Six farmers from Ghana who have won the WASCAL Innovation Contest over the past three years were given the opportunity to present their agricultural farmer innovations at the Farmer Innovation Fair for West Africa in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, West Africa, on May 15-16, 2015.

In addition to the six farmers from Ghana farmers from other West African countries such as Mali, Senegal, Niger, Benin, Togo, Cameroon and Burkina Faso attended the fair. The farmer innovations included institutional, technological (such as in production, processing, treatment of animal diseases and storage), and marketing innovations.

Action at the fair

“The fair attracted a lot of interest and we had politicians, practitioners, researchers, students and farmers visit our stand. It was inspiring and created an optimal environment for networking and the exchange of ideas” says Dr. Tobias Wünscher, senior researcher at the Center for Development Research (ZEF) and coordinator of the WASCAL innovation contest. “Our materials on display were in high demand and our innovators even entered into business negotiations in some cases” adds Zimi Alhassan, project partner at the Ministry of Food and Agriculture in Ghana (MOFA), who joined the fair together with six other partner representatives from NABOCADO, CSIR-SARI and CSIR-ARI.

The Innovation Fair was organized by Prolinova, Inades (Burkina Faso formation) and Réseau MARP. It received funding, among others, from Misereor, the Foundation McKnight and CCAFS (Research program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security).

Background

The Farmer Innovation Contest has the following objectives:

1. Identify farmer innovations; 2. Evaluate them, and communicate the best ones to other farmers; 3. Test the impact of the contest on farmers‘ innovative behavior.

Development research commonly expects farming innovations to be generated by universities and research organizations. The innovation potential of farmers is often ignored but should rather be the focus of our work. The advantage of locally generated innovations is that they have been developed under real conditions and constraints and are locally adapted. Therefore, the dissemination potential can be high.

Farmer Innovation Contest facts & figures:

The contest is being announced to farmers through the Ministry of Food & Agriculture (MOFA) and radio channels.
Farmers in Upper East Ghana send in applications with their innovations.
A local committee selects winners.
Winners receive awards, e.g. water pumps, motorbikes, roofing sheets.
So far three contest rounds (2012, 2013, 2014) have taken place. Round 4 is in preparation.
Total of eligible applications by 2014: 222.
Number of winning farmers: six (two per year).
Local partners: MOFA, NABOCADO, CSIR-SARI, CSIR-ARI, farmers.

An array of agricultural water management (AWM) and resource recovery & reuse (RRR) solutions have been proposed in the Volta and Niger River basins. These aim to improve agricultural productivity in different ways. They focus on various points along the transition between rural and urban landscapes, or between rainfed and irrigated farming. But are all these solutions effective and if so, how effective are they? Which solution should one choose in a certain context as the most appropriate for success? To answer these and more questions the project will assess the potential for wider use of agricultural water management and resource recovery & reuse solutions in the Volta and Niger river basins.

Researchers are specifically examining four topics: 1.) small water infrastructure for small holder irrigation, 2.) drip irrigation, 3.) safe and productive waste water reuse, and 4.) nutrient and organic matter recovery from waste. They are analyzing the social, economic and environmental effects of these interventions – alone and in combination – in the landscape. To achieve this they are mapping ecosystem services, assessing their benefits and trade-offs and examining business opportunities and gender and equity issues. Researchers will be working with, and supporting, up to twelve masters students, from Ghana and Burkina Faso, who are contributing to the project.

WASCAL’s focus and contribution within the Project will be to evaluate the actual or potential effects of the four selected AWM and RRR interventions in the delivery of multiple ecosystem services (ESS) in Burkina Faso and Ghana.

The project aims are to improve productivity, food security, livelihoods and environmental health. Producing RRR and AWM investment guides, policy briefs, technical reports and by conducting a variety of workshops, training and other key stakeholder engagement activities, researchers will:

Enable potential investors (farmers, donors, NGOs and the private sector) to better target AWM and RRR investments and other initiatives.
Provide evidence-based guidance to government agencies to help inform policy formulation on sustainable AWM and RRR interventions.
Build local capacity among government institutions, MSc students and others.
Foster increased public-private partnerships (PPP) and investments in sustainable AWM and RRR interventions.
Improve adoption rates of these solutions, especially by women, by providing gender-differentiated analysis and identifying opportunities to overcome gender-specific adoption barriers.

The Supporting Investment Decisions in Water and Land Management Across the Rural-Urban Continuum in the Volta – Niger Focal Region project aims to offer recommendations on what to use where, provide indications of business focused feasibility and identify successful strategies for expanding the use and benefits of these solutions. The project is one of six research projects under the Volta-Niger Focal Region of the CGIAR Research Program on Water, Land and Ecosystems (WLE) and will be funded for two years with about 700.000 USD. WLE is a global research program promoting a new integrated approach to sustainable intensification.

Main Funding Partners:

CGIAR Research Program on Water Land and Ecosystems (WLE).

Main Cooperation Partners:

IWMI – International Water Management Institute, Accra, Ghana
College of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST)
iDE BurkinaFaso
Ministry of Food and Agriculture, Republic of Ghana (Women in Agricultural Development )
WASCAL – West African Science Service Center on Climate Change and Adapted Land Use

Contact

William M. Fonta, PhD

Senior Economist

WASCAL Competence Center

Off Tel: +226 50375423

Cell: +226 64429239

Email: fonta.w(at)wascal.org

On March 27, 2015 the headquarters of WASCAL was officially inaugurated in Accra, Ghana. As part of the ceremony the first graduates of the WASCAL doctoral program West African Climate System, led by the Federal University of Technology, Akure (FUTA), Nigeria, were presented with their graduation certificates from WASCAL. Representatives of the West African Economic Community (ECOWAS), government representatives of Germany, various Ambassadors in Ghana and the ten participating West African countries, as well as partners from universities and research institutions attended the ceremony.

The move to the new WASCAL building and the inauguration of the headquarters on March 27, in Accra mark important steps in establishing WASCAL as a regional and international institution in the long run. As an additional cause for celebration, the first ten students of the WASCAL Doctoral Program received their graduation certificates. Coming from different WASCAL countries, the students graduated from the Doctoral Program “West African Climate System” located at the Federal University of Technology Akure (FUTA), Nigeria, where they worked on such topics as micrometeorology, climate modeling, impact studies in hydrology and agriculture, rainfall onset and secession, extreme events such as droughts as well as rainfall recovery over West Africa. Dr. Laurent Sédogo, the Executive Director of WASCAL, acknowledged the ten graduates as the first doctoral students to graduate from the WASCAL Doctoral Program. Ten more doctoral students from the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) in Kumasi, Ghana will defend their thesis in the coming weeks adding up to a total of 98 PhD and 40 MSc Students that will be graduating by the end of the year 2015.

At the inauguration ceremony for the new headquarters the international organization was honored by high-ranking guests from all WASCAL countries and Germany. Honourable Elvis Afriyie-Ankrah, the Minister of State of Ghana, who presented a speech on behalf of the Vice President, Mr. Kwesi Amissah-Arthur, described WASCAL as a very important developmental tool through which science and education could interface to find appropriate responses to the phenomenon of climate change and its attendant adverse effects on the livelihood of people. „For the millions of people and the subregion, WASCAL is a source of hope that our environment
can be managed in a sustainable manner to ensure the future and the generations yet unborn“, he further emphasized and stressed that climate change is a threat to the basic foundation of the lives of the people of West Africa as about 80 per cent depend on agriculture. Similarly, the use of natural resources for their livelihood and agriculture contribute about 50 per cent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of most countries in the region. He commended the German government for the support it continues to give WASCAL and further gave assurances that Ghana would continue to support WASCAL to ensure that the ECOWAS region collectively
benefited from its work.

The milestone that was achieved with the commission of the WASCAL headquarters in enhancing the visibility of science in West Africa was welcomed by Mr. Wilfried Kraus. The BMBF’s representative further expressed that WASCAL’s continued efforts will strengthen the long-lasting cooperation between African and German universities and research institutions, support working and career options for scientists in Africa, and strengthen the capabilities of the scientists and organizations in Africa to manage and to implement knowledge for their own objective over time.

Approximately 80 experts from National Meteorological and Hydrological Services, research institutions and universities of the WASCAL mandate region participated in the workshop. The workshop was opened by Dr. Laurent Sédogo, Executive Director of WASCAL, Dr. Dr. Dietrich Pohl, Ambassador of the German Embassy in Ouagadougou, and Prof. Filiga Michel Sawadogo, Minister of Secondary, Higher Education and Scientific Research.

Currently, the National Meteorological and Hydrological Services (NHHS) face many challenges to maintain their data collection stations and to provide conclusive meteorological and hydrological data. The network density of the National Meteorological and Hydrological Services is low in many West African countries and below standards recommended by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). Frequent failures in equipment lead to gaps in the data records. The NMHS stated problems concerning data archiving, quality control and analysis including deficiencies in staff number (mostly affected by personnel retirement) and capacity building.

Dr. Laurent Sédogo, Executive Director of WASCAL, stressed the importance of working together in the effort to combat climate change: “It is only together that we can handle the issue of climate change. Not every single country has the scientific capacity, the human capacity, and the technical capacity to tackle climate change. For the northern countries climate change may be a scenario of the future, but we in West Africa, we already live the reality of climate change.” “WASCAL aims to assess, connect and enhance the existing national observation networks”, explains Dr. Boubacar Barry, director of the WASCAL Competence Center. “Such cooperation would benefit all participants.” WASCAL will provide the networks with a number of stations to fill the gaps in the network. Training of staff members will further contribute to a successful running of the stations. WASCAL’s data infrastructure will serve as a shared dissemination platform. Based on the data provided by the national services, WASCAL in return will be able to improve models, climate change scenarios and offer climate service to stakeholders for the West African region.

The workshop followed two regional workshops organized by WASCAL in August 2010 during which the Directors and representatives of the National Meteorological and Hydrological Services presented the history and the current situation of their respective organizations, on tasks, weaknesses and strengths as well as their expectations of how WASCAL can support and strengthen the West African observation networks on climate and water resources. “Following up with the results from the workshops in 2010, we now established a timeline and agreed on a communique to line out the further steps towards the establishment of the Regional Hydro-Climate Observation Network. Another important result was the drafting of a joint Data Sharing Policy, which regulates the rights and regulations concerning data exchange” summarized Dr. Mouhamadou Bamba Sylla, Coordinator of the WASCAL Observation Networks.

Contact

Coordinator Observation Networks: Dr. M. B. Sylla, sylla.b(at)wascal.org, syllabamba(at)yahoo.fr

Press and Public Relations: Jelana Vajen, press(at)wascal.org

The Mmofra Foundation Climate Change Awareness Park for Children was inaugurated by the Minister of Lands and Mineral Resources of Ghana, Mr. Nii Osah Mills, in presence of the ambassador of Germany in Ghana, Mr. John Ruediger, the Executive Director of WASCAL, Dr. Laurent Sedogo, the Chairperson of the Mmofra Foundation Board of Directors, Mr. Christian Reindorf, the Director of the Foundation, Prof Esi Sutherland, a representative of the British High Commission in Ghana and several other personalities.
Education is an essential element of the global response to climate change. It helps young people understand and address the impact of global warming. In view of the above, the German Embassy in Ghana funded a Climate Change Awareness and Education project developed by Mmofra Foundation in collaboration with WASCAL MRP Climate Change Education / University of The Gambia. The Project seeks to extend the impact of Mmofra Foundation’s unique community children’s park and to give the students of the WASCAL MRP Climate change and education hands-on experience in the area of education and awareness raising concerns on climate change.

In his address during the ceremony, Dr. Sedogo expressed WASCAL’s appreciation to the Germany embassy for funding and giving the opportunity to students to have a hands on experience and support their journey to raise the awareness of younger generations. He also mentioned that the initiative also provided WASCAL a platform to extend its activities to the broader community through partnership with a nongovernmental organization – the Mmofra Foundation. During the ceremony, the children actively participated in the amusement and entertainment of the audience through performance of sketch which were very educative and informative.
The exhibition for the climate change awareness park for children was officially launched by the Hon.Minister. The items displayed for the exhibition were conceptualized by the WASCAL students. They also served as the facilitators and guides throughout the exhibitions. The things that were displayed at the exhibition were in a chronological order in which visitors moved from the general information about the climate to the causes, effects, adaptation, mitigation and the way forward of climate change. The last two features to be seen were the aquaponics and the biofuel toilet. The project climate change awareness park for children which has been officially launched will contribute to raise public awareness especially children on climate change. It is of great importance that the child, future leader be aware that when the last tree dies the last man will die.

By the students MRP & Climate Education, UTG.

Contact

Dr. Musa Sowe
Director Master’s Research Program Climate Change and Education
Email: msowe(at)utg.edu.gm