that vision, a list of constraints they might encounter and crucially a typology of traits and target environments they should focus on (all presentations are available on the CCAFS slideshare).

Beyond solutions, the workshop also helped forge new alliances. One of the most promising is between CCAFS and The West African Centre for Crop Improvement (WACCI).

One workshop is a modest step forward and the lasting of this initiative will be put to test in the absence of concrete joint activities, yet the climate is definitely warming up in the relations between African breeders and modelers and for once that can only be positive news.

Before heading out to the field, impacts of a climate change A2 scenario on crop yields of maize and beans across 4 countries in Central America (Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala) were modeled using crop modules from the Decision Support System for Agrotechnology Transfer (DSSAT), and IPCC climate projections generated by the MarkSimTM weather file generator. Using an average of results on various environmental conditions and crop management (climate, soil quality, fertilizer input) impact hot spots were identified such as:

• Areas where maize-bean systems can be adapted (Focus on adaptation)
• Areas where maize-bean systems are no longer an option (Focus on diversification of livelihoods)
• Areas where maize-bean systems will be established (migration – agriculture frontier – risk of deforestation)

Inside local communities Focal Group meetings were carried out to gather general nominal and ordinal information by using two methodological approaches: the Sustainable Livelihoods Framework (SLF), and the Market Mapping Approach (MMA). The SLF approach focus on gathering information on farmers’ assets (natural, social, human, financial and physical) and on institutions and policies and the MMA approach focus on collecting information on policy issues that may be hindering or enhancing the functioning of a value chain and also on institutions and organizations providing services to farmer.

After finalizing the field work in the 2 other countries (Guatemala and Nicaragua) the project team will step into more details by doing specific questionnaires based on information gathered in the group interviews, all of them will capture enough information to estimate the proposed indicators of sensitivity an adaptive capacity along with their main drivers.

“Tortillas on the Roaster” is an alliance-project of Catholic Relief Services (CRS), the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT) and the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), funded by Howard G. Buffet Foundation.

Within CCAFS Adaption to Progressive Climate Change theme, one of the objectives is to generate comprehensive strategies for crop improvement through a combination of modeling, expert consultation and stakeholder dialogue, and translating these insights into coordinated global, regional and national research and technology investment policies.

As part of its 2011 activities and in collaboration with the Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research (EIAR), and the West African Center for Crop Improvement (WACCI), the CCAFS team is holding a three-day workshop to engage with international, regional and national crop improvement institutions. The workshop entitled: “Developing Climate-Smart Crops for a 2030 World” will be held on 6-8 December in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

The target crops are sorghum, rice, beans and bananas.  The objective is twofold:

• To Identify potential improvement scenarios and begin to incorporate them into models
• To build a community of breeders and modelers alike to work together over the coming 3 years in the development of climate-smart breeding strategies

More than 40 participants are expected representing  CG centers, regional institutions, NARS and Universities. They come from more than 15 countries including:  Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, Ghana and Cameroon for West Africa; Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania for East Africa; Malawi and Zambia for Southern Africa, India, Colombia and Brazil!

Bonny has just finished his MSc in natural resource management at Makerere University, and worked on a CIAT-TSBF project in Uganda looking at community soil mapping techniques for recommendation domains for organic agriculture.

On his first day Bonny set off on a two week trip to review bean production areas in four countries in east and southern africa: Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe (see map).

Meetings were held in Arusha and Mbeya (Tanzania), Lilongwe (Malawi), Lusaka (Zambia) and in Harare (Zimbabwe). Current bean production areas are shaded pink.

We are taking advantage of expert panels in each country who have been gathered in meetings to discuss Diffusion of Improved Varieties in Africa(DIIVA).

So far Bonny has reported new bean areas under irrigation in southern Malawi and we await the results of the meeting from the other countries.

These areas are fundamental for reporting other characteristics of bean production systems in Africa which allow us to better target the research of the Pan African Bean Research Alliance (PABRA).

Rather than satisfy ourselves with these abstract goals, however, researchers from the Pan African Bean Research Alliance (PABRA) have just spent three days looking in detail at what changes in temperature, rainfall and extreme events in Africa will actually mean for bean production, storage, marketing and utilisation.

The symposium held in Arusha, Tanzania between the 29th and 31st March 2010, was organised and facilitated by Louise Sperling of CIAT. Participants hailed from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Tanzania, Kenya, South Africa and Cameroon representing the three regional networks of PABRA. The meeting also welcomed scientists from Wageningen University (WUR) in the Netherlands, the Natural Resources Institute (NRI) of the University of Greenwich in the UK, and the Department of Primary Industries (DPI) of Victoria State Australia.

The meeting opened with three overview presentations focusing on adaptation strategies of smallholder farmers in Africa (Todd Crane and Adele Arendse – WUR), followed by a talk on climate change and women (Valerie Nelson – NRI), and then a presentation on the projections of climate change and the potential impacts on beans which highlighted the modeling work carried out in DAPA (Andrew Farrow – CIAT).

The physiological impact on bean production of increased temperatures, more (or less) rainfall and higher CO2 levels were expounded by Bob Redden (DPI), while PABRA pathologists and breeders (Clare Mukankusi, Robin Buruchara ,Rowland Chirwa and Paul Kimani aided and abetted by Matthew Abang) focused on the changes that could be expected on bean pests and diseases.

The first day concluded with talks on crop insurance as a potential response to climate change and the current socio-economic impacts of climatic stressors – particularly drought (Enid Katungi and Dymphina Andima).

On the second and third days teams reviewed and presented work already being conducted in the existing phase of PABRA (2009-2013) which has relevance for climate change mitigation and adaptation. It was clear that a lot of ongoing work already helps PABRA prepare for the new challenges associated with climate change, such as regional drought trials and seed systems research in marginal areas.

Some presenters noted, however, that more temporal downscaling is required. This is because many of the biotic and abiotic stresses are related to specific events during the growing season, such as high night time temperatures, dry spells, heat-waves and water-logging.

Another area of interest where spatial analysis can play a role is in the visualization of climate change futures. CIAT has experience of developing these kinds of tools going back to the 1990’s and we can learn from the experiences of taking crop simulation models into the field in Zimbabwe.

We will use the results of the discussions which followed the presentations and a SWOT analysis to develop a strategy for incorporating climate change in PABRA’s current 5 year framework as well as future research phases. Watch this space!

Areas suitable for beans in 2020, using EcoCrop model

The partners of the Pan-African Bean Research Alliance (PABRA) have decided to repeat the process and format of version 1 of the Atlas. The Atlas has served as a useful reference for many users, not just in Africa but around the world.

Despite improvements to internet connectivity in Africa there are still serious constraints to accessing information online, especially maps and graphics. For this reason we will stay with the book and CD format, however we will also ensure that the spatial data are available, as with the present version.

The first task is to revise the 14 current bean production environments and the 96 socio-cultural production areas. This will be followed later this year by a collection of secondary data from experts in the bean producing countries of Africa. We aim to produce a first draft of the Atlas by October 2010. This draft will highlight the major gaps in information and allow us to target primary data collection in 2011.

The structure of the Atlas reflects the PABRA framework for 2009-2013, and takes into account the information demands of the PABRA partners. We are proposing the following chapters:

• PRODUCTION
• CROPPING SYSTEMS
• SEED SYSTEMS
• END USERS & GENDER
• UTILISATION & NUTRITION
• MARKETS
• BEAN SEED TYPES
• ABIOTIC – Climatic, Edaphic
• INSECT PESTS
• DISEASES – Fungal Diseases, Bacterial Diseases, Viruses
• BEAN RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT
• SOLUTIONS & MANAGEMENT
• QUALITY OF INFORMATION 

We have just developed the protocol for updating the bean production environments which will be implemented by the bean programmes of the individual national agricultural research with technical support from CIAT.

We are also working closely with the team in CIAT-TSBF who are developing the Africa Soil Information Service (AfSIS), which will provide information on the status of soil nutrients and toxicities that are important for bean production and utilisation.