West Africa region

West Africa region
Posted on October 7, 2013

The West Africa Hub made significant progress during 2012 in the implementation of research-for-development (R4D) projects with a broad range of partners working towards the achievement of our principal objectives:

• Sustainable productivity growth and intensified production systems in the humid and sub-humid areas.

• More resilient agro-ecosystems, improved and less vulnerable livelihoods of rural communities.

• Enhanced and equitable agricultural innovation systems that link to policy and improve the impact of research and development investments.

• Enhanced nutrition and food safety.

Ninety-two research projects were implemented wholly or in part in IITA-West Africa during the year. The releases of new varieties of cassava, maize, cowpea, and soybean by our partner institutions during the year demonstrate the benefits of our collaborative efforts in genetic improvement. The released varieties included three drought tolerant and three pro-vitamin A varieties of maize.

The increasing consolidation of our project activities in the central and northern parts of Ghana during the year is in line with, and supports, our focus on achieving very significant impact in this important agricultural zone of the country. Active in this zone during the year were three major projects funded by BMGF Drought Tolerant Maize for Africa (DTMA), Putting Nitrogen Fixation to Work for Smallholder Farmers in Africa (N2Africa), and Yam Improvement for Incomes and Food Security in West Africa (YIIFSWA) as well as Africa RISING, the USAID-funded project on the sustainable intensification of cereal-legume systems.