Facilitating campus-wide dialogue on critical international development issues,Pages 1-3

Supporting multi-disciplinary research, andPages 4-5

Partnering with developing country institutions Pages 6-8

CIIFADAnnual Report (May 2012 – May 2013)

CIIFAD’s mission is to strengthen Cornell’s capacity for making significant contributions to sustainable global development by

Since May 2012, CIIFAD has made exciting progress in all three areas. This report highlights our major accomplishments over the past year.

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On October 11, 2012, CIIFAD hosted a University Lecture by Professor Sir Gordon Conway titled “One Billion Hungry: Can We Feed the World?”, the same as his book published by the Cornell University Press in October 2012. Gordon Conway trained in agricultural ecology, attending the universities of Bangor, Cambridge, West Indies (Trinidad) and California (Davis). In the 1960’s he was a pioneer of sustainable agriculture developing integrated pest management programs for the State of Sabah in Malaysia. He joined Imperial College in 1970 setting up the Centre for Environmental Technology in 1976. In the 1970s and 1980s he lived and worked extensively in Asia and the Middle East, for the Ford Foundation, World Bank and USAID. He directed the Sustainable Agriculture Programme at IIED and then became representative of the Ford Foundation in New Delhi. Subsequently he became Vice-Chancellor of the University of Sussex and Chair of IDS. From 1998-2004 he was President of the Rockefeller Foundation and from 2004- June 2009 Chief Scientific Adviser to DFID and President of the Royal Geographical Society.

Professor Sir Gordon Conway speaking at the University Lecture series, October 11, 2012.

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University Lecture by Professor Sir Gordon Conway

CIIFAD Seminar Series CIIFAD’s Wednesday seminar series, ‘Perspectives in International Development’ is one of the few seminar series on campus that consistently attracts students and faculty attendees from a broad range of disciplinary backgrounds. It has been able to achieve this by inviting speakers from across the globe to give intellectually stimulating, but layman-accessible, seminars on a broad range of critical topics in international development. During the 2012-2013 academic year, for example, the series included invited speakers who addressed such important development issues as: food security, migration and climate change; water for health and livelihoods, the changing domestic andinternational landscape for agricultural biotechnology and biosafety, and smallholder agriculture in a global economy. The series continues to be very well received by the Cornell community with approximately 100 students and faculty in attendance per week.

Dr. Clifton Wharton, Jr. speaking with a student at the 2013 CIIFAD Symposium

Student Multidisciplinary Applied Research Teams (SMART)

The Student Multidisciplinary Applied Research Teams (SMART) program brings together teams of students and faculty from across the university and pairs them with firms, organizations, or community groups located in developing countries. The teams work on well-defined assignments that challenge students to apply the knowledge and skills learned in the classroom to real world settings. SMART assignments vary from team to team. Teams work on

location with the company or partner group for roughly two weeks during January, and summer SMART programs are currently being piloted in China. SMART is a unique program at Cornell University – and beyond – that explicitly fosters engagement with developing countries that provides service-learning experiences with private and public sector partners for undergraduates as well as graduate students. The SMART program has grown substantially in the last several years. In 2013, 9 SMART projects were led in 7 countries, involving 37 students representing 17 degree programs. The student response to SMART has been overwhelmingly positive. One of this year’s participants said of the program: “I would describe my SMART experience as the ideal opportunity to take everything that our professors teach us and apply it to a real-world issue. With the help of your peers from an array of disciplines, the SMART program places you in the perfect position to contribute your expertise to a problem that will have an impact on the lives of others. In my opinion, the SMART program is an experiential, education model that all universities should look to.” A study of the SMART program conducted by Yoanna Ferrara concluded that the SMART program increased students’ preference for transformational leadership approaches, their confidence as leaders, and their understanding of foreign cultures.

“Bee Natural Uganda, Ltd.” SMART Project 2013, Kampala, Uganda

2013 SMART PROJECTS

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In April 2013, CIIFAD convened its 4th international symposium to initiate dialogue and reflection about the role of the university in international development. The symposium began with a panel discussion entitled, “Relationships of Reciprocity: Exploring the Value of Global Service-learning to Students and their Clients.” The panel was made up of past SMART clients, from South Africa, the Philippines, Bangladesh, and Zambia, who spoke about their experience partnering with Cornell, as well as a former SMART student participant who discussed how the SMART program affected her career path following graduation from Cornell University. The panel discussion was followed by poster presentations by the nine 2013 SMART teams. Dr. Joyce Chitja, professor at the University of KwaZulu

Natal, South Africa, responding to a question during the panel discussion. Photo by Margaret Lynch

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CIIFAD 4th Annual International Symposium

The symposium’s keynote speaker was Dr. Brady Deaton, Chancellor of the University of Missouri and Chairman of BIFAD, who gave a talk entitled: “ The Role of the University in International Development: The Promise of BIFAD.” During the annual dinner, Dr. Brady Deaton was awarded the “Dr. Clifton Wharton, Jr. Emerging Markets Award”; this award is given annually to an individual who has made a profound impact on low-income communities through his/her work on public policy, private strategy, or philanthropic investments. The La Grazia Olives SMART team presenting their poster at the 2013

symposium

All six past “Dr. Clifton J. Wharton, Jr. Emerging Markets Award” winners with Dr. Clifton J. Wharton at the 2013 Award Ceremony (left to right: Per Pinstrup-Andersen, Robert Herdt, Brady J. Deaton, Clifton J. Wharton, Willene A. Johnson, Peter Matlon, Francisco Pedraza)

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Food Systems and Poverty Reduction IGERTCIIFAD’s National Science Foundation-funded Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship (IGERT) program in Food Systems and Poverty Reduction completes its 3rd year in July 2012. This $3.2 M training grant trains cohorts of doctoral students to work effectively as members of multidisciplinary teams. Students undertake 3 semesters of coursework, where they learn the concepts, vocabularies, and methods of multiple disciplines. They also gain valuable field experience working on multi-disciplinary research teams. To date, a total of 28 students from fourteen different graduate fields have been accepted into the program (Appendix C). These include 23 trainees (US Citizens and Permanent Residents) who receive financial support in the form of monthly stipends, as well as 4 Associates (students who do not receive stipends but participate fully in the courses and field experiences). The Associate option enables non-US citizens and permanent residents to participate; to date, this group includes 3 South Asian. Students also partner with various in-country institutions for multidisciplinary field research conducted in Kenya, Ethiopia, Tanzania and Zimbabwe. To date, partners have included the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), Bahir Dar University, CARE, World Vision and ICRAF.

Stimulating Agricultural and Rural Transformation (StART)

In 2012-13, the Stimulating Agricultural and Rural Transformation (StART) initiative supported four major projects, sponsored international and domestic visitors and conference travel, and provided support to instruction of the NSF-funded Food Systems and Poverty Reduction IGERT, field research travel by students in the IGERT program, and to related international agricultural and rural transformation initiatives across campus. These projects have resulted in multiple journal articles and manuscripts in preparation, at least $510K in external funding already obtained for Cornell as well as additional funds for Africa- and Australia-based partners, with other substantial external grant proposals presently under review, and support for at least two African graduate students, plus research experience for several others graduate and undergraduate students and post-docs.

A SMART team in Zambia in January 2012 worked with a micro asset enterprise to develop a more business-friendly catalogue for their products such as generators, refrigerators, irrigation pumps, and other pieces of equipment agribusiness owners might need. Photo taken by Christine Hadekel.

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Training Smallholder Apple Farmers in China for Sustainable Production and Domestic Market AccessThe “Training Smallholder Apple Farmers in China for Sustainable Production and Domestic Market Access” project is a 3-year grant provided by the Walmart Foundation to Cornell International Institute for Food, Agriculture and Development (CIIFAD) and UC Davis, in partnership with the National Apple Research System in China, Shandong Agricultural University, Northwest A&F University, and the Provincial Agricultural Extension Bureaus of Shandong and Shaanxi Provinces, China. The project has the goal of improving the wellbeing of rural smallholder apple farmers, particularly women, in the largest apple producing regions in China: Shandong and Shaanxi Provinces. Over the course of the project, faculty from Cornell University will travel to China to conduct 12 “Master Pomologist Courses”. By implementing the “train the trainer” model, provincial extension agents will learn new techniques from the MPC’s and will teach these new techniques to the smallholder farmers they work with. By the conclusion of the 3 year project, at least 2,000 Chinese extension agents will be trained, who will in turn train at least 200,000 smallholder apple farmers, at least half of whom will be women.

McKnight Collaborative Crop Research ProgramThe Collaborative Crop Research Program (CCRP) supports various clusters of research and development projects in sub-Saharan Africa and the Andes region of South America. Individual projects within these regions form a Communities of Practice and contribute to regional strategies for targeting food and nutritional security constraints through crop research in the natural and social sciences. CCRP makes significant investments in strengthening the research and development skills of its African and Andean grantees, who include national scientists, professors at national universities, people working for non-governmental organizations and, often, post graduate students attached to the collaborative research project. In the past year, Beth Medvecky, Assistant Director of CIIFAD, has been involved in developing a web-based platform, the Agroecological Intensification Exchange (AEIx) that’s goal is to use ICTs to provide grantees, and young African scientists and development practitioners, with a communication and collaboration platform that delivers high-quality, engaging, multi-media information about agroecology and research methods.

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South African Agricultural Professional Fellowship (SAAPF)In November and December 2012, CIIFAD hosted the second cohort of the South African Agricultural Economics Professional Fellows (SAAEPF). SAAEPF is administered by South Africa’s National Agricultural Marketing Council (NAMC) and the Agricultural Economics Association of South Africa (AEASA). It provides training, support and networking opportunities for South Africa’s young agricultural professionals working in the areas of land reform, agricultural trade, agribusiness development, management, policy, and marketing. The program bridges the gap between South African agricultural professionals with experts in their field at American based universities, government agencies, and international research centers. The 2012 cohort comprised of three fellows: Ms. Grany Mmatsatsi Senyolo, a lecturer at the University of KwaZulu-Natal; Ms. Mmapatla Precious Senyolo, a lecturer at the University of Limpopo; and Dr. Thula Sizwe Dlamini, an Agricultural Economist in the Agricultural Research Council. Led by Ed Mabaya, the group toured Cornell University campus and had meetings with various Cornell faculty and several graduate students. After Cornell, the group went to Tuskegee University to attend the 69th Annual Professional Agricultural Workers Conference (PAWC) where they presented papers. From Tuskegee University, they stopped over at nearby Auburn University in Alabama and visited the Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology. Lastly, the group spent five days in Washington, DC where they had meetings at the World Bank, Economic Research Services (ERS), United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the White House.

Genetically Modified Crops in Africa: Current State and Future PotentialIn January 2012, a three-year project funded by the John Templeton Foundation was awarded to Ed Mabaya and Ralph Christy. The ability of GM crops to increase yields and reduce pesticide use is well established. Based on food security needs, Africa could benefit a lot from green biotechnology given the low agricultural productivity especially among smallholder farmers and the looming food crises in most urban areas. However, the adoption of GM crops in Africa has been slow and limited to a handful of countries owing to a variety of reasons including relatively under-developed seed systems. The primary objective of this research is to develop a systematic understanding of the current state and future potential of GM crops in Africa in a way that informs public policy and private strategy. The barriers and enablers of GM acceptance will be evaluated within the context of seed sector development. Through a comprehensive survey of seed companies operating in Africa, attitudes and strategies towards biotechnology will be accessed. The analysis will be based on both cross sectional data (comparing African countries that have adopted GM crops versus similar countries that have not) and time series data. The intended audience for this research project is fourfold – African governments, private seed companies, development organizations and United Nations’ Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO).

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Connecting Chinese Agricultural and Biological Scholars with Cornell UniversityThe Tang Cornell-China Scholars Program aims to enhance scientific and technological collaboration throughout the world by developing cooperative relationships between the best scholars at the thresholds of their

careers and established research and education leaders at Cornell University. Established in 1999, the program was designed to provide opportunities for the most distinguished scholars from the People’s Republic of China—those in the early stages of careers in the agricultural and biological sciences and biological engineering—to spend up to two years at Cornell University undertaking research in their field of specialty. Those chosen to be Tang Cornell-China Scholars are expected to have demonstrated, at the time of their nomination, a track record of extraordinary capability in research and unusual potential for research leadership. The Scholars are also expected to have demonstrated an outstanding capability in teaching and that they will further enhance those teaching abilities during their stay at Cornell. As a result of participation in the program, the Tang Cornell-China Scholars are able to expand their capabilities in research, build lasting research relationships with Cornell colleagues, and develop their abilities to lead research and technology developments and educational advancements in their home institutions and in China at the highest levels. Tang Scholars spend a minimum of one year—all at once or in two study periods—working as a colleague in research in an appropriate laboratory or program at Cornell.

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Tang Scholar Deng Zixin, Professor and Head of the Laboratory of Microbial Metabolism, Ministry of Education; and Dean, School of Life Sciences & Biotechnology, Shanghai Jiaotong University.

The SRI International Network and Resources Center The SRI International Network and Resources Center (or SRI-Rice) was established in 2010 in response to the increasing importance of the System of Rice Intensification (SRI), an agro-ecological methodology that increases yields of irrigated rice by 20-100%, while using less water, seed, and chemical fertilizer. Over the past 12 years, the use of SRI has improved yields and produced economic benefits for an estimated four to five million smallholder farmers in more than 50 countries. In addition, SRI principles are now successfully adapted to wheat, sugarcane, finger-millet, teff, and several vegetable crops.

SRI-Rice has expanded its outreach over the last year to pursue its mission to advance and share knowledge about the System of Rice Intensification and derived practices and principles, and to support networking. Next to communicating on a regular basis with several hundred practitioners, researchers, donors, policy makers, and interested individuals in more than 50 countries, we provided information and resources to national networks and programs, organized and took part in national and regional workshops, and provided technical assistance to development programs. We advised and collaborated with researchers, and synthesized and published the latest findings in a number of publications.

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SRI-Rice has co-organized with CORAF/WECARD and the Center of Excellence on Rice in Mali the First West African Workshop on SRI in Ouagadougou in July 2012, where representatives from 13 West Africa countries shared their experiences with SRI and developed a strategy for a regional program. SRI-Rice was a core team member in developing the regional proposal submitted for World Bank funding. Furthermore, we intensified our communication outreach and networking support in Latin America and the Caribbean by launching a Spanish language Facebook and Twitter and helping to facilitate a Spanish list-serve. SRI-Rice established a three-year collaboration with Peace Corps’ West Africa Food Security Partnership, and has undertaken two trainings in September 2012 and April 2013 for Peace Corps Volunteers, their homologues and Peace Corps staff from Benin, Guinea, The Gambia, Senegal and Togo. We have set up, run and maintain a public database on SRI research, including a large collection of research from China and India. Developing an international SRI research network, a global equipment innovation exchange network and improved networking support for the different regions, are the priorities we have set for the upcoming year.

System of Rice Intensification Regional Training, 11-13 September, 2012 – Kakanitchoé, Ouémé, BENIN, Co-organized by SRI-Rice, Peace Corps’ West Africa Food Security Partnership and the West African Farmers and Agricultural Producers Network (ROPPA)

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Appendix A. CIIFAD 2012-2013 Seminar Series, Perspectives in International Development

Fall 2012 September 5 David Spielman, Research Fellow, International Food Policy Research Institute, Agricultural Science, Technology, and Innovation: New Pathways for Developing Country Agriculture and the Environment

September 12 Luc Christiaensen, Senior Economist, The World Bank, The Role of Agriculture in a Modernizing Society: Food, Farms and Fields in China 2030

September 19 Robert McLeman, Professor of Geography, Wilfrid Laurier University, Food Security, Migration, and Climate Change

September 26 John Duxbury, Professor of Crop and Soil Sciences; Ed Mabaya, Assistant Director, CIIFAD; and Anu Rangarajan, Senior Extension Associate, Horticulture (Moderated by: Ralph Christy, CIIFAD Director), Small- holder Agriculture in a Global Economy: A Panel Discussion

October 3 Joyce Moock, Former Program Officer for African Higher Education Partnership, Rockefeller Foundation, Innovations in Building the Next Generation of Agricultural Scientists in Africa

October 11 Professor Sir Gordon Conway, Imperial College, London, One Billion Hungry: Can We Feed the World?

October 24 Blessing Maumbe, Professor of Agribusiness Management, West Virginia University, ICT for Agriculture Development in Sub-Saharan Africa: Market Linkages and Research Directions

October 31 Beth Medvecky, Assistant Director, CIIFAD, Cornell University, Agriculture, Health and Nutrition Linkages in Mongu, Zambia

November 7 Jeff Milder, Visiting Fellow, Department of Natural Resources, Cornell University and EcoAgriculture Partners, Mainstreaming Eco-Standards for Tropical Agricultural Commodities: Impacts and Implications

November 14 Devparna Roy, Visiting Fellow, The Polson Institute for Global Development, Cornell University, Bt or Not to Bt? Roles of the State, Civil Society, and Firms in Transgenic Crop Controversies in India

Spring 2013February 6 Wendy Wolford, Professor, Development Sociology, Cornell University, Viva Food Security! The Role of Social Mobilization in Reducing Hunger in Latin America

February 13 Presenters: Jemila Sequeira, Coordinator, Whole Community Project, Cornell Cooperative Extension, Tompkins County; Suzanne Gervais, Senior Extension Associate, Division of Nutritional Sciences, Food Dignity Project, co-Investigator; Megan Gregory, Graduate Research Assistant, The Agroecology Lab; John Armstrong, PhD Candidate Adult and Extension Education and Scott Peters, Co-Director, Imagining America: Artists and Scholars in Public Life, Getting Serious about Research and Education for Food, Justice: Challenges from the Field

February 20 David Tardif-Douglin, Chief of Party/Program Director, DAI, Confessions of a Beltway Bandit: What 24 Years in the Trenches Teaches

February 27 Christina Tonitto, Visiting Scientist, Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Improving Food Security and Climate Resilience in Africa: A Meta-Analysis of Sorghum Management

March 6 Per Pinstrup-Andersen, Cornell Professor, Food, Nutrition and Public Policy, How Policy-makers Respond to Food Price Crises: Results from a 14-country Political Economy Study

March 27 Mary Renwick, Water Resources Specialist, Winrock International, Small Steps, Big Impact: Water for Health and Livelihoods

April 3 Pat Clark, Range Scientist, Northwest Watershed Research Center, Evaluating Effects of an Index Based Livestock Insurance (IBLI) Program on Resource Selection Patterns by Pastoralist Herds in Southern Ethiopia: Background Results Following Severe Drought

April 10 Greg Jaffey, Biotechnology Project Director, Center for Science in the Public Interest, The Changing Domestic and International Landscape for Agricultural Biotechnology and Biosafety

April 18 Brady Deaton, Chancellor, University of Missouri, The Role of the University in International Development: The Promise of BIFAD

April 24 Douglas Southgate, Professor of Agricultural, Environmental and Development Economics, Ohio State University, Globalized Fruit: Transnational Firms, Tropical Entrepreneurs and Governments, and Bananas

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Numbers of PhD students enrolled in the FSPR IGERT

Graduate Field Trainees Associates

Animal Science 1 0

Applied Economics and Management 4 2

Biological and Environmental Engineering 2 1

Civil and Environmental Engineering 2 0

Crop and Soil Science 3 0

Development Sociology 2 0

Ecology and Evolutionary Biology 1 1

Food Science 2 0

Plant Breeding 1 0

Natural Resources 1 0

Nutrition 4 0

Total 23 4

Appendix B. CIIFAD 2012-2013 Visiting Scholars

• Carol Colfer, Senior Research Associate, Center for International Forestry Research (Bogor, Indonesia)

• JulioDiaz-Jose,VisitingFellow,UniversidadAtonoma•CIESTAAM(Mexico)

• MariaGuadalupeGabrielaMonsalvoVelazques,VisitingFellow,UniversidadAtonoma•CIESTAAM(Mexico)

• Richard Dudley, Adjunct Professor, CIIFAD, teaching Dynamic Systems modeling for the Food Systems and Poverty Reduction IGERT

• Nicholas Roskruge, Visiting Fellow, Massey University, New Zealand

• Krisztina Tihanyi, Visiting Fellow

Appendix C. IGERT (Fields of study and numbers of PhD students who have been accepted into the Food Systems and Poverty Reduction (FSPR) program as Trainees and Associates as of May 2013)

Appendix D. 2011-2012 SMART Participants by Department

SMART Participants by Department

Department/Field Degree Number

Applied Economics and Management BS 2

Architecture M.Arch 1

Business Administration MBA 2

Chemical Engineering BS 1

City and Regional Planning MA 3

Cornell Insitute for Public Affairs MPA 13

Crop and Soil Sciences MS 1

Development Sociology Ph.D. 1

Economics BA 1

Food Science BS

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Government Ph.D. 1

International Agriculture and Rural Dev. BS 2

Nutrition Ph.D. 1

Plant Science BS 1

Soil Science M.S. 1

Urban and Regional Studies BS 1

Total 35

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CIIFADB75 Mann Library, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853 USA

Telephone: (607) 255-0831 E-mail:ciifad@cornell.edu•www.ciifad.cornell.edu

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CIIFADB75 Mann Library, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853 USA

Telephone: (607) 255-0831 E-mail:ciifad@cornell.edu•www.ciifad.cornell.edu

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