How many farmers in 2030 and how many will adopt climate resilient innovations?

Despite an increasingly urbanized world, the number of smallholder farmers will continue growing fast, from 550 million farms today to roughly 750 million by 2030. In the past 15 years, the adoption of agricultural innovations among smallholder farmers was low, commonly ranging between 0 and 15%. Climate change, land degradation, steady urbanization, population growth and other global changes means smallholder agriculture has to rapidly evolve, has to adopt climate-resilient technologies on a large scale, and make the most of social and economic innovations. We can learn from and replicate the successful examples of scaling up of innovations such as mobile technologies and services, so that many smallholder farmers become climate resilient by 2030. 

The CCAFS Flagship Program 4 Trial on Results-Based Management: Progress Report

This document summarises what was achieved during 2014 by the CCAFS RBM trial. This is followed by a discussion of the prerequisites for a CRP to implement successful RBM, what we mean by “successful RBM”, what has worked according to expectations, and what was done when things did not work out as expected. We summarise a few key results from an on-line survey of project participants conducted in November. We conclude with a summary of our overall learnings about RBM during 2014

Maritime Alpine Cairns in Southeast Alaska: A Multidisciplinary Exploratory Study

This report describes the goals, data recovery methods, data analysis, and conclusions of a pilot project “A Multidisciplinary Exploratory Study of Alpine Cairns, Baranof Island, Southeast Alaska,” funded by the National Science Foundation under Project No. 1230132. The project brought together experts in the disciplines of archaeology (University of Nebraska-Lincoln), lichenology (Oregon State University), and Tlingit oral history (Oxford University) to address questions regarding artificial prehistoric, high altitude cairns. Data were collected in 2013 and 2014. Pedestrian archaeological inventory recorded 50 cairns at 5 sites. Archaeological data includes cairn dimensions, GPS positions, still photographic images, and video documentation. Four cairns were selected for excavation/dismantlement based on their morphology and lichen growth. No artifacts occurred within, under, or around the excavated cairns. Radiocarbon (AMS) analysis of collected organic materials and lichenometrics indicate that alpine cairns on Cross Peak are prehistoric and built within the last two millennia. In 2014, a helicopter survey was undertaken over Chichagof Island mountains along the lower reaches of Hoonah Sound. This survey identified 39 cairns at 29 sites demonstrating that alpine cairns occur in abundance on Baranof and Chichagof Islands. Physical, historical, and oral history points to construction of the cairns by ancestors of the Tlingit and, more specifically, by ancestors of Sitka and Kootznoowoo tribes

Fertilizer Recommendations for the Rio Grande Plain.

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CCAFS Gender Strategy

This Gender Strategy is intended to strengthen CCAFS’ development impact through the integration of gender issues into research in keeping with commitments in the CGIAR Strategy and Results Framework to ensure that rural women benefit from its contribution to poverty reduction, enhanced environmental resilience, improved food security, human health and nutrition. CCAFS plans to situate its gender strategy within a broader strategy addressing social inclusion for different social groups while bearing in mind that women are central to agriculture in developing countries. This Strategy was prepared following CGIAR Guidelines for CRP Gender Strategy1 that focus on showing how the CRP will address issues of gender in its research (as distinct from gender in the workplace which will be handled separately). Accordingly, the document is organized into seven sections that together provide an explanation of how the CRP will address gender issues relevant to its research outputs, activities and outcomes and against which the CRP will report in future, as part of the CGIAR annual monitoring process

A plasticity model for powder compaction processes incorporating particle deformation and rearrangement

This article is available open access through the publisher’s website at the link below. Copyright @ 2008 Elsevier Ltd.This paper develops a mechanistic model of granular materials that can be used with a commercial finite element package (ABAQUS). The model draws on the ideas of critical state soil mechanics and combines them with the theory of envelopes to develop an elasto-plastic model with a non-associated flow rule. The model incorporates both local deformation at the granule contacts, and rearrangement of the granules so that jointly they account for any bulk deformation. The mechanics of the model closely reflect the physicality of the material behaviour and the model parameters are closely linked (although not simplistically identical) to the characteristics of the granules. This not only gives an insight into the material behaviour, but also enables the model to be used to facilitate design of the material, its processing properties and, hence, component development. The model is used to simulate drained triaxial tests, settlement of a powder in a bin, and some examples of die pressing. Simulations are compared with experimental data and with predictions obtained using other models