Agriculture

CABI’s publishing business strengthens partnerships with China

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CABI’s publishing business has been busy strengthening partnerships in China by showcasing the benefits of its range of print and online products and services to Chinese clients and partners, and exploring opportunities of further collaboration with the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences (CAAS) in Beijing.

Dr Andy Robinson, CABI’s Managing Director, Publishing, led a delegation from CABI who outlined the organisation’s new publishing strategies and development plans – including the forthcoming launch of the new CABI Agricultural and Bioscience open access journal – to members of the Agricultural Information Institute (AII) and Institute of Plant Protection (IPP) of CAAS as well as library staff from the China Agricultural University and China Farmer University.

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‘Women can be good leaders and science managers’

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Segenet Kelemu, the Director General of the International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology (icipe). Copyright: Photo supplied by Sida

In the week that the UN Decade of Family Farming was launched, Segenet Kelemu, the Director General of the International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology (icipe), tells CABI’s sister organisation SciDev.Net that women can be good leaders and science managers.

In a candid interview, she reveals how she came from humble beginnings (having to run barefoot to school) to a position of power and influence in the field of agricultural science. Nominated by Bill Gates as one of five inspirational people around the world, Ms Kelemu goes onto describe her journey from rural Ethiopia to a position as head of one of the world’s leading agricultural research centres.

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“The warnings of impending doom are real but the timeframe is very much up for debate”

Wayne Coles2 Comments
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Bananas are eaten the world over but could they really become extinct if a strain of Panama disease takes hold?

Did you know that more than 100 billion bananas are eaten every year in the world, making them the fourth most popular agricultural product? You might also be surprised to learn that Uganda has the highest average per capita consumption in the world, where residents eat an average of 226kgs of bananas per person per year.

In short, bananas are big business – a $35billion global industry as a rough estimate. But all that could come to a crashing halt if the headline in the British Daily Mail newspaper, predicting the fruit’s extinction, is to be believed. The fears are that a strain of Panama disease could wipe out the humble banana putting the food security of millions in Developing World countries that depend upon it for nutrition at risk.

CABI’s very own ‘banana man’ Dr Rob Reeder sheds expert light on the debate and argues that while the diseases is a concern it won’t spell the end of our beloved fruit just yet! Rob explains more…

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Climate-smart pest management holds the key to future global food security

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Forest-agriculture mosaic system in Amani in the Tanga Region of Tanzania – credit René Eschen (CABI).

CABI scientists Luca Heeb, Dr Emma Jenner and Dr Matthew Cock, have issued a stark reminder to the world – we must embrace climate-smart pest management (CSPM) if we are to ensure the food security of a global population predicted to reach 10 billion by 2050.

In the paper ‘Climate-smart pest management: building resilience of farms and landscapes to changing pest threats’, published in the Journal of Pest Science, Heeb et al highlight that climate change is having a significant impact upon the biology, distribution and outbreak potential of crops pests around the world.

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CABI helps Pakistan Museum of Natural History showcase scourge of noxious parthenium weed

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CABI in Pakistan is helping the Pakistan Museum of Natural History (PMNH) showcase the scourge of the noxious parthenium weed, otherwise known locally at ‘Gajar Booti’, to members of the public visiting its Bio Gallery exhibit.

Parthenium is regarded as one of the major threats to native species, environment and ecosystems in more than 48 countries around the world – including Pakistan where it is also considered as a risk to human health, biodiversity, agriculture, livestock, and food security.

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App-based agriculture for a tech-savvy farmer

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The use of mobile technologies in African agriculture continues to grow. Photo: David Ng’ambi

Agriculture in Sub-Saharan Africa is undergoing a digital revolution bought about through the advancement and increasing availability of mobile technologies. Improved affordability has placed mobile devices in the hands of more African’s than ever before, with 444 million subscribed users in 2017. Take Tanzania for example where the average cost of mobile phones has fallen by more than half in five years to just over $100 today.

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Guest blog: ‘Keeping in mind the real use of our research’

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Irrigating rice fields in Sirajganj, Bangladesh. Photo: Haseeb Md. Irfanullah.

In this guest blog, Dr Haseeb Md. Irfanullah discusses the findings of a recent workshop he was a rapporteur of in Bangladesh on the potential impact on policy and practice of agricultural research in the country.

A research system is basically made up of four components: accessing, conducting, communicating, and utilizing research. While we often talk about the first three, use of our research in policy and practice is less frequently discussed in developing countries. Discussions at a recent workshop in Bangladesh about recent agricultural and biological science research projects revealed opportunities to make connections between research and its usage.

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