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Company News of Thursday, March 21, 2019
Source: Graphic.com.gh
2019-03-21
Participants after the training
Scientists and other agricultural experts met in Accra to find ways to use technology (innovation platforms) to find a sustainable solution to the worms' worms. autumn army and boost the productivity of agriculture in Africa.
The gathering of scientists, farmers, farmers, farmers and researchers, as well as researchers, stems from the destruction of farms by the fall army worms that have cost the Ghana's economy about $ 64 million and the whole of Africa $ 13 billion between 2016 and 201, according to figures from the Ministry of Food and Agriculture and Trade. USAID Food Security Bureau.
The three-day event is part of the African Agriculture Transformation Technologies Framework (TAAT) developed by the African Development Bank (AfDB) to foster agricultural development. in Africa.
The meeting aims to train the first group of trainers in the creation of innovation platforms as awareness raising tools to evolve the basic technologies of TAAT products.
Participants come from Ghana, Nigeria, Cameroon, Liberia and Sierra Leone.
TAAT aims to strengthen the use of proven agricultural technologies among stakeholders to foster the needed changes, including through farm-level productivity, value chain development.
Eradication
Speaking at the opening session, Mr. Oluwole Fatunbi, Senior Specialist Innovation Systems and Partnerships of the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA), said: "The worms of the autumnal army strike us in the face as soon as we prepare ourselves as little as possible. continent.
Fall army worms quickly affect our crops of maize, sorghum and other grains.
Our development partners have intervened on several occasions, but TAAT aims to give it priority so that we can use the existing knowledge and technology to control army worms in the fall, did he declare.
Worms attacked cereal crops across the continent, threatening food security, but Dr. Fatunbi said that if the technologies developed were properly implemented, the effect of the autumn army worms would gradually decline and in two or three years, the plague would be eradicated. .
"At TAAT, we do not generate technologies, we put them in the hands of users and we create an environment that allows them to do it effectively," he said.
Generalized impact
"We want agricultural technology to have a widespread impact, from small-scale farmers to large-scale farmers and, ultimately, for agriculture to produce national development," said Dr. Fatunbi.
He added that while many agriculture stakeholders knew that innovation platforms could transform agriculture, the challenge was to implement the platform to increase productivity.
To ensure that the training produces the desired result, he said, participants will be mandated to train others in a timely manner.
"At TAAT, we make sure that after the training, we give them the mandate to create an innovation platform to prove that they have acquired the appropriate knowledge.
We are also careful to provide the necessary resources, "he said.
Durability
In a speech read on his behalf, the Acting Director of the Directorate of Agricultural Extension Services of the Ministry of Agriculture, Theophilus Osei Owusu, spoke about the sustainability of innovation platforms.
"There is an urgent need to integrate this system into the delivery of our agricultural extension services with the participation of stakeholders along the agricultural value chain.
"What we need to do now is move the innovation platform beyond the level of the community.
We should create regional and national innovation platforms for products such as maize, rice and cbadava.
This development will improve food and nutrition security and our exports, "he said.
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