TAINAN CITY, TAIWAN and NAIROBI, KENYA (23 April 2024) – An international research team led by the World Vegetable Center (WorldVeg), and including scientists from the Center for International Forestry Research and World Agroforestry (CIFOR-ICRAF), has won the 2023 Cozzarelli Prize for an article on the potential of ‘forgotten’ food crops in sub-Saharan Africa to provide healthy diets in a changing climate.

The paper was one of six selected by the editorial board of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) – a prestigious scientific journal based in Washington, DC – to receive the annual award for scientific excellence and originality at a ceremony on 28 April 2024.

Papers were chosen from more than 3,000 open-access research articles that appeared in the journal last year and represent the six broadly defined classes under which the National Academy of Sciences is organized.

The study – which was selected in the Applied Biological, Agricultural, and Environmental Sciences category of the Cozzarelli Prize – also involved multidisciplinary scientists from the University of Abomey-Calavi (Benin), the National Taiwan University, and Scotland’s Rural College in Edinburgh.

The study used climate modelling to assess the potential of 138 traditional food plants that could diversify or replace staple crops, and identified 58 that are micronutrient-rich and are suitable for integration into cropping systems under current and projected climatic conditions. The authors concluded that diversifying food production in Africa with these neglected ‘opportunity crops’ improves both the dietary health and climate resilience of food systems in sub-Saharan Africa.

“Our study shows that in most locations where major staples are currently grown in sub-Saharan Africa, one or more forgotten food crops from different food groups will be suitable for cultivation under 2070 climate conditions – and can diversify major staples to support more nutrient-rich diets,” says Maarten van Zonneveld, head of genetic resources at WorldVeg in Taiwan.

The research was part of various initiatives that the study’s collaborating partners are involved in. WorldVeg is the only organization with a global mandate for vegetable research and development – including traditional crops – and works closely with the paper’s co-authors in Benin and Taiwan. CIFOR-ICRAF scientists were involved in the modelling and data analysis, and built on their rich experience with tree and shrub foods.

“Our results suggest that diversifying sub-Saharan African food production with forgotten food crops could improve climate resilience and dietary health,” says Stepha McMullin, a development specialist at CIFOR-ICRAF in Kenya. “But to successfully mainstream these foods, it is crucial that we work closely with both local producers and consumers. At CIFOR–ICRAF, we already work with rural communities in East and Southern Africa to do this, by designing and implementing locally tailored food tree portfolios.”

Recipients of the Cozzarelli Prize – which is named after former PNAS Editor-in-Chief Nicholas R. Cozzarelli – will be recognized at the awards ceremony during the annual meeting of the National Academy of Sciences. Online registration is possible here.

For further information:

• Azzura Lalani, Head of Global Outreach and Engagement, CIFOR-ICRAF: a.lalani@cifor-icraf.org
• Nick Pasiecznik, Communications Lead, World Vegetable Center: nick.pasiecznik@worldveg.org

Co-author quotes:

Cameroon’s wildlife in the spotlight: Launch of a new initiative to sustainably manage the Grand Tridom-Tri-National de la Sangha landscape and support communities.

• Millions of people depend on wild meat for food and income. Wild meat is an important source of protein, fat, and micronutrients, particularly for Indigenous Peoples and rural communities in South America, Africa, and Asia.
• The overall aim of the SWM Programme is to contribute to the conservation of wildlife, ecosystems, and their services, as well as to improve the living conditions and food security of the people who depend on these resources.
• Cameroon is the latest country to join fifteen other countries that are participating in the SWM Programme. In Cameroon, the SWM Programme will work with ten Baka villages and ten Bantu villages next to the Dja Faunal Reserve in the Mintom district.
• The objective of the SWM Programme in Cameroon is to improve and strengthen the sustainability of community-based management of forest resources, particularly wild meat, while guaranteeing the livelihoods of Indigenous Peoples and local communities.
• The SWM Programme activities in Cameroon are funded by the European Union and implemented by CIFOR-ICRAF in collaboration with FAO and MINFOF.

(EBOLOWA, 25 March 2024) – Wildlife in the tropical rainforests of southeast Cameroon is increasingly under pressure from overexploitation driven by a burgeoning human population and uncontrolled commercial interests. To tackle these major challenges, an international initiative – the Sustainable Wildlife Management Programme or SWM Programme – is partnering with Baka and Bantu villages around the Dja Faunal Reserve to develop new sustainable approaches to address wild meat hunting and consumption throughout the entire food chain.

Following Cameroon’s expressed interest, an EU-funded project was signed in September 2023 between the government and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). The Center for International Forestry Research and World Agroforestry (CIFOR-ICRAF) has been designated as the lead partner organisation to coordinate the country project and fieldwork.

A workshop is being organised to mark the official launch of the project, which will take place in Ebolowa from 25 to 26 March 2024. Leaders from the Mintom district – where the project will be implemented – and other technical and financial partners of the project are expected to attend. The implementation phase of the SWM Programme work in Cameroon will run through to July 2026.

This work in Cameroon has three specific objectives.

Firstly, achieving sustainable and legal use of wild animal populations for the food and livelihoods of rural stakeholders whilst conserving biodiversity.

Secondly, reducing the dependence of population centres (urban or otherwise) on wild meat from unsustainable sources, in favour of healthy and sustainable supply chains.

Thirdly, strengthening capacities to prevent zoonotic risks of wild origin at the human-domestic animal-wildlife interface and in ecosystems.

The SWM Programme pilot site in Cameroon is located on the edge of the Dja Faunal Reserve, more precisely in the Djoum-Mintom landscape.
The Dja Faunal Reserve is a priority for biodiversity conservation actions.

Ten Baka villages and ten Bantu villages are targeted by the project, which encompasses most of the population centres in the Mintom district (around 6,000 inhabitants, 5,000 of whom live in rural areas, including 2,000 Baka).

The EU and Cameroon are working together to meet these challenges!

Yaounde, 28 March 2023 – CIFOR-ICRAF and UNHCR signed a memorandum of understanding to strengthen the resilience of refugees and host communities, while preserving the sustainable management of forest resources in areas affected by forced displacement in Cameroon.

“Environmental degradation has become a major concern in refugee-hosting landscapes in Sub-Saharan Africa,” said CIFOR-ICRAF’s Country Coordinator Ann Degrande. “The daily subsistence of refugees relies heavily on forest and tree resources for fuelwood, construction, fruit and non-timber forest products as well as other environmental services. This exerts a lot of pressure on the already fragile ecosystems where most refugees are hosted.”

Said Richard Eba’a Atyi, CIFOR-ICRAF’s Regional Convener, “Targeting sustainable development and resilience at the level of a landscape by an Integrated Landscape Approach is increasingly being recognized as a viable approach to overcome sectorial gaps and find solutions through dialogue with actors at multiple levels.”

In Cameroon, CIFOR-ICRAF has demonstrated how tree growing can mitigate the environmental impact of displacement and develop sustainable wood fuel value chains and food security. However, it soon became apparent that the actions of a single organization could not solve the environmental and social problems related to population migration, given its complexity and scope. This led to the organisations combining their efforts, beginning in 2018 in the east of Cameroon as part of the implementation of the EU-funded Governing Multifunctional Landscapes (GML) project.

In October 2022, a new tool called Guidance for a Landscape Approach in Displacement Settings (GLADS), which outlines how an integrated landscape approach can be adapted for displacement or refugee settings, was launched. Developed in partnership with UNHCR Cameroon, the tool aims to guide stakeholders in building context-relevant understanding, inclusive approaches, continuous learning and outcomes towards sustainability and resilience in refugee hosting or displacement settings.

“The present MoU between our organizations thus reinforces the vision of our operations in refugee settings in order to jointly materialize actions and advocate for sustainable development and resilience in the landscape of the people we serve through an integrated landscape approach,” said UNHCR Representative in Cameroon Olivier Beer.

In order to achieve the sustainable development goals of zero hunger, good health and well-being, access to affordable and clean energy, and addressing climate change, UNHCR and CIFOR-ICRAF are also combining their efforts to mobilize resources for the enhancement of the livelihoods of refugees and members of the host community as well as the sustainable use of forests.

The first activities through the UNHCR and CIFOR-ICRAF partnership will be implemented in the Garoua-Boulai Subdivision in Cameroon’s East Region which is home to almost 64,000 Central African refugees. In order to develop and implement solutions that improve the management of natural resources, both organizations have committed to conducting participatory research so that communities may create futures for themselves and future generations.

For more information
CIFOR-ICRAF Cameroon
Merilyne Ojong
Communications Specialist
Behind Usine Bastos, Yaounde-Cameroun
o.nchare@cifor-icraf.org
PO Box : 16317 Yaounde
Tel: (+237) 222 21 50 84 | 222 22 74 51 | 699 98 16 58
Email: cifor.cameroon@cifor-icraf.org | icraf-aht@cifor-icraf.org

Media advisory

Nairobi, 26 January 2023 – Climate change is making it harder to grow enough nutritious food, but a unique programme is training African scientists in harnessing a cutting-edge breeding tool to adapt agriculture to new threats.

The African Plant Breeding Academy, a programme for top plant breeders to upgrade their skills in advanced crop breeding, is training 11 doctorate-level scientists from across the continent to use CRISPR (Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats), a tool that allows scientists to make precise and specific changes to DNA sequences in living organisms, including crops.

The technology will help plant scientists to quickly develop crop varieties adapted to the changing climate, and to boost their nutritional content for important vitamins and minerals like Zinc, Iron and Vitamin A, all of which are critical for human health and development.

As an initiative of the African Orphan Crops Consortium (AOCC), the University of California of Davis organised the six-week training programme, partnering with UC Berkeley’s Innovative Genome Institute (IGI) and the International Institute for Tropical Agriculture (IITA) which is hosted in Nairobi, Kenya by the Center for International Forestry Research and the World Agroforestry (CIFOR-ICRAF) and the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI). Additional partners include African Union Development Agency – New Partnership for African Development (AUDA-NEPAD), Morrison and Foerster, Bayer, Syngenta, UM6P Ventures, and the Foundation for Food and Agricultural Research (FFAR).

“We are honoured to be working with the top institutions in the world in this Academy that will enable Africans to drive innovation critical to improving African crops to eliminate stunting due to malnutrition,” said Dr Allen Van Deynze, Director of the Seed Biotechnology Center at UC Davis and Scientific Director of the AOCC.

“This training is the first of its kind to impart knowledge, skills and tools to accomplish gene editing in crop plants to national program scientists in Africa,” said Dr Rita Mumm who oversees Capacity Building and Mobilisation at the AOCC and directs the African Plant Breeding Academy.

Eleven doctorate scientists from seven countries are participating in this first cohort, from a highly competitive applicant pool of 57. The scientists work at institutions that are already undertaking research in gene editing in crop plants or have committed to doing so upon their employee’s graduation from the course.

“The gene-editing toolkit training is a momentous occasion that should be celebrated given the scale of the problem that CRISPR is expected to address,” said AOCC founder Dr Howard-Yana Shapiro during the official launch of the training programme.

“CRISPR is a key strategy towards improving food nutrition in Africa and the trainees from this programme will be the change agents that will make the impossible happen especially with the kind of pan-African collaboration we have witnessed today.”

Dr Silas Obukosia from the African Union Development Agency – New Partnership for African Development (AUDA-NEPAD) emphasised the organisation’s support for gene editing as one of the key innovations that will transform the continent.

“Gene-edited crops and their products that are equivalent to conventionally bred crops should be regulated under the conventional seed laws,” said Dr Obukosia. “Gene editing makes specific, targeted changes to the DNA of an organism and can be programmed to produce products equivalent to those developed through conventional breeding. In contrast, techniques used to develop GMOs often involve introducing genetic material from distantly related organisms to develop traits of economic importance.”

The programme supports the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal 2 (SDG2), which aims to end hunger, achieve food security and improve nutrition as well as promote sustainable agriculture by 2030.

“It’s a step in the right direction,” said World Agroforestry Interim Director General Dr Ravi Prabhu, adding that, “addressing nutrition by improving local skillsets through such a programme is key to improving food security on the continent and an important contribution to a productive and sustainable transformation of African agriculture.”

For more information please contact:
Susan Onyango
Global Communications Coordinator
Nairobi, Kenya
Tel: +254 700 299 227
Email: s.onyango@cifor-icraf.org

Media advisory

• Carbon offsetting is a popular strategy for individuals and companies looking to offset their carbon footprint and mitigate the effects of climate change. One way to do this is through planting forests or trees. While this approach has its benefits, it also has its drawbacks
• Forest carbon offsets and REDD+ can help reduce deforestation and forest degradation – but those without proper oversight may have limited impact
• Effective REDD+ projects can reduce greenhouse gas emissions, support the rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities – and the women within those groups – as well as reducing deforestation and forest degradation and providing additional tree cover in agricultural landscapes
• To meet the Paris Agreement goals, we must reduce our use of fossil fuels by 90%, and REDD+ remains an effective solution for sectors that cannot be decarbonised, while also supporting biodiversity and ecosystem services

An article in The Guardian on 18 January 2023 questions the effectiveness of REDD+ and forest carbon offsets if projects lack the proper oversight and monitoring standards necessary to achieve their goals of reducing carbon emissions and forest degradation.

But scientists at the Center for International Forestry Research and World Agroforestry (CIFOR-ICRAF) are cautioning governments from abandoning the practice altogether, emphasizing the critical need to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and the effective role REDD+ can play in mitigating the effects of industries that cannot decarbonise.

“Carbon offsetting is often presented as a panacea or as a dangerous distraction in relation to mitigating greenhouse gas emissions. It is neither one nor the other,” says Dr Robert Nasi, acting CEO of CIFOR-ICRAF, a global research and development organisation with more than 75 years of experience in harnessing the power of trees, forests, and agroforestry landscapes to address the most pressing global challenges of our time – biodiversity loss, climate change, food security, livelihoods, and inequity.

To achieve the goals set by the Paris Agreement, we must drastically reduce our dependence on fossil fuels by 90%. But as not all sectors can be decarbonised, this is where scientifically sound, equitable and transparent carbon offset schemes can play a role. Forests and trees (and the oceans) are particularly effective at absorbing and storing carbon dioxide. They also provide many other benefits: they are home to a diverse array of plant and animal species, and they help to regulate the Earth’s climate by releasing water vapour and absorbing sunlight. Forests also help to protect against soil erosion and flooding and provide resources such as timber and non-timber products.

Win-win forest and tree-based solutions thus include:

• Protecting intact, and largely intact, forests to preserve biodiversity and ecosystem services. Indigenous-controlled lands play a major role here
• Managing production forests and plantations better, to provide much-needed materials for shifting from a fossil-fuel-based to a bio-based economy, and replace materials with high carbon impact like cement and steel
• Increasing the presence of trees in agricultural lands through diverse agroforestry systems
• Restoring, in a locally adapted and accepted manner, the vast amount of degraded land on our planet, to yield a bundle of critical ecosystem-based goods and services

Each of these solutions has the potential to become forest or tree-based carbon offsets; they also bring along a myriad of other benefits, with carbon storage becoming one of the by-products of better care of our land.

However, carbon offsetting through forests and trees also has its downsides. One major concern is that these projects can displace local communities, particularly in developing countries where land is often scarce. Furthermore, many carbon offsetting projects take place in remote areas, making it difficult to monitor and verify the actual carbon sequestration taking place. Another problem with carbon offsetting through forests and trees is that it is often a short-term solution to a long-term problem. Trees and forests take time to mature and reach their full carbon sequestration potential, and even then, they may not be able to fully offset the emissions being produced.

In sum, carbon offsetting through forests and trees can be a valuable tool in the fight against climate change, but it is important to approach it with caution. Careful consideration must be given to the potential negative impacts on local communities and the need to monitor and verify carbon sequestration. It is also important to recognise that while carbon offsetting through forests and trees can help, it is not a substitute for reducing our overall carbon emissions. It’s clear that carbon offset projects will never be able to curb the emissions growth if fuel-fed power stations continue to be built or petrol cars continue to be bought.

“We are like the Red Queen in Alice in Wonderland who needs to run endlessly to stay in the same place,” says Nasi. “This is not to say that carbon offset projects should stop – quite the opposite. We must continue to restore forests and peatlands while also scaling up renewable energy and energy efficiency projects via offset schemes. But it cannot simply be an excuse to continue business as usual. Like the Red Queen, we must run faster if we want to go somewhere.”

Related research

• How do REDD+ projects contribute to the goals of the Paris Agreement?
• Safeguards at a glance: Supporting the rights of Indigenous Peoples and local communities in REDD+ and other forest-based initiatives
• Environmental Justice in the REDD₊ Frontier: Experiences from the Amazon and Beyond
• Lessons towards rights-responsive REDD+ safeguards from a literature review

About CIFOR-ICRAF

CIFOR-ICRAF brings more than 75 years of experience in harnessing the power of trees, forests, and agroforestry landscapes to address the most pressing global challenges of our time – biodiversity loss, climate change, food security, livelihoods and inequity. It has partnerships in 64 countries, 159 funding partners and 192 active projects, alongside more than 2,200 completed projects across 92 nations. The organisation has an annual budget of USD 100 million, and a combined legacy investment of USD 2 billion in research and technology, policy and development. On average, CIFOR-ICRAF research is cited nearly 137 times a day and appears in global media more than 3,000 times per year. CIFOR and ICRAF merged in 2019 and are both international organizations and CGIAR Research Centres. Learn more at cifor-icraf.org.

For more information, please contact:

Azzura Lalani
Global Head of Outreach and Engagement
Bonn, Germany
Tel: +49 151 1062 6686
Email: a.lalani@cifor-icraf.org

From left: Chandrashekhar Biradar, Country Director- India, CIFOR-ICRAF and Chief of Party-Trees Outside Forests in India (TOFI) Program; Pankaj Prasad Raturi, Head- Department Bio-Resource Development, Dabur Research & Development Center; Mohit Malhotra, CEO, Dabur India Limited; Ravi Prabhu, Director General, ICRAF; Javed Rizvi, Director – Asia Continental Program, CIFOR-ICRAF; and Rahul Awasthi, Executive Director-Operations, Dabur India Limited. Photo: CIFOR-ICRAF/Sakshi Gaur

New Delhi, 14 December 2022: India’s leading science-based Ayurveda company, Dabur India Limited, today joined hands with the Center for International Forestry Research and World Agroforestry (CIFOR-ICRAF) to roll out a mega initiative aimed at improving trees, fruits, medicinal and aromatic plantation practices on farms and outside forests areas, using agroforestry, across Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Rajasthan, Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, Assam and Tamil Nadu.

The initiative, which will play a critical role in increasing the tree cover outside demarcated forest areas and on farmlands, will go a long way towards helping India achieve its climate mitigation targets in the forestry sector, while also supporting sustainable livelihoods for communities.

“At Dabur, nature is the lifeline of our business. With a range of products based on nature and natural ingredients, we depend on nature’s bounty to deliver on our promise of delivering holistic health and well-being to every household. Managing natural resources sustainably comes naturally to us, and we encourage the same across our value chain. Dabur is proud to be partnering with CIFOR-ICRAF on boosting agroforestry and trees outside forests. This is a step forward in our Environment Sustainability strategy of preserving ecosystems and halting land degradation and the accelerated loss of biodiversity,” Dabur India Ltd. Chief Executive Officer, Mr Mohit Malhotra said.

Under this project, Dabur will focus on the domestication of selected medicinal tree species and medicinal plants, as well as establishing satellite nurseries in states to ensure the availability of quality planting material for the selected plant species.

CIFOR-ICRAF is leading the implementation of the Trees Outside Forests in India (TOFI) Program, which is a five-year joint initiative of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Indian Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) under the bilateral agreement on Sustainable Forestry and Climate Adaptation. The main goal of the TOFI program is to significantly expand the area under trees outside forests, thereby enhancing livelihoods and ecosystem services in the seven participating states (Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Haryana, Odisha, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh). The initial phase of the collaboration with Dabur will be initiated through the TOFI Program.

Dr Ravi Prabhu, Director General a.i., ICRAF said: “We are glad to collaborate with India’s leading science-based Ayurveda company-Dabur India Limited. Through this partnership, we look forward to developing a partnership through which smallholders and tree growers in participating states are enabled to produce the kinds of tree-based raw materials required by Dabur. This will not only help augment the livelihoods of the smallholders but will also promote sustainable production and harvesting of tree-based products of medicinal value while supporting India’s larger development goals and NDC targets”.

Other priority activities under the agreement include developing a business model through which Dabur can buy back the final produce from the community, and developing optimum harvesting protocols for commercially important medicinal plants.

About Dabur India Ltd: Dabur India Ltd is one of India’s leading Fast-Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) Companies. Building on a legacy of quality and experience for 138 years, Dabur is today India’s most trusted name and the world’s largest Ayurvedic and Natural Health Care Company. Dabur India’s FMCG portfolio includes nine Power Brands: Dabur Chyawanprash, Dabur Honey, Dabur Honitus, Dabur Lal Tail and Dabur Pudin Hara in the Healthcare category; Dabur Amla, Vatika and Dabur Red Paste in the Personal care space; and Réal in the Food& Beverages category.

About CIFOR-ICRAF:  The Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) and World Agroforestry (ICRAF) address local challenges and opportunities while providing solutions to global problems for forests, landscapes, people and the planet. CIFOR-ICRAF is more than a research institute: it is a union of the best minds working to find nature-based solutions for forest and tree landscapes. This dynamic and resilient partnership is uniquely equipped to deliver evidence-based, actionable solutions and to lead the radical transformations to address the interlinked crises of climate change, deforestation and biodiversity loss, dysfunctional food systems, and unsustainable supply and value chains, and inequality affecting women, Indigenous Peoples and other marginalized groups. Learn more about CIFOR-ICRAF’s work in India: https://www.cifor-icraf.org/locations/asia/india

For further information, contact:

Byas Anand @+91-9811994902
Head-Corporate Communications, Dabur India Ltd.

Sakshi Gaur
Communications Coordinator, India, CIFOR-ICRAF
s.gaur@cgiar.org

On 14 September 2022 World Agroforestry (ICRAF) and the Government of the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka signed a Host Country Agreement formalizing their shared commitment to developing strategies for a more resilient, food-secure Sri Lanka.

“We feel honoured and privileged to be afforded this esteemed status as a high-level international partner,” said Tony Simons, Director General of ICRAF. “This year alone we have seen how climate change, unsustainable farming systems, and conflicts can unbalance entire economies and cause suffering worldwide. For centuries, Sri Lanka has skilfully harnessed the power of nature through traditional agroforestry practices, and it can set an example by continuing to place a high priority on addressing environmental, food security and social development issues. The Host Country Agreement offers ICRAF even more scope – and responsibility – to contribute to Sri Lanka’s development agenda by supporting local expertise with the latest in agricultural science. We stand ready to assist the government, institutions and people of Sri Lanka in creating a greener and more vibrant future for all.”

Anura Dissanayake, Secretary to the Prime Minister of Sri Lanka, said: “Sri Lanka sees in the green economy vast opportunities for sustainable development. Our biodiversity is a treasure waiting to be unlocked and we expect ICRAF’s presence in Sri Lanka to catalyse our progress towards a resilient economy and improved income opportunities for smallholder farmers.”

Sri Lanka is one of the world’s 34 biodiversity hotspots and has a rich tradition of agroecology. But according to the World Food Programme, 80 percent of the land is prone to water shortages and nearly 30 percent of its population are currently food-insecure. Urgent solutions are needed to climate-proof the country’s agroecosystems and increase food security for its most vulnerable populations.

One immediate priority of the Agreement is to set in motion a USD 49 million joint project between the Ministry of Irrigation, ICRAF and International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Financed by the Green Climate Fund (GCF), the project aims to strengthen climate resilience among the subsistence farmers and agricultural plantation communities living in vulnerable downstream areas of the Knuckles Mountain Range Catchment in central Sri Lanka.

Over 1.3 million people – 51.4 percent of whom are women – live in this area and can benefit greatly from the adoption of diversified, climate-resilient livelihood options. The five-year project aims to enhance their ability to weather shortages of irrigation and drinking water by climate-proofing both farm- and land-management practices and the underlying upland and lowland ecosystems, which span an area of 346,000 hectares.

This on-the-ground work complements another GCF project in Sri Lanka, namely ICRAF’s role as a delivery partner in the development of the country’s ‘GCF readiness’. In 2018, as a first step towards the Host Country Agreement, both parties signed a Letter of Intent at the 24th UN Climate Conference in Katowice, Poland, with the aim of working together towards mitigating tropical deforestation, land depletion and rural poverty through improved agroforestry systems. The Ministry of Mahaweli Development and Environment (MMDE), which is Sri Lanka’s National Designated Authority (NDA) to the GCF, requested ICRAF to be its delivery partner and help build its capacity to perform its GCF-readiness duties.

“Having collaborated with ICRAF in strengthening our readiness to harness opportunities to combat climate change and the erosion of key ecosystem services, we welcome the potential benefits of the permanent presence of an ICRAF team in the country working alongside our world-class Sri Lankan scientists and practitioners,” said Dr Anil Jasinghe, Secretary of Environment. “We firmly believe in such partnerships.”

“This collaboration will effectively build a strategic framework for engaging the GCF on climate interventions by advancing the implementation of the National Adaptation Plan and Sri Lanka’s Nationally Determined Contribution,” said Simons.

Other priority activities under the Host Country Agreement include supporting the emergence of a climate-resilient green economy by mainstreaming the tools of collaborative research into national policies that address mitigation and adaptation, green development, ecosystem services, and social forestry and tenure. ICRAF will continue efforts to strengthen Sri Lanka’s capacity to carry out ecosystem-based adaptation to climate change, including support to upgrade value chains and improve ecosystem resilience through agroforestry. It will also develop new and productive partnerships across public and private sectors, while conducting research that positively impacts development at scale.

ICRAF’s ability to contribute to Sri Lanka’s sustainable development has only increased since its functional merger with the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR). While maintaining separate legal entities and headquarters, CIFOR-ICRAF now operates under a single governing Board and leadership team, with a joint regional structure and 10-year strategy. Harnessing a combined 70 years of expertise and extensive partnership networks across Africa, Asia and Latin America, CIFOR-ICRAF has over 700 dedicated staff working in 60 countries, and has completed over 2,200 projects worth more than USD 2 billion in 92 countries.

Since January 2005, ICRAF researchers in Sri Lanka have focused on identifying and overcoming barriers to agroforestry development, as well as capacity building with a variety of partners, including the Ministry of Environment and Wildlife Resources, the Coconut Research Institute of Sri Lanka and the University of Peradeniya.

“ICRAF has been a trusted partner in Sri Lanka’s agricultural and forestry landscape for over two decades,” said Javed Rizvi, CIFOR-ICRAF Director for Asia and head of ICRAF’s former South Asia Regional Programme, which included Sri Lanka. “Most notably, proactive efforts by ICRAF researchers contributed to the swift eradication of a devastating outbreak of Weligama Coconut Leaf Wilt Disease (WCLWD) in 2007.”

Coconut is a source of income for hundreds of thousands of resource-poor Sri Lankan farmers, who rely on the trees for food, cosmetics, wood, choir and medicine. But in 2007, coconut trees were dying from WCLWD, with over 320,000 coconut trees affected across three districts. Drawing on its experience with WCLWD in Kerala, India, ICRAF worked in partnership with Sri Lanka’s Coconut Research Institute to contain the outbreak. CRI launched a programme to breed disease-resistant coconut trees, and ICRAF provided technical support to maintain the health of coconut-based agroforestry systems.

On World Coconut Day, 12 October 2012, the then Ministry of Coconut Development and Janatha Estate Development presented ICRAF with the Presidential Science Award – the first time it was awarded to an international organization – and a certificate of appreciation for its role in supporting the transition to a more resilient agroforestry model.

Other examples of ICRAF’s ongoing work in Sri Lanka include improving home gardens through diversification and strengthening the existing germplasm; training of key staff in the policy and practice of agroforestry for sustainable development, as well as through fellowships and training courses; and joint efforts on the domestication and improvement of quality planting material – mainly of gooseberry, jackfruit and dragon fruit – which led to the introduction of high-yielding varieties.

Mr Laksiri Abeysekera, Interim CIFOR-ICRAF Country Head for Sri Lanka, said: “As we establish a more stable institutional presence in the country, we look forward to working with partners to support Sri Lanka in meeting its national commitments on climate, biodiversity and sustainable development, and to build greater climate resilience in Sri Lanka’s agroecosystems.”

Dr Sunimal Jayathunga, Additional Secretary for Environment Development echoed the sentiment: “We recognize that climate change will play an enormous role in shaping ecosystems and livelihoods in Sri Lanka in the decades to come. In ICRAF, the Government of Sri Lanka recognizes a key partner that will help build resilience and adaptive capacity across our unique and precious ecosystems and the people who depend upon them.”

The agreement was signed at the Treasury Secretariat Building in Colombo by Mr Ajith Abeysekera, Director General of the Sri Lanka External Resources Department and by Prof Tony Simons, Director General of ICRAF. Among those present were Dr Anil Jasinghe, Secretary, Ministry of Environment; Mr Sampath Manthreenayake, Additional Director General, External Resources Department; Dr Ravi Prabhu, Deputy Director General of ICRAF, Dr Javed Rizvi, Director of Asia for ICRAF and Mr Laksiri Abeysekera, Interim CIFOR-ICRAF Country Head for Sri Lanka.

Contact:

• CIFOR-ICRAF Country Office
  Laksiri Abeysekera
  CIFOR-ICRAF Country Coordinator for Sri Lanka
  Email: l.abeysekera@cgiar.org
• ICRAF headquarters
  Susan Onyango
  Global Communications Coordinator
  United Nations Avenue, Gigiri
  PO Box 30677, Nairobi, 00100, Kenya
  Tel: +254 20 7224000
  Via USA: +1 650 833 6645/+1 650 833 6646
  Email: s.onyango@cgiar.org
  Web: www.worldagroforestry.org

Learn More:

• Website: CIFOR-ICRAF in Sri Lanka
• Project: Support to the National Designated Authority and Country Programming in Sri Lanka: Readiness in the Vulnerable Upper Watersheds
• Project: Strengthening Climate Resilience of Subsistence Farmers and Agricultural Plantation Communities residing in the vulnerable river basins, watershed areas and downstream of the Knuckles Mountain Range Catchment of Sri Lanka