Progress of Soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merrill] Breeding and Genetics Research in Ethiopia: A Review

Ethiopia the second largest population in Africa and is one of the five fastest growing economies in the world. The global population is expected to increase by roughly 20% in the next 20 years. Agro-industries in Ethiopia like Jimma, Hawasa ,Mekele, Kombolcha and the like needs providing tax exemptions for oil processing plants to use the close destination opportunity to the European markets for contributing for foreign currency reserve.Since there is huge potential for soybean production in the country, mechanized soybean farming should be introduced;machines should extensively use in sowing and harvesting so that that the yield of soybean has been improved.Model cultural techniques are studied and practiced in various soybean so that varieties should   used according to recommendation. This implies an incomplete value‑chain development. Availability of sufficient genetic variability has been the major limitations of soybean breeding in the country. To overcome the problem introduction of germplasms from various sources and > 1000 germplasm has been introduced in the last 4 years. In addition, there has been considerable effort to improve the local capacity to enhance the genetic variability through hybridization and selecting recombinant inbred lines (RILs) from the segregating populations. Consequently, crossing and evaluation of segregating populations (F2‑F4) are being done every year. Modified single seed descent was identified as the best procedure to evaluate segregating populations and select transgressive segregants. The first 200 RILs were developed by Jimma Agricultural Research Centre and evaluated at different stages of variety trials and some of these materials are in the national and Pre-national variety trials. Generally, strategies’ that enhance the productive potentials of the crops that make the crop attractive choice of smallholder farmers for production, large scale plantation and agro- industries needs to be designed to help farmers exploit the multiple benefits of the crop.  Thus, the objectives of this review paper are to discuss the genetic resources of with the examples taken from the Ethiopian context. Keywords: Ago-industry, Cost cutting technology, mal-nutrition, RILs, transgressive sergeant

The Role of Proverbs in Extension Dissemination and Technology Transfer: A Case of Ethiopia

This paper examines the use of proverbs in extension and communications in Ethiopia. The purpose of this article is to show the influence proverbs in extension and technology transfer. In Ethiopia the use in the farming community of proverb to encourage or discourage the society, to influence the weak so that to be strong, to encourage the strong farmers and appreciate the industrious. This research aims to was to assess the role and implications of proverbs with regards of the agricultural extensions and communications in Ethiopia. The paper concludes indigenous Ethiopian proverbs are rich in conveying messages, rich in knowledge and. Hence, the use of proverbs in the farming society need to be further exploited. Keywords፡ Proverb, Tradition, Extension, A metaphorical DOI: 10.7176/JBAH/9-21-01 Publication date: November 30th 201

Refresher Training Workshop on Feeds and Forage for Dairy Development

Report on Refresher Training Workshop on Feeds and Forage for Dairy Development 27-28 March 2023| Addis Ababa, Ethiopi

Evaluation of radio broadcasts on livestock feed and forage technologies

The International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) works for better lives through livestock in developing countries. ILRI is co-hosted by Kenya and Ethiopia and has 14 offices across Asia and Africa. The institute is one of the CGIAR research centres, a global research partnership for a food-secure future. CGIAR science is dedicated to reducing poverty, enhancing food and nutrition security, and improving natural resources and ecosystem services. Its research is carried out by 15 CGIAR centres in close collaboration with hundreds of partners, including national and regional research institutes, civil society organizations, academia, development organizations and the private sector. Africa Research in Sustainable Intensification for the Next Generation (Africa RISING) is a program funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and operates in six African countries (Mali, Ghana, Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia and Ethiopia). The program aims to contribute to Feed the Future goals of reducing hunger, poverty and under-nutrition by delivering high quality research outputs that are relevant to these goals. Through action research and development partnerships, Africa RISING is creating opportunities for smallholder farm households to move out of hunger and poverty through sustainably intensified farming systems that improve food, nutrition and income security, particularly for women and children, and conserve or enhance the natural resource base. In Ethiopia, the main aim of the project is to identify and validate solutions to the problems experienced by smallholder crop–livestock farmers. Some problems arise from the difficulties facing farmers in managing natural resources and achieving efficiencies from managing crops, trees, water and livestock together. These efficiencies are often influenced by other factors such as access to inputs and reliability of markets. To address this complexity, Africa RISING takes an integrated approach to strengthening farming systems. It conducts participatory research that identifies technologies and management practices that work for farmers and takes account of contextual issues like markets for inputs and outputs, community and other institutions and policy environments that influence farm households. The project in Ethiopia facilitates wider scaling of validated crop-livestock-natural resource management technologies to reach and benefit more smallholder farmers. Accelerating the Impact of CGIAR Climate Research for Africa (AICCRA) is a three-year (2021–2023) project that operates in six African countries, including Ethiopia. The project is supported by a grant from the International Development Association (IDA) of the World Bank and will enhance the research and capacity-building activities of CGIAR and its partners. AICCRA in Ethiopia aims to strengthen the capacity of targeted national partners and stakeholders of the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) East Africa to access and implement at scale validated climate-smart agriculture technologies, climate information services and climate-informed digital ag-advisories to build the resilience of agri-food systems. The value chains considered for AICCRA’s project in Ethiopia include beans, wheat, small ruminants and livestock feed and forage options. The AICCRA project in Ethiopia has eight research activities, four of which the livestock feed and forage options value chain contributes to. These four are capacity building to support the implementation of climate-smart agriculture (CSA) technology packages; identification of climate, gender and social inclusion-smartness of CSA packages; prioritization and awareness increase of best-bet CSA options and approaches for key value chains; and integration of climate-smart options and tailored climate-smart innovation (CSI) advisory systems for specific value chains. The Sustainable Intensification of Mixed Farming Systems (SIMFS) initiative aims to provide equitable, transformative pathways for improved livelihoods of actors in mixed farming systems through sustainable intensification within target agroecologies and socio-economic settings. Through action research and development partnerships, the initiative will improve smallholder farmers' resilience to weather-induced shocks, provide a more stable income and significant benefits in welfare, and enhance social justice and inclusion for 13 million people by 2030. Activities will be implemented in six focus countries globally, representing diverse mixed farming systems as follows: Ghana (cereal–root crop mixed), Ethiopia (highland mixed), Malawi (maize mixed), Bangladesh (rice mixed), Nepal (highland mixed), and Lao People's Democratic Republic (upland intensive mixed/ highland extensive mixed). Africa RISING, AICCRA projects and SIMFS initiative contracted a consultant to undertake media and communications-related activities. These included media assessment, facilitating media partnership, training radio journalists on livestock feed and forage technologies, and monitoring the radio broadcasts

Epidemiology of rubella virus cases in the pre-vaccination era of Ethiopia, 2009–2015

Abstract Background Rubella is a common mild rash illness caused by rubella virus. The majority of infections occur in children and young adults. The infection is the cause of a serious birth defect known as Congenital Rubella Syndrome (CRS) when a woman acquires infection early in pregnancy. Ethiopia has not yet established rubella virus surveillance and has not yet introduced rubella vaccine into the routine immunization program. We characterize the epidemiology of laboratory confirmed rubella virus cases collected through measles surveillance from 2009 to 2015 to better understand the burden of the disease in the country. Methods A descriptive analysis was made to characterize rubella cases reported through the national measles case based surveillance system. The measles case definition was used to capture potential rubella cases. A suspected measles case was a person with generalized rash and fever with cough, or coryza or conjunctivitis. Those cases whose sera were negative for measles IgM antibodies were tested for rubella IgM antibody. A confirmed rubella case was a person who tested positive for rubella IgM. Only laboratory confirmed rubella cases were analyzed in this article. Results Between 2009 and 2015, a total of 28,284 serum/plasma samples were collected and tested for measles IgM antibody and 11,151 (39.4%) were found positive. A total of 17,066 measles IgM negative or indeterminate samples were tested for rubella virus IgM and 2615 (15.3%) were found positive during the same period. Of 2615 confirmed rubella cases, 52.2% were females. The age of confirmed cases ranged from one month to 42 years with a mean age of 7.3 years. Three-fourth of all confirmed rubella cases were aged less than 10 years. The number of laboratory confirmed rubella cases linearly increased from 83 in 2009 to 856 in 2013 but dropped to 222 and 319 in 2014 and 2015 respectively. Higher number of cases occurred in the hot dry season (January through June) and in the central and western part of Ethiopia with 127 lab-confirmed outbreaks in the study period. Conclusions Based on our analysis, rubella was found to be endemic throughout Ethiopia. Children below the age of 10 years were the most affected. The burden of rubella cases varied from year to year but had a seasonal peak in March. To better understand the magnitude of rubella prior to vaccine introduction, establishing rubella surveillance system, conducting sero-prevalence studies among child bearing age females and establishing CRS sentinel surveillance among young infants are critical

Antenatal care utilization and nutrition counseling are strongly associated with infant and young child feeding knowledge among rural/semi-urban women in Harari region, Eastern Ethiopia

There is a gap in evidence linking antenatal care (ANC) utilization, nutrition counseling, and knowledge of pregnant women about infant and young child feeding (IYCF), particularly in low-income settings. Therefore, this study aimed to identify the association between ANC follow-up and nutrition counseling with IYCF knowledge. A cross-sectional study was conducted among 390 pregnant women in the rural kebeles of the Harari region from January to June 2019. Data were collected using face-to-face interviews on tablet computers. Bivariate and multivariate logistic regression were employed. An adjusted odds ratio (with 95% CI) was used to determine the strength of association between IYCF knowledge with ANC follow-up and nutrition counseling by adjusting for educational status, occupation, gravida, and distance to the nearest health center. Overall, 54.4% [95% CI 49.2, 59.2] of currently pregnant women were knowledgeable about IYCF of which only 20% started ANC follow-up and 24.4% received nutrition counseling. Out of 288 multigravida women, only 51.4% had ANC follow-up during their last pregnancy. In the adjusted model, ANC follow-up during the current pregnancy (AOR 1.85, 95% CI 1.07–3.22), those who received nutrition counseling (AOR 1.92, 95% CI 1.09–3.38), literate in education (AOR 1.71, 95% CI 1.07–2.73), multigravida (AOR 1.96, 95% CI 1.12–3.43), and far from the nearest health center (AOR 0.95, 95% CI 0.93–0.97) were significantly associated with the mothers IYCF knowledge. Thus, health care providers should encourage mothers to attend ANC during pregnancy and provide nutrition counseling about the IYCF

Global, regional, and national cancer incidence, mortality, years of life lost, years lived with disability, and disability-Adjusted life-years for 29 cancer groups, 1990 to 2017 : A systematic analysis for the global burden of disease study

Importance: Cancer and other noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) are now widely recognized as a threat to global development. The latest United Nations high-level meeting on NCDs reaffirmed this observation and also highlighted the slow progress in meeting the 2011 Political Declaration on the Prevention and Control of Noncommunicable Diseases and the third Sustainable Development Goal. Lack of situational analyses, priority setting, and budgeting have been identified as major obstacles in achieving these goals. All of these have in common that they require information on the local cancer epidemiology. The Global Burden of Disease (GBD) study is uniquely poised to provide these crucial data. Objective: To describe cancer burden for 29 cancer groups in 195 countries from 1990 through 2017 to provide data needed for cancer control planning. Evidence Review: We used the GBD study estimation methods to describe cancer incidence, mortality, years lived with disability, years of life lost, and disability-Adjusted life-years (DALYs). Results are presented at the national level as well as by Socio-demographic Index (SDI), a composite indicator of income, educational attainment, and total fertility rate. We also analyzed the influence of the epidemiological vs the demographic transition on cancer incidence. Findings: In 2017, there were 24.5 million incident cancer cases worldwide (16.8 million without nonmelanoma skin cancer [NMSC]) and 9.6 million cancer deaths. The majority of cancer DALYs came from years of life lost (97%), and only 3% came from years lived with disability. The odds of developing cancer were the lowest in the low SDI quintile (1 in 7) and the highest in the high SDI quintile (1 in 2) for both sexes. In 2017, the most common incident cancers in men were NMSC (4.3 million incident cases); tracheal, bronchus, and lung (TBL) cancer (1.5 million incident cases); and prostate cancer (1.3 million incident cases). The most common causes of cancer deaths and DALYs for men were TBL cancer (1.3 million deaths and 28.4 million DALYs), liver cancer (572000 deaths and 15.2 million DALYs), and stomach cancer (542000 deaths and 12.2 million DALYs). For women in 2017, the most common incident cancers were NMSC (3.3 million incident cases), breast cancer (1.9 million incident cases), and colorectal cancer (819000 incident cases). The leading causes of cancer deaths and DALYs for women were breast cancer (601000 deaths and 17.4 million DALYs), TBL cancer (596000 deaths and 12.6 million DALYs), and colorectal cancer (414000 deaths and 8.3 million DALYs). Conclusions and Relevance: The national epidemiological profiles of cancer burden in the GBD study show large heterogeneities, which are a reflection of different exposures to risk factors, economic settings, lifestyles, and access to care and screening. The GBD study can be used by policy makers and other stakeholders to develop and improve national and local cancer control in order to achieve the global targets and improve equity in cancer care. © 2019 American Medical Association. All rights reserved.Peer reviewe

Communicating livestock feed and forage innovations

Presentation in Media Training Workshop on Climate Smart Livestock Feed and Forage Innovations. Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Effects of integrated soil and water conservation measures on soil aggregate stability, soil organic matter and soil organic carbon stock of smallholder farmlands in semi-arid Northern Ethiopia

Soil and water conservation (SWC) measures such as stone bunds and trenches integrated with fodder species (ISWC) have been implemented to tackle soil erosion in Ethiopian highlands. However, effects of ISWC measures on soil aggregate stability (SAS) and soil organic carbon stocks (SOCS) have been less studied. Fifteen disturbed composite and 15 undisturbed soil samples were collected from cropland sites treated with ISWC measures, SWC structures alone and no SWC measures (NSWC). Results revealed that mean values of stability index (SI) and stability quotient (SQ) are: 15 and 712 for sites with ISWC measures, 8 and 268 for sites with SWC structures alone and 6 and 187 for sites with NSWC measures. The SOCS (t ha-1) and SOM contents are: 12.7 and 1.7% for sites with ISWC, 8.0 and 1.2% for SWC alone and 6.3 and 0.7% for NSWC. SI, SQ SOCS and SOM content are significantly higher (p0.05) in SI, SQ and SOCS, between sites with SWC alone and NSWC. This study strongly suggests that, application of ISWC measures has considerable potential to enhance SAS, SOCS and SOM content

Identification of appropriate regional radio stations and building partnerships in Amhara (Debre Birhan), Oromia (Bale) and SNNP (Hadiya) regions

The International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) works for better lives through livestock in developing countries. ILRI is co-hosted by Kenya and Ethiopia, has 14 offices across Asia and Africa. ILRI is a CGIAR research center, a global research partnership for a food-secure future. CGIAR science is dedicated to reducing poverty, enhancing food and nutrition security, and improving natural resources and ecosystem services. Its research is carried out by 15 CGIAR centers in close collaboration with hundreds of partners, including national and regional research institutes, civil society organizations, academia, development organizations and the private sector. AICCRA is a three years (2021-2023) project that operates in six African countries including Ethiopia. The project is supported by a grant from the International Development Association (IDA) of the World Bank and will enhance research and capacity-building activities by CGIAR and its partners. AICCRA in Ethiopia aims to strengthen the capacity of targeted national partners and stakeholders of CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) East Africa to access and implement at scale validated climate-smart agriculture technologies, climate information services, and climate-informed digital ag-advisories to build the resilience of agri-food systems. The value chains considered for AICCRA project in Ethiopia include beans, wheat, small ruminant and livestock feed and forge options. The AICCRA project in Ethiopia has eight research activities. Livestock feed and forage options value chain contributes to four of the eight activities, which include capacity building to support implementation of climate-smart agriculture (CSA) technology packages; identification of climate- and gender and social inclusion-smartness of CSA packages; prioritization and awareness increase of best-bet CSA options and approaches for key value chains; and integration of climate-smart options and tailored CSI advisory systems for specific value chains