Articles, Conference and Workshop Papers Collection

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Browsing Articles, Conference and Workshop Papers Collection by Subject "Africa"

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    From policy promises to result through innovation in African agriculture?
    (MDPI, 2021-05-05) Haug, Ruth; Nchimbi-Msolla, Susan; Murage, Alice; Moeletsi, Mokhele; Magalasi, Mufunanji; Mutimura, Mupenzi; Hundessa, Feyisa; Cacchiarelli, Luca; Westengen, Ola T
    The problem addressed in this paper is the challenge of moving from formulating policygoals to achieving the promised results. The purpose is to assess the possible role of innovationin agriculture as a way of contributing towards achieving the Malabo Declaration commitmentsand the zero hunger Sustainable Development Goal 2 (SDG2) in six African countries. Since theSDGs are high on both international and many national agendas, there is a need to increase ourknowledge of how to move beyond formulating goals. The approach includes both quantitative andqualitative data from a multisite research and development project. Moving from promises in relationto policy goals such as SDG2 and the Malabo Declaration to actions that make a difference at locallevel is a challenging task, and COVID-19 has added negatively to that challenge. Technological andinstitutional innovations exist that have the potential to improve the agricultural productivity, foodsecurity, and income levels of smallholder men and women farmers. However, innovation processesare hindered by barriers related to governmental, economic, knowledge-based, socio-cultural, andresource-based factors. To overcome these barriers, governance needs to go further than defininggoals, and proceed to the next step of establishing effective implementation mechanisms that ensurethe promised result.
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    Long-term spatial-temporal trends and variability of rainfall over Eastern and Southern Africa
    (Springer, 2019) Muthoni, Francis Kamau; Odongo, Vincent Omondi; Ochieng, Justus; Mugalavai, Edward M; Mourice, Sixbert Kajumula; Hoesche-Zeledon, Irmgard; Mwila, Mulundu; Bekunda, Mateete
    This study investigates the spatial-temporal trends and variability of rainfall within East and South Africa (ESA) region. The newly available Climate Hazards group Infrared Precipitation with Stations (CHIRPS-v2) gridded data spanning 37 years (1981 to 2017) was validated against gauge observations (N = 4243) and utilised to map zones experiencing significant monotonic rainfall trends. Standardised annual rainfall anomalies revealed the spatial-temporal distribution of below and above normal rains that are associated with droughts and floods respectively. Results showed that CHIRPS-v2 data had a satisfactory skill to estimate monthly rainfall with Kling-Gupta efficiency (KGE = 0.68 and a high temporal agreement (r = 0.73) while also preserving total amount (β = 0.99) and variability (γ = 0.8). Two contiguous zones with significant increase in annual rainfall (3–15 mm year−1 ) occurred in Southwest Zambia and in Northern Lake Victoria Basin between Kenya and Uganda. The most significant decrease in annual rainfall (− 20 mm year−1 ) was recorded at Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania. Other significant decreases in annual rainfall ranging between − 4 and − 10 mm year−1 were observed in Southwest Tanzania, Central-South Kenya, Central Uganda and Western Rwanda. CHIRPS-v2 rainfall product provides reliable high spatial resolution information on amount of rainfall that can complement sparse rain gauge network in rain-fed agricultural systems in ESA region. The observed spatial-temporal trends and variability in rainfall are important basis for guiding targeting of appropriate adaptive measures across multiple sectors.