Gender strategy of the East Africa Dairy Development project boosts women's participation in dairy organizations

The March 2013 issue of the New Agriculturist online newsletter highlights some of the approaches used by the East Africa Dairy Development (EADD) project to transform attitudes to gender so as to achieve increased participation of women in livestock development activities.

The EADD project aims at doubling household income from dairy products among 179,000 livestock-keeping households in Kenya, Uganda and Rwanda.

The project has adopted a dairy hub approach to enable farmers' have easy access to key farm inputs and animal health services as well as bulking and chilling facilities for their milk.

A baseline survey carried out in 2008 found that only 14% of dairy organization members were women. Because gender equity was a key pillar of the project, a pragmatic gender strategy was developed to incorporate gender issues into the project towards increasing women's participation.

Various gender transformative approaches were used. These included training of project staff at country and regional level, incorporation of key gender indicators in project planning and budgets for monitoring and evaluation, and training of farmer groups, particularly women, on the importance of being a member of a dairy organization.

These efforts have borne fruit, with a noted increase in women's membership in dairy organizations from 14% at the start of the project to 29% in June 2012.

The EADD project is now entering its second phase, which will see the project activities expand into Ethiopia and Tanzania.

ILRI in the news: Are environmental changes spreading Rift Valley and Lassa fevers?

Cattle wade in the Awash River in Ethiopia. Changes in farming practices and forest cover are thought to be affecting the transmission of diseases from animals to people  (photo credit: ILRI).

An opinion piece by International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) veterinary epidemiologist Delia Grace in The Guardian's Poverty Matters Blog discusses ways in which environmental changes including farming practices, forest cover and reservoirs are thought to be affecting the spread of emerging infectious diseases that are transmitted from animals to people.

Persistence of high food prices in Eastern Africa: What role for policy?

High food prices in Eastern Africa and the role of policy: Dr Joseph Karugia presents at an Open Forum on Agricultural Biotechnology lunch seminar

The coordinator of the Regional Strategic Analysis and Knowledge Support System for Eastern and Central Africa (ReSAKSS-ECA), Dr Joseph Karugia, today afternoon (30 June 2011) gave a presentation titled “Persistence of high food prices in Eastern Africa: What role for policy?” at a lunch seminar at the Jacaranda Hotel, Nairobi. The seminar was organized by the Kenya Chapter of the Open Forum on Agricultural Biotechnology in Africa (OFAB).

Dr Karugia presented some regional perspectives to the food price situation in Eastern and Southern Africa and put forward some policy options that would best enable governments and other stakeholders to respond in a timely manner, based on evidence from research data.

Sharing research with the general public: Dr Joseph Karugia does a piece-to-camera  for the Kenya News Agency (KNA) after his OFAB seminar on high food prices in Eastern Africa and the role of policy

Earlier this week, Dr Karugia was also interviewed on the same subject on two live television shows -- The Breakfast Show by NTV and The Platform by Kenya Broadcasting Corporation (KBC).

Curbing rising food prices: Screen grab of Dr Joseph Karugia (right) in a live Kenya Broadcasting Corporation television interview on 28 June 2011 by journalist Kasujaa Onyonyi (left)

 
ReSAKSS-ECA is based at the Nairobi headquarters of the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) in Nairobi under the Market Opportunities Research Theme.

ReSAKSS is an Africa-wide network established to provide readily available analysis, data, and tools of the highest quality to promote evidence-based decision-making on policy issues on Agriculture in Africa.

To find out more about ReSAKSS, please visit http://www.resakss.org

Persistence of high food prices in Eastern Africa: What role for policy?

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ILRI in the news: Business Daily features ILRI project on improving pig production in western Kenya

The 8 March 2011 issue of the Business Daily newspaper featured research work by the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) and partners on improving pig production in western Kenya.

The research project developed and validated a tool to help smallholder pig farmers accurately estimate the weight of their animals to determine the selling price. Because the weight estimation tool is more accurate than the commonly used method of visual assessment, which often under-estimates the actual pig weight, small-scale farmers in western Kenya can now get a fairer price for their pigs and, consequently, boost their household incomes.

Here's the link to the Business Daily article: Pig measuring tool tips the scales in favour of farmers.

Related blog posts
No more guesswork: Tool developed for better prediction of live weights of local pigs in western Kenya

New study calls for better training of local pig farmers in western Kenya to boost profits

ILRI in the news: Scientist Delia Grace features on BBC Radio 4's Farming Today program

At a global conference on leveraging agriculture for improving nutrition and health held in India early February 2011, veterinary scientists from the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), John McDermott, deputy director general in charge of research, and Delia Grace, veterinary epidemiologist and food safety specialist with the Market Opportunities theme, presented a report on agriculture-associated diseases like avian influenza that affect humans, animals and ecosystems.

They called for the use of multi-disciplinary, systems-based approaches, such as One Health and EcoHealth, among other strategies in order to achieve better health outcomes.

Here is the link to the policy brief, Agriculture-associated diseases: Adapting agriculture to improve human health.

The BBC Radio 4 interviewed Delia Grace on the Farming Today program on 7 March 2011 where she talked about the increasing risk of zoonotic diseases as more people keep more livestock, and what can be done to mitigate the impacts of these diseases.

Below is the link to a post on the ILRI Clippings blog written by Susan MacMillan, Head of ILRI's Public Awareness Unit, with the transcript of the interview.

BBC’s ‘Farming Today’ interviews ILRI’s Delia Grace on links between farm animals and human diseases

ILRI in the news: Call for new approaches against livestock diseases that affect human health

Young women herd goats in Rajasthan, India: Multi-sectoral approaches are needed in the fight against animal diseases that affect humans. (Photo credit: ILRI/Mann)

The intimate linkages between agriculture, nutrition and health were the focus of discussion at a recent global conference organized by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) in New Delhi, India from 10-12 Februrary 2011.

The theme of the conference was "Leveraging agriculture for improving nutrition and health". Some 1000 participants from the agriculture, health and nutrition sectors attended, representing various academic, research, policy, development, governmental and non-governmental organizations.

Among the featured presentations was one by veterinary scientists from the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), Dr John McDermott, ILRI's deputy director general in charge of research, and Dr Delia Grace, veterinary epidemiologist and food safety specialist with ILRI's Market Opportunities theme.

In their presentation on agriculture-associated diseases, McDermott and Grace called for the adoption of multi-disciplinary approaches to tackling these emerging infectious diseases that are a threat to humans, animals, agriculture and ecosystems.

A summary may be found in this ILRI policy brief titled, Agriculture-associated diseases: Adapting agriculture to improve human health.

Below are links to related media coverage:

The Guardian's Poverty Matters blog
Animal farming and human health are intimately linked

The Economist
Hot spots: How changing farming habits threaten public health

SciDev.Net
Livestock surge may harm human health

Voice of America (VoANews.com)
Growing global appetite for meat, milk presents health risks

In addition, here's a related story from the ILRI News blog
Livestock boom risks aggravating animal ‘plagues,’ poses growing threat to food security and health of world’s poor

In the news: Director of ILRI's market opportunities theme interviewed on Vietnam agriculture TV channel

Agricultural economist and director of the Market Opportunities Theme at the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), Dr Steve Staal, was interviewed on the Weekend Agro-Products Market programme on VTC-16, Vietnam’s Agriculture and Rural Development television channel.

Dr Staal was speaking during a workshop for an ILRI-led project aimed at improving the competitiveness of pig producers in an adjusting Vietnam market. The workshop was held on 5 October 2010 at the Melia Hotel, Hanoi, Vietnam to mark the end of the project and to present research findings to stakeholders.

In this video (produced in Vietnamese), he highlights the key findings of the project, noting that smallholder pig producers in Vietnam are indeed competitive and are likely to remain so, especially in light of projected future increases in consumer demand for fresh pork. (From time 15:18).

The three-year project (2007-2010) was sponsored by the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR). The project collaborators were the Centre for Agricultural Policy - Institute of Policy and Strategy for Agricultural and Rural Development (CAP-IPSARD), the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), Oxfam Hong Kong and the University of Queensland.

More information is available on the project website http://www.vietpigs.com.vn/

Produced by the Agriculture and Rural Development Channel (VTC-16) and used with authorization from VTC-16.

In the news: ILRI-led research on smallholder pig producers features in Vietnam News

The 09 October 2010 issue of the Vietnam News highlights the collaborative research project, Improving the competitiveness of pig producers in an adjusting Vietnam market, which was led by scientists from the Market Opportunities Theme of the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) and funded by the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR).

The three-year project which ran from April 2007 to March 2010 aimed to identify an appropriate policy and institutional framework that would best improve the competitiveness of smallholder pig producers in Vietnam in light of rising consumer demand for pork.

The project collaborators were the Centre for Agricultural Policy - Institute of Policy and Strategy for Agricultural and Rural Development (CAP-IPSARD), the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), Oxfam and the University of Queensland.

Here's the link to the article, Small pig producers bring home the bacon.

For more information about the project, please visit the project website at http://www.vietpigs.com.vn/