Innovations for Agricultural Value Chains in Africa: Applying Science and Technology to Enhance Cassava, Dairy, and Maize Value Chains

Project Description

The importance of science and technology in addressing health, agriculture, communication, and other challenges in developing countries is widely recognized. Donors and others are actively pursuing strategies for increasing overall funding for science and technology.  While most new funding will be directed toward building scientific capacity in Sub-Saharan Africa and applying existing technology to well understood problems, donors and other stakeholders believe there may be many missed opportunities for applying science and technology to crop and livestock value chains.

Meridian Institute received a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to bring together leading scientists and innovators with key players in the maize, cassava, and dairy value chains in Africa in order to identify innovative post-harvest management and processing technologies that would add significant value for smallholder farmers by reducing inefficiencies in these value chains in Africa.  In 2009, Meridian’s activities focused on:

• Working with contracted local partners to identify key bottlenecks and inefficiencies in the cassava, dairy, and maize value chains;
• Facilitating interactions among scientists, African farmers, entrepreneurs, companies, other institutions, and agricultural experts, which resulted in a prioritized set of 22 technically feasible and potentially impactful innovative applications of science and technology to reduce value chain inefficiencies; and
• Developing concept briefs and strategies for turning the most promising technology ideas into real-world solutions.  

The scientists and innovators were drawn from a cadre of people at the cutting edge of their fields.  A central premise of the project is that leading scientists from important scientific disciplines have not been adequately engaged as sources of information and innovations for poor farmers in Africa.  Therefore, this project aims to apply ideas from emerging areas of science and technology to enhance African agricultural innovations. The scientists and innovators will focus on ways to improve existing technologies and on how to introduce and apply new technologies.

The project looks for opportunities to develop technologies that (1) complement and support other efforts to improve value chains in Africa (including other technology-focused initiatives, but – importantly – projects that are focused on policy, legal, institutional, market, and socio-economic issues) and (2) are technically, socially, and economically feasible. This project will focus on post-harvest technologies for cassava and maize and targeted technology applications along the dairy value chain.

Meridian is working closely with actors in the maize, cassava and dairy value chains in Africa. Our partners helped identify key value chain constraints and helped organize a field trip for the scientists to both East and West Africa. Because of the checkered history of technology-based interventions for rural development, Meridian documented lessons learned from past successes and failures to introduce new or enhanced technologies and work closely with local partners to generate creative new ideas that would add value for smallholder farmers, not cost, and to do so in a manner that responds to people’s preferences and priorities and is mindful of the important work by others who aim to improve market linkages, infrastructure, and policy and institutional frameworks to better link smallholder farmers to markets.

The outcomes of this project to date are as follows:

1. Descriptions of 22 new ideas for technology applications that have the potential to reduce value chain inefficiencies
2. Detailed concept briefs for five products that utilize cutting edge technology and are highly promising for their potential impacts on sustained income increases of poor farmers (available fall 2010)
3. A report that captures lessons learned from previous technology introductions—successes and failures—to address value chain constraints

Follow on activities are focused on further development of the following concepts: Modified Plastic Tank with Dryer Options; Milk Container with Anti-Microbial Properties; Cassava Tuberator; Universal Power; Milk Safety Diagnostics; Reproductive Health Diagnostics; and Vector-Borne Disease Diagnostics.

Meridian is also developing strategic and structural recommendations to BMGF and other potential donors for supporting and accelerating the commercialization of post-harvest technologies in Sub-Saharan Africa (including, but not necessarily limited to, innovations developed by participants in the Meridian project) to improve smallholder farmer food security and income in sub-Saharan Africa.