Developments
The 'FHIA' good factor for Ugandan bananas
Leaning against a banana tree, Mr Livingstone Odoi, poses for a picture with several of his grandchildren. Both the tree and the children look healthy and Mr Odoi has every reason to be smiling because, surrounding his thriving banana plantation, some of his neighbours are not faring so well...
Foot and mouth disease in Zimbabwe
Limited funding to contain foot and mouth disease, alongside continued challenges of drought, flash floods and land reform upheavals, is endangering Zimbabwe's beef exports, particularly to the European Union. Three years after the first outbreak, the disease continues to afflict the country, with new cases reported south of Harare in late July this year...
"I have never in my life seen anything as profitable for smallholders as vanilla," says Steve New, a high-value crops advisor with more than 25 years' experience. He works for a USAID funded project called Investment in Developing Export Agriculture (IDEA) which has provided training and technical assistance to vanilla growers in Uganda since 1995...
Wilge Velasco is an agronomist who works in the isolated community of Tumuyu B in the municipality of Pocona, Bolivia. 'Rhizoctoniosis', named after a common fungus which attacks many crops, is evident in potato crops across the area. Tubers appear to bulge out of the earth, but these purple and greasy looking structures are not the normal red and cream colour of true potatoes. And they are not tubers either, but swollen and highly abnormal aerial shoots...
