Business News (Agriculture) –The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and UK's Department for International Development are investing 25.2 million U.S. dollars (about N3.96 billion) in efforts to boost the cultivation of cassava in sub-Saharan Africa.
The International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), Ibadan, made this known on Saturday in Abuja via a statement signed by its Communication Officer, Mr Godwin Atser.
The statement said that the investment also covered the building of the human and technical capacity for cassava breeding in the sub-region.
It said that the project would ensure that cassava genetic research was strengthened to a level comparable with the extant research on major staple crops such wheat, rice, maize and potato.
The statement noted that the five-year project, which was hosted by Cornell University in the U.S., would be executed in collaboration with five partner institutions, which included the National Root Crops Research Institute (NRCRI) and IITA, both in Nigeria.
The other institutions are the National Crops Resources Research Institute (NaCRRI) in Uganda, the Boyce Thompson Institute (BTI) for Plant Research in New York, and U.S. Department of Energy Joint Genome Institute of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, California.
The statement quoted Peter Kulakow, a Cassava Breeder and Geneticist with IITA, as saying that the project would enable the institutes to rapidly deliver improved cassava varieties to farmers.
“The `next generation cassava' will give breeders in Africa access to the most advanced plant breeding technologies to deliver improved varieties to farmers more rapidly,'' Kulakow said in the statement.
The statement also quoted Ronnie Coffman, the Principal Investigator in the multi-partner venture, as saying that “partners in the `next generation cassava' breeding project will use genomic selection to improve cassava productivity in the 21st Century.''
Besides, the statement quoted Yona Baguma, the Project Coordinator for NaCRRI, as saying: “Increased support for strengthening the research capacity in Africa and harnessing novel technologies are critical to improving overall agricultural productivity and food security for poor people.''
Dr Chiedozie Egesi, Head of Cassava Breeding at NRCRI, also said in the statement that the “next generation cassava'' provided opportunities for researchers to harness the power of modern science for faster delivery of the best cassava varieties to smallholder farmers.
Egesi was quoted as saying that Africa's smallholder farmers produced more than half of the world's cassava.
“The tough woody plant is predicted to be one of the few crops that will benefit from climate change.
“It requires few inputs and can withstand drought, marginal soils and long-term underground storage.
“No other continent depends on cassava to feed its people as Africa, where 500 million people consume cassava daily,'' he said in the statement. (NAN)
