1.
A prosperous and nutritionally secure
drylands through demand-driven
innovation
Dr. David Bergvinson, DG, ICRISAT
2 November 2015
USA

2.
SRF
17 Sustainable Development Goals with emphasis on
sustainable and equitable food systems

3.
We believe all people have a right to nutritious food
and better livelihoods
ICRISAT works in the dryland tropics of
sub-Saharan Africa and Asia to:
Our research activities are focused on crops of immense value to the
nutrition and economics of the semi-arid tropics – dryland cereals
(sorghum and millets) and grain legumes (chickpea, pigeonpea and
groundnut).
ICRISAT - Our “Why”

4.
WHY
LEGUMES?

5.
CLIMATE-HARDY, MICRONUTRIENT-DENSE CEREALS

6.
ICRISAT’s holistic approach to the agricultural R4D value
chain
Cross-cutting issues
Mainstreaming nutrition
Empowering women – women are consulted,
involved and supported to lead
Attracting youth to agriculture
Approach for Adoption
Participatory approach and partnering –
working side by side
Building capacity – at a national and
local level
Integrating communications - to
build awareness and share knowledge
Monitoring and evaluation – for
feedback and adjustment
Policy support – work closely with
government to encourage the
needed policies
Developing
on-farm
practices and
technologies
Analyzing
key problems
and
opportunities
Managing
soil and water
Crop
Improvement
& seed Access
Diversifying
Farms
Introducing
processing
Facilitating
market
access
Driving market
development

7.
Managing and Sustaining Crop Collections (ICRISAT)

8.
Morris et al., 2013. PNAS 110: 453-458
Population genomic and genome-wide association studies
of agroclimatic traits in sorghum – 971 accessions
Unleashing Genomics to Accelerate Genetic Gain
8

9.
International Pearl Millet Genome Sequencing
Consortium
India

10.
Revolving
Seed Fund
Boundary
partners
Lead
farmers
Broader
community
ICRISAT has built a large network of delivery partners
capable of identifying and equipping lead farmers …
… who rapidly mobilized others in their community to
adopt new varieties, thereby motivating seed companies
to produce, promote and distribute improved varieties
Science of Delivery and Adoption
Lead farmers have interest
and capacity to assist
others in community, are
influential and trusted,
and can take risk with
testing new technologies
Boundary partners are
community based NGOs
& government extension
system with aligned
goals
Participatory Variety Selection – asking the farm
family what they want in a new variety
Swarna-sub1
1
0
Crop
Improvement
& seed
Five new varieties including
ICGV-SM 03517 now called
Wamusanga (were released in
September 2015.

11.
Soil Mapping as an entry point under
Bhoochetana: Our Watershed Story
Village
1999
District
2006
State
2009
Nation
2015
• All 37 functional wells
• Water availability year
• round
Partnering with
corporates in various
districts across
different states in India.
Benefitting over 5
millions of farmers
across Karnata
Genesis:
Kothapally
village,
Telangana
ICRISAT is working
closely with the
Government of
India to scale up its
learnings
and water
Managing
soil and
water

12.
http://annualreport.icrisat.org/