Agriculture is greatly affected by the global climate shifts caused by the Greenhouse effect. The release of malign gases such as carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrogen dioxide depletes the ozone layer and leads to an increased risk of flooding, soil erosion, droughts, and wildfires. It invariably decreases crop productivity and affects the global agricultural value chain. 

Researchers are looking at alternative farming techniques, as well as solutions to the environmental condition. Thus, the need for farmers and all agro stakeholders to adopt a sustainable solution to avoid a global food crisis.  

The first step in addressing the impact of climate change on food production is to inform the farmers. They need to understand the causes and consequences of environmental challenges and mitigate them through safer farm practices.

Farmers need to understand the risk involved in not minding the relationship between environmental factors and food production. It is the farmers who have to adapt their agricultural practices to a changing environment.  

This may include adjustments in planting dates, crop varieties, drainage systems, and land management regimes to maintain soil fertility and maximize yields. An example of adaptation is the use of cover crops to protect the soil from erosion and the minimization of tillage.  

Global warming should be treated with urgency. Those who deny its anthropogenic sources do not know the implications of carbon emissions. The government is in a better position to endorse climate change mitigation policies. It should regulate industrial activities associated with the emission of harmful gases into the environment.  

These industries should leverage technology to reduce emissions and increase carbon sequestration/storage. The government should also set up legislative mandates to reduce emissions and tax defaulters. This way, more people will become more intentional in protecting the environment. 

Farmers, industries, the government, and we all should understand the impact of our changing climate on food production. Climate change-related shifts in long-term weather patterns will cause damages to crop, heat-induced pollination, and a higher incidence of pest infestation and crop diseases.  

Therefore, we should be concerned about the impacts of climate change on global food production and take additional steps to raise awareness of the issue. Farmers should adapt to, while the government should mitigate climate changes. 

Written by Joy Ejere Uche 

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Farmers have to ensure that the world continues to eat healthily and that food production is not interrupted by Coronavirus (Covid-19).

The spread of the corona virus has deterred operations of restaurants, hotels and airlines that patronizes farm produces in large quantities. It has greatly slowed down export demands and global economic activities.  

Although there are current challenges in the agricultural sector, the farmer’s health is most paramount. Farmers should observe basic bio security protocols and safety rules while working on farms.

The onus lies on food producers, processors and vendors to take the following precautions to stay safe amid the Covid-19 outbreak.

• Handle all food samples wearing face masks and gloves. Livestock farmers should also avoid direct contact with animals.  
• Wash your hands properly before and after visiting your farm.  
• Remove and wash clothing immediately after visiting the market.  
• Seek medical attention early when you feel sick, even with mild symptoms such as cough, headache, and fever.  
• Hand wipes and sanitizers should be made available in marketplaces.  
• Opt for bank transfers rather than cash handling in the marketplace.  
• Stay away from crowded environments.  
• Maintain social distancing of at least three feet when conducting business transactions with vendors and consumers.  
• If you can, package all vegetables in transparent bags to stop customers from touching food  

Finally, everyone involved in the agricultural value chain has to follow strict food safety and health regulations. Always listen to the news and stay in touch with the Agro community for updates about the global agro economy. Protect yourself, your Agro products and others to help prevent the possible spread of Covid-19 and other viruses. 

Written By:

Joy Ejere Uche 

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Sustainable agriculture aims to meet our present agricultural needs without compromising its availability for future generations.

Agricultural Sustainability is not boosting food production to feed people, neither is it farming that focuses on the environment. It is a multifaceted system that focuses on the Argo process and agribusiness in general, rather than just a specific agricultural product.

Research has it that sustainable agriculture can be actualized via three factors; a healthy environment, economic profitability, and innovation. The process of agricultural sustainability cuts across every member of the agri-ecosystem; farmers, food processors, distributors, retailers, consumers, and waste managers alike.

To achieve a sustainable agricultural future, collaboration and cooperation at multiple levels and cross-cultural knowledge exchange is required.

Meet the Farmers Conference (MTFC) 2019, the largest agro conference brings together agro stakeholders from Africa and the GCC. It aims to create a healthy environment, economic profitability, and innovations, to drive business partnerships that will make a formidable impact in agriculture.

The conference will feature panel session that includes Bola Oyedele, Azeez Oluwole, Joshua Ajisope, Ademola Akinyemi and Kenneth Okonkwo will be addressing ‘Ways to Create a Sustainable Future in Agriculture’. 

More on MTFC:

• The Role of Dubai as an International Trade Hub for Businesses in Africa
• The role of African Farmers in Achieving Zero Hunger and Global Food Security
• Where this is found in Africa Series – an Expository of African Cash Crops
• UN Appoints Aliko Dangote and Akinwumi Adesina to Tackle Global Malnutrition
• AATF partners IRRI to Scale Hybrid Rice Production in Africa

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Africa consumes a total of 11.6 million tonnes of milled rice yearly. About 8.3 million of this farm produce is gotten locally while 3.3 million tonnes are imported. The partnership was spurred by the inability of Africa to become self-sufficient in rice production and concurrent demand grew at 6% yearly.

IRRI was founded in 1960 to combat hunger and improve the health of rice farmers and consumers. It also provides advanced rice research and gives lasting solutions to challenges.

IRRI will leverage AATF’s technological expertise and reach 23 Africa countries to deliver innovation to African farmers. It will accelerate the distribution of high-yielding rice varieties, good agro-practices, digital technologies, farm mechanization, crop care, etc. It will create awareness for rice farmers and also promote food security in the African agro-economy.

See also: NARO Invents Anti-tick Vaccine for Livestock Farmers

Both bodies will meet regularly to develop joint projects for rice production and the seed industry. AATF’s network would expand by joining other Agri-organization like Hybrid Rice Development Consortium (HRDC) and Direct Seeded Rice Consortium (DSRC). On the other hand, IRRI will become a member of the AATF-led Alliance for Hybrid Rice in Africa (AHyRA).

African Agricultural Technology Foundation Rice Project Manager, Kayode Sanni expressed his satisfaction on the partnership with IRRI. He noted that Rice is an important staple food for Africans. Thus, the need to upgrade the continent’s technologies and rice cultivation is key.

IRRI’s Head of Tech Transfer, Remy Bitoun also described the partnership as a good way to accelerate the distribution of better rice varieties and good agronomic practices. It will improve food security and the economic sustainability of rice-based agri-food systems.

Before the partnership with AATF, IRRI had made significant strides in uplifting the productivity and livelihoods of farmers in Asia.

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Tick is a major disease that affects livestock production in Africa and worldwide. Yearly, about 1.1million cattle die from tick-borne diseases. This results in about $160 million in economic losses for farmers. Tick vectors also contribute to 30% death in cattle and account for 90% disease control cost in the continent.

See also: Is Africa truly ready for the Africa Continental Free Trade Agreement? Part 1

In 2016, a study by the United States National Health Institute ranked Uganda as the hardest hit location of the vectors disease. The new vaccine will, therefore, help combat the high livestock mortality rate in the continent.

According to NARO’s Director-General, Dr Ambrose Agona, the new vaccines will combat three species of tick vectors like the brown ear, bont and blue tick disease which spreads East coast fever, anaplasmosis and babesiosis also known as Redwater.

Uganda’s State Minister for Animal Husbandry, Joy Kabatsi described the vaccine as the beginning of a new chapter in livestock farming in the country since the prevalence of tick nearly rendered livestock farming impossible. She also stated that the invention will save the country a huge sum of money lost to the procurement of anti-tick vaccines annually.  

Kabatsi added that the Ugandan government has set aside 100 billion shillings to support the scientist. The vaccine has gone past the first stage of clinical trials where it showed 50% effectiveness in combating tick diseases. This percentage is expected to increase to 70% before its full launch. Also, it will undergo a second trial period that will be conducted on farms.

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As a five-year-old boy, Alloysius lived with his aunt, who is a smallholder farmer in a rural community in Ghana. The 15 years he spent with her, fueled his dream to establish a farm in the future.
Alloysius founded Alloyworld, a photography and video production company and iCottage Networks, a software company, after graduating from college. In 2013, he co-founded Farmline with Emmanuel Owusu Addai, an agritech startup that supports smallholder farmers in Ghana.

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Farmline has served over 200,000 farmers and mapped out 70,000 hectares of farmlands across 11 countries. Alloysius has received several awards for leading the overall strategy and vision of the company. Some of the awards received include the 2017 CNBC Africa’s Young Business Leader Award, the Echoing Green Global Fellowship, and the Cordes Fellowship.

At the Cambridge Institute of Sustainable Leadership, he emerged finalist of the HRM Prince of Wales and Unilever Sustainable Living Young Entrepreneur Award

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To build the capacity for establishing a farm mill in Northern Nigeria, Abubakar had to study. He obtained a masters degree in Entrepreneurship and Innovation Management from the Nottingham Ningbo University Business School, China in 2014. He equally holds a graduate degree in Computer Science and a masters degree in Management from Swinburne University of Technology, Australia.

See also: Personality of the Week: Onyeka Akuma

Today, his farming and entrepreneurial skills have borne good fruits. FaLGates Rice Mill employs over 200 people across Kaduna, Kebbi and Niger States of Nigeria. The company recorded a turnover of $450 000 in 2017 and has an annual capacity of producing over 5000 metric tons of a variety of rice products.
Abubakar is currently one of the young African farmers who carved himself a niche in the Nigerian rice market. In 2018, Abubakar got featured in Forbes Africa 30 Under 30 as one of the promising youths in Africa.

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Global demand for agricultural products is expected to grow by 15% over the coming decade. “The way in which this demand is met will determine the sector’s impact on the natural resource base, notably land, water, and biodiversity,” FAO Director-General José Graziano da Silva and OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurría write in the Foreword to the report. Much of the additional food demand over the next decade will originate in regions with high population growth, in particular Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and the Middle East and North Africa,” according to the Executive Summary of the report. The use of cereals for food is projected to grow by about 150 million tonnes over the outlook period – amounting to a 13% increase, with rice and wheat accounting for the bulk of the expansion.

See also: Egypt partners The UN’s FAO to Digitize Agriculture

Agricultural production is expected to grow by 15% over the coming decade. For nearly all commodities covered in the report, real prices are projected to remain at or below current levels, as productivity improvements continue to outpace demand growth. The Outlook foresees that yield improvements and higher production intensity, driven by technological innovation, will result in higher output even as global agricultural land use remains broadly constant. “Rising food production also comes with higher greenhouse gas emissions, with nearly one quarter of all emissions coming from agriculture, forestry and land use change,” Graziano da Silva and Gurría add. Direct emissions of agriculture, mostly from livestock, as well as rice and synthetic fertilisers, are expected to grow by 0.5% annually over the coming decade, compared with 0.7% annually over the past 10 years. This is lower than the growth in agricultural production, indicating a declining carbon intensity as productivity increases.

World agricultural markets will face a range of new uncertainties that add to the traditionally high risks facing agriculture. On the supply side, these include the spread of diseases such as African Swine Fever, growing resistance to antimicrobial substances, regulatory responses to new plant breeding techniques and increasingly extreme climatic events. On the demand side, they include evolving diets, reflecting perceptions with respect to health and sustainability issues, and policy responses to alarming trends in obesity. The report finds that consumption levels of sugar and vegetable oil are projected to rise, reflecting the ongoing trend towards prepared and more processed foods, notably in many rapidly-urbanizing low and middle-income countries.

“A combination of excessive calorie consumption, unbalanced diets and declining activity levels imply a growing burden of overweight and obesity in various countries across the world. In many low and middle-income countries, these problems coexist with undernourishment and micronutrient deficiencies, implying a ‘triple burden’ of malnutrition,” warns the report. However, concerns about health and wellbeing, meanwhile, are likely to nudge numerous higher-income countries towards lower consumption of red meat.

See also: Crenov8 launches Meet the Farmers Conference 2019 in Lagos Nigeria

This year’s publication has a focus on Latin American and the Caribbean, a region that accounts for 14% of global production and 23% of the world’s exports of agricultural and fisheries products. This share is expected to rise to 25% by 2028. Despite the impressive growth, the region is facing challenges in terms of food security, as many households are unable to afford the food they need, the report warns. In addition, there are also growing natural resource challenges. OECD and FAO highlight that “ensuring a more sustainable and inclusive pathway for future agricultural growth will depend on developments in the areas of nutrition, social and environmental protection and support for livelihoods.” The authors write that extreme poverty in the region has risen since 2015. “Ensuring income growth among the poorest communities is paramount – a challenge where agricultural development has an important role to play.” The Outlook sees “strong growth opportunities” in the region to produce high-value fruits and vegetables, which provide better opportunities for smallholders and healthier diets for the population. Targeted policies could help farmers and consumers reap these opportunities, while protecting the region’s natural resource base, the report notes.

Source: Global Agriculture

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He founded Cowtribe in 2016, an on-demand animal vaccine delivery service provider which utilizes cloud-based computing and mobile technology to accurately forecast demand for vaccines from livestock farmers in Ghana.
His mobile technology national scale system provides healthcare and disease prevention for livestock farmers. With the Cowtribe mobile app, farmers receive disease alerts for timely prevention, information and educational health tips. To offer farmers quick and affordable access to vaccinations,

Peter deployed warehouses in rural communities so that veterinarians can deliver vaccines to rural areas with the use of motorcycles, at subsidized rates.
Peter is currently working across 3 districts in Ghana, signed up over 30000 farmers and have about 116 veterinarians that have delivered over 40000 vaccines through his platform. Every day, not less than 500 animals are vaccinated and veterinary doctors now have more patronage as a result of increased demands. Peter plans to expand to 7 more districts this year and aims to cover entire Ghana by 2020.

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Co-Founder and CEO, Farmcrowdy

Years later, Onyeka bagged a first-class degree in Applied Information from the Sikkim Manipal University of Health, Medical and Technological Sciences in India. Thereafter, he gathered measurable work experiences from several job roles at Wakanow, Jumia, Guaranty Trust Bank, Konga, Travelbeta, CoSign Inc., etc. In 2015, he decided to apply his technical know-how to agriculture, after conducting research.

Farmcrowdy Group was the brain-child of the research, birthed with a team of Onyeka’s co-founders in 2016. Today, the company is the parent company to Farmgate, a technology-driven agro-trading platform for agro commodities in Africa. The Farmcrowdy Group is now a leading agritech company with over 12,000 farmers registered across 13 states in Nigeria

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