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January-March 2019 Newsletter
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Dear NextGen Cassava community,
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From left, Joseph Onyeka of NRCRI, project manager Chiedozie Egesi, Robert Kawuki of NaCRRI, and Jean-Luc Jannink, Research Division lead, inspect new cassava varieties during a visit to research fields at NaCRRI, Uganda.
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The past few months have been focused on team-building and collaboration, as we held our annual NextGen meeting in Kampala in February; just a few weeks later some of us met up again, this time in Abuja, for the annual meeting of one of our partner projects, RTBfoods. As our projects span many countries and continents, getting together in person each year gives us an opportunity to connect more deeply, build our energies and revitalize our networks. Our meetings are also a chance to reconnect with our driving mission: improving the lives of smallholder cassava farmers.
In Kampala, we reviewed our accomplishments and challenges from our first year of NextGen's Phase 2, and made great progress on planning our activities for the year to come. You can read more about our meeting below, and about NextGen's participation in the RTBfoods meeting. As we review our own successes, those of our partner projects and beyond, we are reminded of how inspiring it is to be a part of a network of projects revolving around cassava, root and tuber crops, and to be active members of the community seeking to increase food security for Africa and the world.
In this issue, we draw attention to two recent developments we're very proud of. Firstly, we congratulate our Survey Division leader Hale Ann Tufan, who was recognized for her efforts to improve the atmosphere for women at Cornell University. We are also happy to announce the launch of our refreshed NextGen Cassava website: we have given the site
a new, fresh face and hopefully made it more user-friendly and accessible. Please check it out (more info below), and we'd love to have your feedback!
Spring is in the air (OK, mostly for our Northern hemisphere-based partners, but I feel it too!). Our year is off to a great start, and we continue our work reinvigorated and energized.
Chiedozie Egesi
NextGen Project Manager
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From February 18-22 2019, the Next Generation Cassava Breeding (NextGen Cassava) project held its 7th annual meeting at the Speke Resort Munyonyo in Kampala. Led by International Programs at Cornell University's College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (IP-CALS), NextGen Cassava is an initiative to unlock the full potential of cassava and deliver improved varieties to smallholder farmers in sub-Saharan Africa.
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NextGen Cassava annual meeting participants. Photo by Chris Knight.
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Hale Ann Tufan recognized for work in gender with Cornell's Cook Award
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| Hale Tufan stands center left with Cornell President Martha E. Pollack, in red, and other Cook Award recipients. Photo from Cornell Chronicle. |
Big congratulations to our own Survey Division leader Hale Ann Tufan, on being named a 2019 Cook Awardee! The awards honor Cornell students, faculty, and staff for their commitment to women's issues. Hale's work on gender responsiveness includes her role in NextGen, and is the focus of the aptly named Gender-responsive Researchers Equipped for Agricultural Transformation (GREAT) project, which she leads. (Several NextGen project members are GREAT alumni!)
Hale had this to say about her achievement: "I am very honored to join this remarkable community of Cornell faculty, staff and students, both women and men, who are champions for gender equality and women's well-being. Gender responsiveness is at the core of my work, and it is very gratifying to see my efforts recognized, along with those of my co-awardees."
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| Left to right: Chiedozie Egesi, Tessy Madu, and Robert Kawuki. Photo by Hale Ann Tufan. |
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The RTBfoods project annual meeting was held March 21-27 in Abuja, Nigeria. The project is an effort created to pinpoint the quality traits that determine the adoption of new root, tuber and banana (RTB) varieties developed by breeders. RTBfoods works with NextGen Cassava's survey division to identify tools and methods that can be used to better understand cassava end user preferences and incorporate them into breeding targets.
Quite a few NextGen team members were in attendance, including project manager Chiedozie Egesi, who presented an overview of the NextGen Cassava project. Hale Ann Tufan (NextGen Survey division leader), Robert Kawuki (lead cassava breeder at NaCRRI) and Ugo Chijioke (gender specialist from NRCRI) are a part of both projects, and all three gave presentations on their work with the RTBfoods project.
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Chiedozie Egesi presents an overview of NextGen Cassava. Photo by Hale Ann Tufan. |
Other scientists and experts participating in both projects who were in attendance: Béla Teeken and Busie Maziya-Dixon (IITA Nigeria); Damian Njoku and Tessy Madu (NRCRI), Ephraim Nuwamanya (NaCRRI), and Hernán Ceballos (CIAT).
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Partner Spotlight: International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), Nigeria
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Weighing roots from a cassava plot at IITA. Photo credit: Ismail Rabbi
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The International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) is a non-profit institution that generates agricultural innovations to meet Africa's most pressing agricultural challenges. Working with various partners across sub-Saharan Africa, IITA seeks to improve livelihoods, enhance food and nutrition security, increase employment, and preserve natural resource integrity.
The role of IITA in NextGen Cassava is to develop superior cassava varieties that will be adopted by farmers not only in Nigeria but other countries of Africa. Our ultimate objective is to improve livelihoods of cassava growers by providing them with superior clones that meet their needs for high and stable productivity, resilience to biotic and abiotic constraints in addition to traits relevant to processors and end-users. IITA is therefore a key partner in the NextGen Cassava Breeding Project and works on Breeding, Survey and Research Divisions.
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NextGen website refreshed for Phase 2
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Our new homepage!
Why did we update?
Our website was outdated in style, and reflected the objectives of our first phase. For Phase 2, we wanted a fresh start with a new face. Some of the information was out of date as well, and the formatting/site host made it very difficult to add to the site, or make changes.
We also felt that the content was too static, the site was difficult to navigate, and that it did not highlight the roles of our partners enough.
What did we update?
We made sure our new website would be modern, mobile-friendly, and user-friendly, easier to navigate. The new Wordpress platform assures that NextGen staffers can keep the site up to date, and easily add content.
One of the most important decisions we made was to make the website completely outward facing, meaning it is not meant to be an internal repository of documents or information, as we have other platforms for that, like Slack. The website should be an easy to use, one-stop-shop for those wishing to learn more about our project, like the media, potential donors, or collaborators.
Check it out! www.nextgencassava.org.
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Contact newsletter editor
Canaan Boyer or respond to this email to submit items for the next issue of the NextGen newsletter.
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