Knowledge Management Portal

Participatory engagement of communities is key to establish clearer understanding of existing challenges, collectively identify plausible solutions, and to ensure sustainable adoption of innovative technologies and practices. Community Conversations (CCs) offer unique opportunities to facilitate dialogue among groups of a community and key local government and research institutions on selected topics of interest. Initiated through a joint ICARDA-ILRI effort and building on the Community Based breeding program (CBBP), CCs were conducted in several districts in northern and southern Ethiopia to, inclusively and collectively, identify key challenges in the management and marketing of sheep; facilitate group learning and joint analysis; and seek context-specific solutions to address them. Common topics of the CCs included community breeding, feed production and management, animal upkeep and health, antimicrobial use and resistance, marketing, and gender roles. The CCs were subsequently complimented with the organization of Communities of Practice (CoP) that comprised of representatives of woreda-level experts in selected fields of practice including – agriculture, livestock, gender, natural resource management, animal health, socioeconomics, extension, communication, and others as needed. The CoPs created space for woreda-level inter-disciplinary dialogue, peer-learning, project and resource coordination, and promotion of integrated context-specific solutions that are in line with woreda and regional strategic plans. Multiple topic-specific modules have been developed over the years to support facilitators of CCs, as well as reports on the outcomes of the conversations held. In June of 2022, a joint ICARDA-ILRI field trip was organized to meet with members of CC groups in selected Kebeles located in Doyogena and Menz to: • assess the effectiveness of the CCs and CoPs in facilitating sustained community engagement and bringing about changes at the household and community level, • learn about prevailing technical and organizational challenges, and • explore opportunities to address selected challenges through the SAPLING Initiative The findings of the assessment mission are summarized below. Section II and III present the findings from Doyogena and Menz respectively. The report concludes with presentation of general lessons learned from the visits and potential actions to address identified challenges and/or capitalize on gains made.

Presentation: Socioeconomic Impact Assessment of the Red Palm Weevil in NENA Countries (The Case of Egypt and Saudi Arabia): Ex-post Impact Assessment

The report describes a six day training session on Agroecology and Permaculture. The training composed three days of theoretical and three days of practical training. Target group were agricultural trainers and extension agents

Since 2019, farmers in the highlands of Ethiopia are losing their chickpea and lentil crops because of virus epidemics, and lentil production area in Ethiopia was reduced due to the virus infection. Based on FAOSTAT, lentil production (tonnes) and Area Harvested (ha) in Ethiopia decreased from 166,274 tonnes and 113,685 ha during 2016 to 113,018 tonnes and 84,512 ha during 2020, respectively (FAOSTAT, 2022). Knowing the exact identity of viruses affecting both crops is essential for breeding for resistance and crop management purposes. To achieve this, field surveys were carried out for four consecutive seasons (2019-2022) in collaboration between ICARDA and Ethiopian researchers, using up-to-date detection tools to monitor virus incidence and distribution on lentil and chickpea crops in the highlands of Ethiopia. Data generated can be used by plant pathologists, scientists, breeders, plant protection organizations, policy makers, National agricultural research, and extension agencies to mitigate the viral diseases.

A series of hybrid country-focused meetings took place between NARES, national and regional stakeholders, CGIAR breeders and F2R-CWANA WP2 researchers to promote the fast-track release of the most suitable Genetic Innovations for the CWANA region. Participants were familiarized with OneCGIAR strategies to disseminate Genetic Innovations and were asked to prioritize, firstly, the crops and crop- Target Product Profiles (TPPs) available in the OneCGIAR portfolio that were considered most important for the countries. Prioritization was based, among other considerations, on their socioeconomic importance for the country and the current availability of suitable varieties targeting the TPPs selected. Secondly, newly released but underutilized varieties that best fit the selected TPPs were also prioritized. The prioritized county and crop-level target product profiles and newly released varieties will be the basis of subsequent activities related to developing and releasing genetic innovations within CWANA under WP2. This record is for the stakeholder engagement meeting in Morocco.

The primary objective of this working paper is to review literature (i.e., peer-reviewed and grey) on the extent to which women’s full and effective participation in climate change policies at different scales; defined at the level at which a policy is implemented, including macro, meso and micro; improve women’s resilience to climate change and environmental hazards. Given that women are vulnerable to climate change in unique ways and have important contributions to increase the climate resilience of the agri-food sector, it is imperative for governments to design and enact policies to enhance women’s resilience to climate change by alleviating gendered constraints and building women’s resilience capacities in line with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). The SDGs provide a goalpost for strengthening women’s voice and agency in climate resilience. In particular, SDG 5.5 which “seeks to ensure women’s full and effective participation and equal opportunities, defined as meaningful involvement and exertion of influence, for leadership at all levels of decision-making in political, economic and public life.” Improving women’s full, effective, and meaningful participation in the policy process is a critical pre-condition to increasing women’s resilience to climate change and disaster risk. As such, one of the central conclusions of the 65th Commission on the Status of Women (CSW65) reaffirmed the need for government policies to champion women’s full and effective participation and leadership in climate change governance. The review emphasizes government policies that promote women’s agency and voices in climate change resilience at multiple scales; national frameworks for integrating gender in climate policy, and women’s resilience capacities in the agri-food sector. Importantly, and when data allows, the review also details how and under what conditions these policies succeed in enabling women to acquire voice and agency in climate change resilience through specific well-being outcomes.

Wheat is one of the most important crops for global food security and represents a main source of food and income for millions of smallholder farmers worldwide. Pseudomonas syringae pv. syringae (Pss) is the causal agent of bacterial leaf blight or leaf necrosis disease with specific symptoms on wheat leaves and spikes and in good conditions it can reach to the seeds to be seed borne disease. Yield losses caused by Pss can reach up to 50% or more depending on the crop, time of infection, and region. Therefore, developing and implementing effective management strategies for bacterial diseases is very important to reduce yield and quality loss. However, accurate detection of diseases is the first essential step for effective management strategies for control of this disease. Molecular is efficient tool to accurately detect and monitor the occurrence and development of crop diseases. This report describes a validated conventional polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assay for Pss detection and characterization applied by ICARDA’s GHU.

ICARDA’s Germplasm Health unit (GHU) is responsible for the monitoring, clearance and documentation of safe germplasm movement at the Center's locations in Lebanon and Morocco. All incoming and outgoing genetic resources and breeding germplasm must go through a strict quarantine monitoring system, including seed health testing. To confirm the health status of seed samples, the GHU conducts different types of tests based on the nature of the pest to be identified. In this manual, we listed and described the procedures of diagnostic tools validated by ICARDA’s GHU for detection of legume seed-borne pests: