Cotonou, Benin
November 14, 2012
Rice is playing a key role in providing food security for the poorest categories of rural and urban populations in Africa. It is the leading provider of food calories in West Africa and in Madagascar, and is now the second largest source of food energy in sub-Saharan Africa as a whole.
AfricaRice is pleased to announce the release of its Annual Report 2011, which provides compelling highlights of the work carried out by the Center and its partners to sustainably boost the rice sector in Africa by bringing rice research and development to the aid of Africa's poor.
Entitled "A new rice research for development strategy for Africa," AfricaRice's Annual Report features a special focus on the Center's new 10-year Strategic Plan, which will guide the implementation of its activities to realize Africa's tremendous rice potential.
The Report demonstrates the strategic vision and the dynamism of the Center in terms of research, partnership and policy advocacy.
It highlights the progress made in using molecular approaches to strengthen rice breeding programs in Africa, developing a systematic approach to varietal evaluation, building Africa's rice breeding capacity and addressing the bottlenecks affecting the production and deployment of improved rice seed across the continent.
Research briefs on rice value chains, small-scale mechanization and consumer preferences for rice attributes show the shift in focus of the Center's strategy from supply-driven research to more demand- or market-driven research.
Other features include a case study of Ethiopia's remarkable rice boom and a profile of Canada, which has been an important donor of AfricaRice for over 20 years. Updates on the Center's training activities and publications are also provided.
AfricaRice is an intergovernmental association of African member countries and one of the 15 international agricultural research Centers that are members of the CGIAR Consortium. It is also a major player in the CGIAR Research Program on Rice - the Global Rice Science Partnership (GRiSP) - taking the lead in GRiSP activities across Africa.
For online version, Click here to download a copy:
http://africarice.org/publications/ar2011/AfricaRice-AnnualReport-2011.pdf
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