Agricultural Education

A large cadre of well-trained and motivated African agricultural scientists will play a critical role in providing African farmers with a steady flow of improved farming practices and new crop varieties developed to thrive in local climates and meet local needs. Today, in most African countries, there is a shortage of well-trained scientists who specialise in crop breeding, particularly when it comes to scientists familiar with the varied crop species, farm practices, food preferences, and soil and climate conditions of different regions of Africa.

As part of its Programme for Africa Seed Systems (PASS), the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa has launched a new Education for African Crop Improvement (EACI) initiative. It is an aggressive effort to invest in the education of a new generation of agricultural scientists across Africa with the immediate goal of training 220 new African crop scientists at the M.Sc. and Ph.D. levels.

In addition, it will provide funding where needed to strengthen both the curriculum and infrastructure required to properly nurture the next generation of African agricultural experts.

EACI seeks to train African scientists who can develop new, improved varieties of crops that are commonly grown on many African farms, using conventional breeding techniques to endow them with traits like disease and pest resistance and the ability to withstand challenging growing conditions. Their work will focus on developing new types of maize, rice, sorghum, soybean, sweet potato, bananas, cassava, cow pea, ground nut, maize, pigeon pea and other crops.

The initiative is currently working with training programmes at educational institutions in Tanzania, Uganda, Ethiopia, Zambia, Mali, Burkina Faso, Kenya, Nigeria, and Ghana. In some cases, African students will study abroad if there is a need to gain expertise not currently available in Africa. But regardless of where they study, the programme will support African students who intend to work as career scientists in Africa specialising in a crop that is a high priority for small-scale farming in their home country.

To keep the focus on Africa’s small-scale farmers, these young scientists will conduct the field work portion of their training in their home country, usually at a research institution where they are or will be employed, thereby ensuring they work with local farmers after graduation. After completing their training, students will be eligible for grants to support their research on a continuing basis.

These efforts should greatly increase the number of African crop scientists who can work across Africa and play an instrumental role in developing and delivering the seeds that will help African small-scale farmers dramatically boost their productivity and incomes.