Climate services for agriculture in Rwanda: What farmers know about climate information services in Rwanda

We evaluated 3,046 farmers spread across the country’s districts to establish baseline about climate information and climate change, in September 2016. This Info Note shares insights into the status and needs for climate services in Rwanda at the time of this survey

Optimizing the Emitter Layer for Higher Efficiency Solar Cell Based SiGe Using AMPS1D

The thin-film SiGe is considered as promising candidate to meet the outstanding need for photovoltaic applications with enhanced adsorption characteristics and improved conversion efficiency [1-6]. In this paper, we simulated a solar cell type SiGe using AMPS1D (Analysis of Microelectronic and photonic structure) developed at Pennsylvania State University, to analyze emitter layer (thickness, doping) and we studied their influence on the photovoltaic solar cell. The simulation result shows that the maximum efficiency of 16.181 % has been achieved, with short circuit current density of 32.657 mA/cm2, open circuit voltage of 0.61 V and fill factor of 0.809. The obtained results show that the proposed design can be considered as a potential candidate for high performance photovoltaic applications

Village Baseline Study: Site Analysis Report for Makueni – Wote, Kenya (KE0202)

The village baseline study of Kithoni village in the CCAFS benchmark site of Makueni, Kenya took place from June 11th – 14th, 2012. Focus group discussions were conducted separately for men and women. The village is in a marginal landscape and is food insecure. Frequent droughts and crop failures plague the area. The biggest constraint to agricultural production is the shortage of water. Land holdings have become increasingly smaller due to the increase in human population. The government has to frequently provide relief food during times of crisis. There are many organisations operating in the village, but there is a lack of concerted efforts between them, particularly those working in food security and natural resource management. Very few organisations are working on the food crisis situation in the area, although this is a frequently recurring issue. Networks of information for agricultural advice are based mainly on the radio and friends/neighbours. All the organisations mentioned as providing information are those that operate beyond the locality. There is potential to link these organisations with community groups and individuals especially to develop a feedback mechanism so that the flow of information is two-way. The FM stations can also be supplied with a wider range of information to disseminate. However, this must be in line with the community needs which should be established beforehand