Africa needs home-grown solutions to its problems, agricultural economist Dr Ponniah Anandajayasekeram said in Windhoek, Namibia Tuesday.

The Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) has received a major boost as several countries have begun drawing on funds from a $22 billion pledge made by the G8.

Researchers are proposing a review of distribution mechanisms for seed and fertiliser in Zambia’s seven-year Fertiliser Support Programme (FSP).

Restrictions on the movement of seeds in the SADC region because of agriculture legislation contributes to food insecurity.

Women farmers are particularly affected by climate change, food insecurity and disaster, so we have to drive gender equality and decrease women’s vulnerability in the sector.

Up to 30,000 small farmers in East Africa, mostly in Kenya, have adopted the push-pull method to control pests and weeds in maize, the staple crop.

Not even the least alert of drivers can miss the sign along the busy road 30 kilometres south of Lusaka: “Look, Conservation Farming Pays!”

Chirimanyemba is a marvel among women, and men! Watching her digging holes in dry ground earlier this year, her neighbours thought the old lady had gone berserk.

One of the key components of global action on climate change will be measures to adapt to changes that are already unavoidable.

For some seven million Congolese living in Kinshasa the only meat and poultry they could buy to eat since the 1980s was frozen imports from Western countries, distributed locally by a few local businessmen.