N2Africa - Putting Nitrogen Fixation to Work for Smallholder Farmers in Africa was a 10-yr large development-to-research project focused on tapping expertise from all around the world to ensure the best technologies find their way into the hands of smallholder farmers in Africa which concluded late last year. N2Africa reached more than 650,000 farmers and the major output of the project is enhanced productivity, nitrogen fixation and production of the major grain legumes: common bean, groundnut, cowpea, soybean, chickpea and faba bean. Grain legumes allow a form of sustainable intensification through diversification of the farming system. They have multiple benefits – of nutritious food for the family diet, a source of income particularly for women, and improved soil fertility that boosts the yields of subsequent crops. N2Africa worked across 11 countries in East and Central, West and Southern Africa through a wide range of partnerships with research and development organisations. The project’s approach was to target nitrogen fixation technologies to ‘socioecological niches’ within the wide diversity of countries, agroecology and farming systems in Africa. A key technology introduced and promoted was the use of rhizobium inoculants which were highly successful in increasing the yield of major grain legumes and very popular with farmers due to their low cost. As the nitrogen fixation technologies were scaled out, continuous learning about the problems faced by smallholder farmers ensued. In particular, critical deficiencies of phosphorus were prevalent and needed to be addressed through the judicious use of P fertilizers. What is heard repeatedly from farmers across the continent is: “Don’t come back with more demonstrations – please help us to get access to the seed and inputs!”.

This webinar will elaborate on the major issues that need to be addressed to ensure that the benefits of N2-fixation can be realized by smallholder farmers in Africa. 

Watch the webinar recording here.

Agenda

Moderator: Edmundo Barrios, Agricultural Officer, FAO Plant Production and Protection Division (NSP)

• 15.00-15.05: Introductory remarks: Jingyuan Xia, Director, FAO Plant Production and Protection Division (NSP)
• 15.05-15.30: Four consecutive short interventions

1. Introduction to N2Africa

 Ken Giller, Plant Production Systems Professor, Wageningen University

1. Increasing yields and nitrogen fixation through good agronomy and rhizobium inoculation

Freddy Baijukya, Country Coordinator for Tanzania, N2Africa

1. The key role of learning and partnerships

Theresa Ampadu-Boakye, Monitoring and Evaluation Specialist, N2Africa

1. Legumes, gender and human nutrition

Ilse de Jager, Human Nutrition and Plant Production Systems Division, Wageningen University.

• 15:30-16:00 Q&A session

Speakers

Ken Giller is a Professor of Plant Production Systems at Wageningen University. Ken’s research focuses on smallholder farming systems in sub-Saharan Africa, and in particular problems of soil fertility and the role of nitrogen fixation in tropical legumes. He leads a number of initiatives such as N2Africa. Ken is co-chair of the Thematic Network 7 on Sustainable Agriculture and Food Systems of the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) of the United Nations. Ken joined Wageningen University as Chair of Plant Production Systems in 2001 after holding professorships at Wye College, University of London, and the University of Zimbabwe.

Frederick Baijukya is a Farming System Scientist at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) based in Tanzania. Formerly, he was Agronomist at the Intentional Centre of Tropical Agriculture (CIAT), Nairobi office, and before that, he served as Principal Agricultural Research Officer in the Department of Research and Development, Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives, Tanzania. He has worked extensively in different farming systems in East Africa with a special focus on intensification and diversification of smallholder agricultural systems, participating in different projects including ‘Transboundary Agroecosystems Management of Kagera Basin (TAMKB)’; ‘Exploring trade-offs around farming livelihoods and the environment: the AfricaNUANCES framework; N2Africa and Africa Cassava Agronomy Initiatives (ACAI).

Theresa Ampadu-Boakye is a Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (ME&L) Expert at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), based in Nairobi. She currently coordinates ME&L activities of different projects across different staple and cash crops. Prior to this, she led the implementation of ME&L, including the impact assessment of the ten-year initiative N2Africa which worked to intensify and diversity smallholder farming using grain legumes across eleven countries. She was formerly the Regional Monitoring and Evaluation Specialist for 2SCALE Project of the International Fertilizer Development Centre (IFDC) and Senior Technical Advisor with the German Development Cooperation (GIZ) funded Market-Oriented Agriculture Programme (MOAP).

Ilse de Jager recently completed her PhD titled ‘Harvesting Nutrition. Grain legumes and nutritious diets in sub-Saharan Africa’ at the Division of Human Nutrition and the Plant Production Systems group at Wageningen University. She started her PhD research in 2014 after obtaining her MSc degree in Human Nutrition. Her research focuses on the impacts of agriculture on improving diets and nutritional status of vulnerable groups from rural households in sub-Saharan Africa, in particular focusing on the potential of grain legumes. She conducted her PhD research within the context of the N2Africa project that was one of the winning projects of the 2013 Harvesting Nutrition Contest initiated by the World Bank.