After many years of neglect, there is a renewed interest in agricultural mechanization in Africa. Since government initiatives to promote mechanization, e.g., by importing and subsidizing tractors, are confronted with major governance challenges, private-sector initiatives offer a promising alternative.

This study provides an overview on the patterns and dynamics of mechanization in African agriculture over the 10 year period (2005-2014). Farm level and value chain related mechanization are considered.

Hunger has become ever more complex, and therefore efforts to sustainably eradicate hunger and malnutrition depend on policies and programs that match these complexities. Innovations are critical for progress. However, they require increased public and private investments as well.

In this paper, use a case study approach to investigate the patterns of employment and income generation in cotton and rice value chains in Senegal and Benin.

This paper examines whether investment in the agriculture and food sectors in Africa significantly increases overall economic growth and, hence, reduces food and nutrition insecurity.

The majority of rural Indian households remain dependent on unreliable, inefficient and harmful household energy technologies. Rural households make their energy decisions with respect to the Water-Energy-Food security (WEF) Nexus jointly, however, previous research initiatives have analyzed household energy access problem in isolation.

West African farmers are among those most likely to suffer from climate change, partly due to the agro-climatic characteristics of the regional system and to their limited scope for coping with shocks. Climate change adaptation has thus been touted as a necessary path for rural poverty reduction and development in the region.

The dramatic global food price upsurges of 2007/2008 and the resurgence of 2010/2011 have kept the welfare effects of food price shocks at the epicentre of policy discussions worldwide. Studies have found heterogeneous impacts, but empirically little is known in Nigeria. The key objectives of this study are to examine the welfare, i.e.

This paper results from a study that was commissioned to contribute to the Program of Accompanying Research for Agricultural Innovation (PARI).

This paper presents the experiences and outcomes of applying contests to elicit farmer-generated innovations and to reward outstanding farmer innovators in selected districts in Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi and Zambia. The contests attracted 349 eligible entries, most of which were submitted by male innovators.