Transcript Feed the Future Research Strategy

Global Food Security Research Strategy
Saharah Moon Chapotin
Office of Agricultural Research & Transformation
Bureau for Food Security
U.S. Agency for International Development
Feed the Future
Global Food Security Research Strategy
FTF Research Strategy aims to:
• Increase agricultural productivity and
reduce environmental impact
• Improve markets, institutions and policies
• Raise smallholder incomes and resilience
• Increase availability of and access to
nutritious foods
Specific Objectives:
• Problem-focused agricultural research
• Global & regional/country-level public
goods research
• Adaptive research at country-level
• Integrates biophysical sciences, social
sciences, policy research
• Capacity building is underlying theme
Cross-cutting themes - to foster inclusive,
sustainable agricultural productivity gains and
improvements in child nutrition
• Resilience to climate change
• Sustaining natural resource base
• Gender awareness/inclusivity
Defining FTF Research Priorities
Using poverty & nutrition lens, identify key
production systems where hunger and
poverty are significant…
Prevalence
Sub-national poverty ca.
2005 (<$1.25/day)
Number
Source: Stan Wood et al. (IFPRI) 2009.
Child stunting
Source: USAID and IFPRI, using Harvest Choice maps
Farming Systems
Dixon, 2001
This process led to focus on:
What? Sustainable Intensification
Where? Agro-ecologies in Focus Countries
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Spillovers to region
Who? Leveraging partnerships
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US Universities
International Agriculture Research Centers
National Agriculture Research Systems
Private Sector
Implementing the Research Strategy:
• Building the research portfolio
• Identify and engage partners
• Link outputs to country-level programs &
processes
Building a Research Portfolio
• Identify researchable constraints to
production
• Establish criteria for selection of priorities
• Build pipeline of short, medium, long term
impact
• Manage risk with portfolio approach – fewer
high risk, more lower risk investments
Investment criteria
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Relevance to poverty, women and children and food security
Likelihood of success: Technical merit and pathways for adoption
Cost/Benefit considerations
Economic sustainability for producers/adopters
Natural resources sustainability: water, soil, ecosystem and
climate change
• Institutional sustainability and impact on capacity: engagement of
national and regional partners
• Time Frame: timeline, milestones
• Risks: potential impacts on vulnerable groups, environment or
breakdown in key pathways
Consultative Process
In collaboration with BIFAD, USDA, APLU
• January 2011 – Meeting at Purdue with research
community
• May 2011 – Global e-consultation on research
strategy
• June 21-23, 2011 – Forum for stakeholders in
Washington, DC
FTF Research Themes
• Advancing the Productivity Frontier
• Transforming Key Production Systems
• Enhancing Nutrition and Food Safety
Advancing the Productivity Frontier
• Overcoming major crop and livestock productivity
constraints: increase yields and incomes
• Breeding and genetics for major crops & livestock
• Livestock infectious diseases
• Aquaculture systems management
• Livestock feed improvements (availability/quality)
• Policies and partnerships for technology adoption
Increasing crop resilience to climate change
Abiotic stress tolerance research to
address major emerging global
challenges:
– Rising temperatures
– Water availability
– Climate variability
– Population pressure
– Resource use
– Land availability
Methods: conventional breeding &
advanced molecular approaches
Source: Chris Rey, University of the
Witwatersrand, South Africa
Cassava Resistant to
mosaic disease in E. Africa
Source: Agricultural Research
Council, S. Africa
Genetic Engineering of African Staple Crops: Solving production
constraints that cannot be solved using conventional breeding
Insect resistant
potato in S. Africa
Banana resistant to black
sigatoka disease in E. Africa
Insect resistant
cowpea in
Nigeria
Source: Larry Beachj
Source: Larry Beach
Capacity building in biosafety policy and regulatory science
• Building decision-making capacity on biotechnology
• Enhance capability of partners to develop fully
functional biosafety systems
– Necessary to evaluate new applications of biotechnology
– Ensure that only safe products of biotechnology are
deployed, absence of biosafety framework precludes all
adoption
– Includes tools and information to assess safety and make
decisions on introduction of new products
• Necessary component of enabling policy environment
for technology adoption– also seed laws and IPR
Enhanced Nutrition & Food Safety
• Grain legume productivity
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Abiotic stress tolerance, nitrogen fixation, disease/pest
resistance, system integration
Biofortification of staple crops
Reduce/eliminate mycotoxin contamination
Reduce post-harvest losses
Decision making and behavioral change for
improved nutrition
• Improved policies for nutrition and food safety
Transforming Key Production Systems
• Integrate global technology with site specific natural
resource, social science, and market research
• Link global research partners with regional & national
• Integrate research with development interventions
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Rice-Wheat system of South Asia
East Africa highlands system
Southern & East African maize-based systems
West African Sudano-Sahelian systems
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Area
Sustainable intensification – more with less
Yield
South Asia
Yield
Sub-Saharan Africa
Cereal Systems in the Indo-gangetic Plains
• Home to 900M people
(1/7 world population)
• Dominated by rice-wheat,
rice-rice, rice cotton systems
• Breadbasket of S. Asia
• Key constraints
o Water availability
o Labor Shortages
o Soil erosion/nutrient
depletion
o Available land
o Climate change
Source:
IRRI
Intensifying production in South Asian cereal systems
Target Interventions
Outcomes
• Retention of Crop Residues
• Reduced erosion / run-off
• Minimal/zero Tillage of Soil
• Improved water and nutrient
use efficiency & soil health
• Innovative Cropping Systems
• Mechanization
• Improved Varieties
• Better Policies
• New crops in rotations
• Reduced labor costs
• Climate change adaptation
• Improved total factor
productivity (not just yield!)
Capacity Building at All Levels
• Agricultural education, extension, training, policies
and research
• Capacity of smallholders to use new scientific
innovations and technologies
• Integrate capacity development and research
investments for maximum impact and sustainability
• Capacity needs for monitoring and evaluation (M&E)
Global Research Partners
• US Universities
– Collaborative Research Support Programs and other
collaborations
– Other Competitive Grants Programs (USDA/NIFA, NSF
BREAD, etc.)
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CGIAR
NARS partners in Focus Countries
Private sector companies and institutions
USDA/USAID Norman Borlaug Commemorative
Research Initiative
Linking research outcomes to end-users
• USAID Mission country-level programs
– Bring innovations to farmers
– Enhance market access (infrastructure, information systems)
– Engage governments (national and local) to adopt and
implement enabling policies
– Improve local capacity for research, policy making
• USAID/Washington centrally-funded programs
– Building research capacity
– Developing global extension platform
www.feedthefuture.gov
Feed the Future
the U.S. government’s
global hunger and food security
initiative