The Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA), in collaboration with the Universidade Federal de Viçosa (UFV) in Brazil, invites submissions from interested African scientists to teach non-degree, virtual mobility online courses in English through UFV.
The coordinator of each UFV requested course will evaluate your application, based on your curriculum vitae and transcript of records.
Before March 4, the UFV international office will inform you the list of courses you are approved to register for.
Classes will start on March 7, 2022 (except for INF100, which starts on May 2, 2022).
IMPORTANT :
Good internet connection is mandatory to follow the activities!
For academic mobility, one of the required documents is an official nomination from the home institution. “Self-nominated” candidates are not accepted for academic mobility.
The program does not provide a degree – students who conclude courses will receive only an official transcript of records from UFV.
We may all have organized virtual learning sessions, but how many of us have organized effective sessions in the agricultural systems setting? Well, this calls for a deeper reflection. I recently participated in the #KM4AgDChallenge which I believe fits the description of an effective learning program.
A novice in the field of Knowledge Management: Finding a new family
In August 2021, I got an opportunity from the African Forum for Agricultural Advisory Services to participate in the Knowledge Management for Agricultural development Challenge. Organized by the Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA), AFAAS, CCARDESA, CORAF, ASARECA, in cooperation with the Knowledge for Development Partnership (K4DP) and partners YPARD and GFAR, the challenge aimed at building appropriate capacities, establishing communities of practice for Knowledge Management, and strengthening mechanisms for knowledge generation to accelerate the achievement of the CAADP Malabo goals by 2025 and the SDGs by 2030. The maiden version was attended by 28 participants (10 women, 18 men) from 22 countries, and over 20 experienced facilitators globally sourced.
Above: Participants in the 2021 KM4AgD Challenge
Joining this challenge was an eye opener for me. I was one of the many people who could not explicitly differentiate between information and knowledge; and who did not care about the relevance of knowledge management in the growth of individuals and organizations, nor elucidate the difference between tacit and explicit knowledge. If anyone asked me that question again, my response would be different-courtesy of the several KM essential sessions delivered by the top authorities in the KM space globally that I participated in. I am loving this new field.
Content and key outputs of the Challenge:
Categorized under three major components, the content revolved around essentials of knowledge management, advanced knowledge management and knowledge societies. Another outstanding aspect was when we were tasked to identify knowledge challenges in agriculture, develop concepts, organize and deliver knowledge cafés. The execution process of bringing different people together virtually to work on a common task was amazing-despite the busy schedules. This was crowned with a conference to share outputs from the 3 months challenge. In general, the outputs were 28 KM strategies for different organizations, 20 country policy briefs and statements on Knowledge Management, and 10 thematic policy briefs derived from the knowledge cafes, now christened as the KM for Agricultural development Agenda. The output around networking and friendships may be difficult to quantify, but it was overwhelming..
A mix of methodologies: learning, friendship and fun
According to the Collins English dictionary, camaraderie is a feeling of trust and friendship among a group of people who have usually known each other for a long time or gone through some kind of experience together. This is what I felt being part of the KM4AgDChallenge family.
Some of the key tenets of a family are togetherness, compassion, trust, friendship. The KM4AgD Challenge team fit that description. The Lead facilitators Dr Andreas Brandner and Mr Benjamin Abugri and guest speakers were friendly and used delivery approaches that were conducive for adult learners. Despite the virtual nature of the course, it felt as if we were together in one physical classroom.
The blend of methodologies including simulation-group work, follow ups, WhatsApp reminders, videos, all made learning easy. The art walk during the conference cannot be forgotten. If I missed a session, I would be sure to find it in the class folder, or, even before checking the folder, I would contact the trainers or fellow participants for a quick brief-which they gladly did.
Above: Dr Andreas sharing light moments with some of the participants from Uganda Elizabeth Asiimwe (Left) and Charles Masereka (right).
These flexible methodologies complemented by sharing light moments, celebrating one another were my social highlights which contributed a lot to learning. Any chance of any members meeting could not go unnoticed-whether it was Dr Andreas meeting with some participants at a conference in the Southern part of Africa, Mr Benjamin meeting with participants in related avenue in Uganda, or fellow participants meeting at a conference in Benin, Uganda, we would not miss the happy ‘selfies’ on the class WhatsApp group. What a great family!
Staying connected…
At the end of the challenge, participants were inaugurated in the Community of Practice for Knowledge Management. I am overjoyed that this high energy will continue. Each of the participants was unique and has a lot to offer.
As I write this, I am on a process to recover from the jetlag, having arrived this morning from the #KM4AgChallenge conference in Ghana. It was worth it! The intellectual exchanges, the interaction, the hospitality by our Ghanaian hosts, the short trips in Accra are much appreciated. Special thanks to the FARA Executive Director Dr Yemi Akinbamijo for the words of wisdom. He challenged us to apply the learnings and be the best knowledge managers which is a major component of agricultural development in Africa. ‘‘If you rest, you rust’’ remarked Dr Akinbamijo.
A section of participants and organizers during the KM4AgDChallenge Conference in Accra, Ghana
Highlights of the training and conference can be seen at the hashtag #KM4AgDChallenge
The KM4AgD Challenge is an integrated, strategic, educational and transformational long-term initiative to advance sustainable agricultural knowledge societies, linked with research to create scientific substance, evidence and outreach for Africa AR4D. It will be a lighthouse project for knowledge-based development in AR4D in Africa, and will take place annually in a growing number of countries. Please look out for the next opportunity!
Gratitude
Thanks to AFAAS, FARA, CCARDESA, ASARECA, CORAF, KDP and partners GFAR, YPARD for organizing the challenge. Special appreciation to AFAAS, the Uganda Forum for Agricultural Advisory Services (UFAAS), and GREAT, Makerere University for enabling me to participate.
We did it! Group 4 teammates-Marc Bappa from Cameroon, Phidel Hazel Arunga from Kenya, Zainab Abdulai from Ghana and Lorato Bailang from Botswana-we made it! The Uganda team-Victoria Mbigidde and Charles Masereka.
As emphasized by all the speakers at the conference, this maiden challenge was just the beginning of the engagement with Knowledge Management. Upwards!
Above (L): Mr Benjamin Abugri and Elizabeth meet in Kampala during the FARA-AFAAS meeting on interoperability of KM and MEL systems; (R): Elizabeth and fellow participant Marc Bappa from Cameroon meet in Kampala during the Africa-wide Agricultural Extension Week co-organized by AFAAS.
Above: Dr Andreas (C) meets with participants under CCARDESA in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Above: Dr Andreas with Elizabeth (L) in Kampala, and Benjamin (R) in Accra
For inquiries about the KM4AgD Challenge, please contact:
The 5th of December is the 2021 World Soil Day, this year’s theme is “Halt Soil Salinization and Boost Soil Productivity”. In Africa, 50% of the irrigated lands have different levels of salinization problems, although only 6% of our agricultural lands are irrigated. Notwithstanding the growth in demand for food and fiber, and increase in intensification models; Africa must prepare to prevent salinization by using appropriate irrigation techniques.
In Africa, Our Soil is Our life. It is the richest resource we own; it is our primary production asset. A household with land can never be labeled as poor because its land could be made to produce sustenance and wealth for the household. The Soil is a bundle of life; a teaspoon contains trillions of individual microbial lives amidst organic and mineral matter. Our Soil is the purifier of our environment, the source and sink of numerous soil nutrients. It is one resource we will use to sink carbon and limit the destruction of climate change, an affliction we are suffering from when others are the cause.
It is noteworthy that 60% of the available arable land in the world is in Africa. I guessed that this is one positive thing about Africa, one resource our continent could be proud of holding in trust for the world to feed its teeming population. It then can position Africa and its posterity for health and wealth. Alas! While the world looks on, the most treasured asset of Africa is getting lost to land degradation! The frightening statistics indicated that erosion takes away 50 million tons of topsoil per year. Fertility degradation from nutrient mining makes 27% of the arable Soil infertile and largely unproductive.
Africa needs to wake up to this reality and salvage itself from the upcoming food slavery by halting its land degradation. Africa leaders cannot afford to play the politics of silence to this menace; neither can the farmers nor other land users lend an unconcerned posture. Our platform is collapsing, and we are the only one that can mend it and mend it well.
The first step to managing Africa soil is to accept the fact that our soils are inherently fragile and must be handled carefully to sustain long-term food and fiber production. Current land-use practices have shown that the majority in Africa are oblivious of this scientific truth and its long-term implication on the overall wellbeing of our society. We urgently need coherent policies and guidelines on land use and management of the different landscapes. We need to recommend and enforce the best practices in land clearing and tillage practices for agriculture at all levels. Land capability assessment needs to be done, to prevent farming on marginal soils or the use of fertile soils for other construction purposes; both are counterproductive.
Africa needs to rise to this challenge and develop an Africa-owned and Africa-driven approach to solve this problem. At the instance of the Africa Union Commission, FARA is working with all stakeholders in Africa agriculture to develop the Soil Initiative for Africa (SIA) to address land degradation in Africa. The SIA will engage all in co-creation and implementation of the solutions. It will give attention to the development of appropriate policies and institutional frameworks to stop the pace of soil degradation at all levels of governance and societal order in Africa. It will scale up existing technologies as well as facilitate the development of new technologies to respond to emerging issues. The capacity issues will be addressed headlong using holistic approaches. The quagmire of the soil information system will be addressed by building on all existing systems and ensuring that Africa owns an upgradable system that meets the needs of all using the best ICT facilities. Effective soil knowledge management will be developed including a dashboard that informs necessary actions. The SIA will embrace all production systems ranging from the agroecology social movement to the integrated soil fertility management and the conventional practices using mineral fertilizer.
The cooperation of all is needed to ensure the success of the soil Initiative for Africa. Let’s pull together and deliver together to halt the degradation and start the restoration of the already degraded Africa soil.
The Continental Conference has been organized in collaboration with the Knowledge for Development Partnership (K4DP), Young Professionals for Agricultural Development (YPARD), and the Global Forum on Agricultural Research and Innovation (GFAR). The three-day conference will take place from December 7th to December 9th, 2021, in Accra, with physical attendance strictly limited to 40 guests from over 20 African countries. The online version will be open to the general public (register here).
Dr. Yemi Akinbamijo, the Executive Director of FARA, will open the maiden Conference on December 7th, 2021, followed by a series of goodwill statements from partner organizations. Dr. Sarah Cummings, a leading voice of the global Knowledge Management Community (KM4Dev) and a Director at the K4DP, will deliver the keynote titled: A sixth generation of knowledge management for development? Implications for agriculture in Africa. It will be followed by a presentation on “Advancing the Science Agenda for Agriculture in Africa (S3A), CAADP Malabo targets, and the SDGs agenda in Africa through KM for improved production and productivity in Africa” by Dr Irene Annor-Frempong, Coordinator for the LEAP4FNSSA Project and former Director for Research and Innovation at FARA. The 28 participants in the 2021 KM4AgD Challenge will take turns to present their draft countries’ KM Concepts and Challenges for input and validation.
Presentations of concepts and challenges produced in the KM4AgD Challenge will continue on Day 2 (December 8th, 2021). The final day will be dedicated to validating the 10 KM briefs developed from the 10 identified Challenges, inaugurating the Africa Knowledge management Community of Practice for Artificial Intelligence; a presentation on the implications of fake news and misinformation by Prof Kimir Dalkir of McGill University (Canada) and the concept of Knowledge Art by Dr. Andreas Brandner, a founding director of the K4DP; a special awards ceremony to honour successful candidates in the 2021 Challenge with certificates and an International Knowledge Management Award Ceremony to honour the 2021 Global prestigious KM Excellence award recipients, and presentation of the conference communique.
This Conference is organized under the CAADP-XP4 Programme, funded by the European Union (EU) and administered by the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD). Dr. Aggrey Agumya, Director for Research and Innovation at FARA, will anchor the Conference with Mr Benjamin Abugri, Knowledge Management, Learning, and Communications Lead Specialist at FARA, and Dr. Andreas Brandner, Director at K4DP and faculty Coordinator for the 2021 KM4AgD Challenge.
About FARA
The Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA) is the apex continental organization responsible for coordinating and advocating for agricultural research for development (AR4D). FARA is the designated technical Institution of the African Union Commission and the African Union Development Agency on matters concerning agriculture science, technology and innovation.
The first batch of ARIFA fellows arrived at the Universidade Federal de Goiás.
The cohort, drawn from five different Nigerian institutions, is part of the TETFund-sponsored candidates under the FARA-TETFUND-UFV Pegadogogic retooling strategy, which began in November 2020. More than a hundred additional candidates are anticipated to join them in the following weeks.
This fellowship program is a partnership between FARA and Nigeria’s Tertiary Education Fund (TETFUND) to jointly implement the Agricultural Research and Innovation Fellowship for Africa (ARIFA) championed by Brazil. The program adds a unique and much-needed perspective to MSc programs and typically awards scholarships to students planning to major in disciplines directly related to agriculture, food security, and other fields of study.
It has the aim of supporting the innovation of young Africans in the field of agriculture through the provision of grants to aid studies and research at Ph.D., MSc levels as well as other short-term postgraduate certificate courses in selected countries outside of Africa. This is to bring up a crop of AR4D practitioners who are vested in contemporary techniques in agriculture and to strengthen the capacities of Nigerian academic lecturers and researchers.
All suitable candidates who have the passion to solve agricultural issues innovatively are encouraged to apply.
THE LONG-TERM EU-AU PARTNERSHIP FOR FOOD AND NUTRITION SECURITY FOR SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE
The Long-term AU-EU Partnership for Food and Nutrition Security for Sustainable Agriculture (LEAP4FNSSA) is a four-year (November 2018 to October 2022) project financed by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation programme. The objective of this project is to create an institutional arrangement for African and European institutions to engage in Sustainable Partnerships for research and innovation on Food and Nutrition Security, and Sustainable Agriculture (FNSSA). For more about the LEAP4FNSSA please click here.
From its inception up to the end July 2021, the LEAP4FNSSA project was very ably coordinated by the French Agricultural Research Centre for International Development (Centre de coopération internationale en recherche agronomique pour le développement – CIRAD). In July 2021, the LEAP4FNSSA General Assembly endorsed the Forum for Agricultural Research (FARA) to serve as coordinator for the remainder of the project period, i.e. up to October 2022. FARA wishes to register her deep appreciation to members of the LEAP4FNSSA General Assembly for entrusting FARA with the responsibility of coordinating the project. This is an important milestone because FARA becomes the first African institution to share in the coordination of an EU Horizon 2020 project. The sharing of the coordination role by European and African institutions exemplifies the bi-continental character of the LEAP4FNSSA project. In performing her coordination role, FARA is counting on the support and commitment of all LEAP4FNSSA consortium partners to ensure achievement of the project’s purpose.
On behalf of the LEAP4FNSSA consortium FARA wishes to use this opportunity to applaud CIRAD for the outstanding leadership it exhibited in advancing the project through its inception and in coordinating its implementation up to July 2021. After handing over the coordination role, CIRAD continues to play key roles in the project.
Upon being mandated to coordinate the LEAP4FNNSA project, FARA appointed Dr. Irene Annor-Frempong to serve as the project’s Coordinator.
Dr. Annor-Frempong possesses very strong technical and leadership qualities in the agricultural research and development domain. A Ghanaian by birth, Dr. Annor-Frempong holds a PhD from the Veterinary School, University of Bristol, UK; MSc in Animal Production Science from Wageningen University and Research, the Netherlands; BSc. (Hons) Agriculture and a Diploma in Education from the University of Cape Coast, Ghana. Dr Annor-Frempong is currently, a Commissioner of the CGIAR Commission on Sustainable Agricultural Intensification (CoSAI). She was the immediate past Director of Research and Innovation and the former Director of Capacity Strengthening at FARA. She previously served as the Head of Department of Animal Science at the University of Cape Coast. At FARA, she led the strategic orientation of Research and Innovation and the Capacity Development Support Function from 2008 to 2020. In her role as the Director of Research and Innovation, she led the development and coordination of continent-wide programs including the Science Agenda for Agriculture in Africa—a continental framework for improving the application of science towards achievement of Africa agriculture development targets. The Science Agenda was ratified by African Heads of State and Government in 2014. She advanced the ‘Research and Innovation Partnership’ between the Africa Union and the European Union through, among others, the leadership of the Platform for Africa-Europe Partnership on Agricultural Research for Development (PAEPARD), and participation in the LEAP4FNSSA, the AU-EU High Level Policy Dialogue (HLPD) on FNSSA working Group and the EU’s Development-smart Innovation through Research in Agriculture (DeSIRA) project implemented by FARA and the sub regional agriculture research organisations (ASARECA, CCARDESA and CORAF) and AFAAS.
FARA looks forward to a successful coordination tenure of the LEAP4FNNSSA project, characterised by the deepening of the Africa-Europe partnership on research and innovation for improving FNSSA.
