IRRI project to help poor farmers in S Asia

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chennai: Six million South Asian farmers would be able to produce an additional five million tonne grain annually and yearly income of the poor farmers would increase by at least $350 within a span of 10 years.

This goal is expected to be achieved under the Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia (CSISA), announced by the Philippines-based International Rice Research Institute (IRRI).

The 10-year project would focus initially on eight hubs in Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, and Nepal, which represent key intensive cereal production systems and plays a major role in feeding close to a quarter of the world’s population.

The initiative will bring together a range of public and private sector organisations to enable sustainable cereal production. CSISA will be led by IRRI with support of $19.59 million from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation over three years and more than $10 million aid from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) over the first three years.

Achim Dobermann, IRRI deputy director general for research said, “The food price spikes of 2008 were a stark reminder of what can happen when agricultural productivity growth which is reliant on continued research and development-tapers off and demand begins to overtake supply.”

“By contributing critical know-how to major national initiatives and private-sector investments in new technologies for improving cereal productivity and farm income in South Asia, CSISA can take big steps in the eradication of hunger, malnutrition, and poverty in a region that has grappled with these afflictions for far too long,” added Doberman.

CSISA aims to reverse declines in annual cereal yield growth of recent years, decrease hunger and malnutrition (almost half the region’s children under five are malnourished), and increase food and income security in South Asia through the accelerated development and deployment of new cereal varieties, sustainable management technologies, and agricultural policies.

According to Dobermann, CSISA’s 10-year-goal is for four million farmers to achieve a yield increase of at least 0.5 tonne per hectare on five million hectare and an additional two million farmers to achieve a yield increase of at least 1.0 tonne per hectare on 2.5 million hectare.

These figures translate into at least five million tonne of additional grain produced annually, with an additional economic value of at least $1.5 billion per year and substantial other savings in terms of energy and other production costs.