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Grain Legumes Strategies and Seed Roadmaps for Select Countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.

OAR@ICRISAT

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Relation http://oar.icrisat.org/8016/
401-2013
 
Title Grain Legumes Strategies and Seed Roadmaps for Select Countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.
 
Creator Monyo, E S
Gowda, C L L
 
Subject Chickpea
Pigeonpea
Groundnut
Food legumes
 
Description Tropical Legumes II (TL-II) is a Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) sponsored project implemented
by three International Agricultural Research Centers – ICRISAT, CIAT and IITA. TL-II aims to improve the
livelihoods of smallholder farmers in the drought-prone areas of Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) and South Asia
through improved productivity and production of six major grain legumes – chickpea, common bean,
cowpea, groundnut, pigeonpea and soybean. The project activities are in Burkina Faso, Ghana, Mali, Niger,
Nigeria, Senegal, Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania, Uganda and Zimbabwe in SSA and India
and Bangladesh in South Asia. The project has formed a wide range of partnerships with the host national
agricultural research systems, advanced research institutions, NGOs, and several other projects funded
by the BMGF and other organizations to ensure the sustainability and scalability of the project outcomes.
In the six years since inception in 2007/08, a total of 113 new legume varieties have been released in
collaboration with NARS in the partner countries. The newly released groundnut, cowpea, common
bean, chickpea, pigeonpea and soybean varieties are fast replacing old varieties in these areas of Africa
and Asia resulting in significant increases in productivity and production at national level. Participatory
variety selection trials have been expanded to new villages to up-scale dissemination of new varieties in
all project countries. The project was able to undertake trials with more than 281,000 farmers directly
during the past six years (2007/08–2012/13). Workable and efficient models for the production of different
categories of seed have been identified. The seed production systems are country-specific. Women and
women’s groups have been empowered to produce and market legume seed in many countries. A total of
222,531 tons of improved legume seed of all six crops have been produced and distributed since inception.
The project strategy is to reach smallholder farmers with improved varieties through small seed packs
(1, 2 and 5 kg) for wider technology dissemination. At the current smallholder land allocation to
legumes of approximately 0.2 ha per household, the 5kg pack will guarantee farmers their seed
legume requirement within one season. The seed so far produced is enough to serve 44.5 million
smallholder farmers, providing the legume protein and nutrition requirement of 222.5 million
individuals (5 persons per household). Cumulatively, as a result of improved seed availability and
accessibility, farmers have adopted improved legume varieties in about 27% of the area under
legumes in Mali, 38% in Niger, 57% in Malawi, 35% in Tanzania, 59% in selected districts of Uganda
and 22% in Nigeria. The reduction in per unit cost of cultivation of improved varieties ranges from
21% in Malawi to 44% in Uganda, compared to local varieties.
 
Publisher International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics
 
Date 2014
 
Type Monograph
NonPeerReviewed
 
Format application/pdf
 
Language en
 
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Identifier http://oar.icrisat.org/8016/1/J401_2013.pdf
Monyo, E S and Gowda, C L L (2014) Grain Legumes Strategies and Seed Roadmaps for Select Countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. Project Report. International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics, Patancheru, Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh.