Sharing the Ascension Experience
In the summer of 2001, Andres Barahona, a senior agricultural economics major at Texas A&M, traveled to Bali, Indonesia, for an internship and started a fresh fruit processing business with a group of Indonesians. By the end of the trip he could converse in Bahasa Indonesia, the country’s official language. He said the experience opened … Read more
Bangladesh has gained resilience in terms of food production and food security and self-sufficiency in food grainThe Consultative Group of International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) comprises few institutions of repute that were aimed to help developing countries face their challenges towards food production and food security. Initially, before CGIAR stepped in, there were one or two … Read more
When mautam struck Mizoram last during 1959, the unofficial figure for the death toll was between 10,000 and 15,000A bamboo shoot flowers only once during its lifetime, after which the plant dies. Gregarious flowering – when large clumps of the plant spread over a vast area bloom simultaneously – occurs every 48 years or so, … Read more
It was recently disclosed that Nigeria spends about N280 billion or the equivalent of $2 billion annually on the importation of basic food items like sugar, rice, wheat, milk and vegetable oil. It is also on record that, Nigeria is the 4th largest importer of wheat from the United States of America, about 1,842 metric … Read more
Swazi maize farmers are blaming World Food Programme (WFP) aid for their inability to sell their produce, despite evidence that record high maize prices coupled with increased poverty are undermining consumers’ ability to purchase the national staple food. “Local maize millers are now at one-third of normal milling capacity as a result of a sharp … Read more
FOOD security is the sine qua non of human existence. Without food nothing happens, no economic endeavour, no science or engineering, no music or literature, not even, in a year of famine, procreation.Since 1974, the year of the Henry Kissinger-sponsored World Food Conference, called at a time of catastrophic food shortages, there has been immense … Read more
Women achieve wonders as they turn their hand to carob molasses productionThe creation and development of the Ain Ebel Agricultural Products Manufacturing Cooperative (APMC) in southern Lebanon is an ideal example of hardship and need giving rise to ingenuity and unexpected results. “During the occupation we were cut off from the outside world for two … Read more
Just a little bit below the top 6 feet of ground – an area ecologists have studied extensively – is a large layer of naturally occurring nitrate. Nobody knew it was there. Nobody knows why it has stayed in the ground, instead of being taken up by plants as a key nutrient. “We were drilling … Read more
Farmers and peasant groups around the world are pressing the concept of ‘food sovereignty’ as a challenge to the World Trade Organisation’s agriculture policies, which they say push millions of small farmers off their land and lead to food insecurity. Described by the international farmers network Via Campesina as ”the right of peoples to define … Read more
Action by Churches Together (ACT) – SwitzerlandACT Appeal: Famine Recovery & Mitigation, REVISION 1, MalawiGeneva – The Malawi appeal has been revised to include a proposal for the Churches Action in Relief and Development (CARD) which was meant to form part of the original appeal issued on 23 September, 2003. However, CARD were still working … Read more