Virginia Tech in Senegal

Professor Ozzie Abaye's notes from Senegal

Greetings from Senegal! I just completed my last projects with USAID-ERA. After 8 years, the project will be ending in September. Here are some field updates.

Mungbean - a new feed the future crop for Senegal

In 2012, USAID-ERA, through linkages between research, education, and outreach, began investigating the potential utilization of mungbean as a new crop with a nutrition-led agriculture focus, recognizing that acceptance and consumption of mungbean may simultaneously address malnutrition and food insecurity in Senegal. The introduction of mungbean into household farming systems (garden and field) expected to result in health benefits provide much-needed proteins and micronutrients, such as iron and zinc, commonly lacking in the starch-based diet of the rural poor. Hearing positive feedback from farmers, USAID-ERA and its partner institutions launched several programs throughout the country to further explore the adaptation of mungbean throughout Senegal. Currently, over 300 farmers are growing mungbean in Senegal. July 17-21, in collaboration with Kawolor, the new USAID nutrition project, we conducted a 5-day workshop on topics such as mungbean production practices including the effect of rhizobial inoculation on soil fertility and management, cropping systems, grain storage, and preservation techniques, etc.  After the workshop, we planted mungbean.  Proposed future training include capacity building of school communities to contribute to school feeding

Grassland Management and Evaluation

Sponsored by USAID-ERA, in collaboration with Senegal’s ministry of livestock, Mr. Gora Gora BEYE (Directeur Technique, Projet Régional d'Appui au Pastoralisme au Sahel (PRAPS Sénégal) and I provided a 5-day training program dealing with grassland management, assessment, and evaluation. The 26 trainees represented 7 of the 14 Senegal’s regions and managed over 30,000 transhumant and sedentary livestock farmers.  Soon after we started talking about grassland in general, I realized that the majority of the trainees lack the basic knowledge of grassland management. I asked myself, what happened to the millions of dollars spent “educating” the Sahelian livestock herders? The Sahel’s pastoral region covers 8 countries. Although transhumant livestock farming can be devastating to the sustainability and integrity of the grassland, mobility represents an essential component of the herd’s productivity. It allows it to benefit from fodder resources which vary in quality and quantity in a different area during the year. However, the devastation that caused by millions of livestock rampaging through the communal grassland every year with no control is enormous. Although it is possible to rehabilitate such grassland systems, it would require a diversity of factors responding to farmer’s diverse needs. The task is very daunting.   

Research

Andre Diatta, a Ph.D. candidate in SPES (Co-mentored by Wade Thomason and Ozzie Abaye), is in Senegal conducting his 2nd-year research.  Andre has been mentoring several undergraduate students from l’Institut Supérieur de Formation Agricole et Rurale (ISFAR) SFAR.  Due to less than normal rainfall (compared to last year at this time), we expect challenging growing conditions this year.

Pedagogy

Due to simply a lack of interest in incorporating experiential learning tools into lectures and constraints in teaching resources, most of the students’ learning experience is confined to classrooms. USAID-ERA and several partner institutions in Senegal have been actively training teachers how to utilize simple pedagogical techniques to integrate experiential learning methods into courses that requires zero to minimum resources. On a yearly basis, we have been training instructors how to incorporate experiential components into their courses. Also, discussed learning strategies in which educators and learners co-engage in direct experience and reflection.  At ISFAR, we introduced simple grassland management tools that can be used in several classes (botany, animal science, agroforestry, agronomy etc.) 

Finally, Mark Reiter is here with me. Mark is working with the mungbean team  (Issa Faye – ISRA-Senegal, Mark Reiter, Bo Zhang and Ozzie Abaye, Virginia Tech).  Mark gave an excellent presentation to a group of researchers at one of Senegal’s research station in Bamby.

Cheers,

Ozzie Abaye