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This is an AICCRA 3rd Quarter Report 

This is the inception Report for the AICCRA Programme

Trip rport for the AICCRA Project 

This is a news article on the AICCRA Project

This report is about the Strengthening Food Systems Resilience and Agricultural Trade In Southern Africa- Workshop that CCARDESA and AICCRA jointly convened to consult the region and give an opportunity to stakeholders to provide input to the work of CCARDESA relating to cross border trade, agroecology, and climate smart agriculture as well as the involvement of the private sector in promoting Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA). The meeting was also used to distil CSA issues for the forthcoming Conference of Parties (COP) 27.

Terms of Reference

APPSA Lesotho engaged a South African based consultancy firm on the drawn terms of reference to develop the Management Information System (MIS). The agreement reached between APPSA and the consultants resulted in the establishment of a series of back-and-forth communication to gain in-depth understanding on the direction of the proposed MIS

The compendium is a compilation of stories about project activities (research and development, agricultural extension, trainings, project management and monitoring) implemented under APPSA Lesotho. It is the mandate of the Communication Working Group (CWG) to manage project communication and technology dissemination for visibility and awareness, knowledge sharing and collaboration among stakeholders. The roles of Technology Dissemination Office; and Information Technology and Knowledge Management are responsible for ensuring the functionality and delivery of the objectives of the CWG.

The present research was conducted to determine the knowledge of farmers from Malawi and Mozambique on the use of cactus (Noppolea Cochenillinifera L. Sam-Dyck) as fodder for small ruminants in dry season. The study took place in Mzimba, Mchinji and Chikwawa districts (in Malawi) and Manhiça, Changara and Lichinga districts (in Mozambique), where 450 farmers keeping ruminants were surveyed through semi-structured interviews. Each respondent was interviewed alone in Chewa and/or English (in Malawi) and Tsonga, Nyungwe, Yao and/or Portuguese (in Mozambique). During the interview, farmers were shown pictures stuck on a poster and numbered (no name), where they recognized the species, mentioned the local name and shared their experience on cactus as fodder. The legend of the images on the poster were listed on separate page to which farmers did not have access. Respondents were allowed to explain the preparation procedure before cacti were given to animals. They were asked to mention other uses of cactus in their region. Related uses were grouped in terms of frequency of mention. Interviews were recorded as audios on a Samsung Galax J1 cellular phone and a notepad. In addition, a literature search was undertaken in order to find some of the most common species of cactus in Africa (emphasis was given to East and Southern Africa). Images displaying stems, spines, leaves, flowers and fruits of cacti were collected. The study concluded that most farmers and probably other residents from the districts and villages where the present study was conducted knew cactus as medicine, edible fruit, ornament and live fence. The knowledge of cacti as fodder both in Malawi and Mozambique was negligible.

Cotton (Gossypium hirsutum L.) is an important cash crop for small-scale farmers in Mozambique. The yield is dependent on various factors of plant management, and this can be affected by variations in plant density. In Mozambique the cotton crop is mainly growed in plant and row space arrangement corresponding to 50,000 plants per hectare, which is considered low resulting in low cotton yielding.The goal of this study, was to evaluate the effect of plant density in cotton yield, Gossypium hirsutum L. The experiment was conducted in Namialo village, in a randomized complete block design with four replications in a split-plot, where the main plot was distance between the plants within the rows (15, 20, 25, 30 cm) and distance between the rows (50, 75, 100 cm) as subplots randomized in each plot, making plant from 33000 to 133000 plants per hectare. Results of this experiment showed no significant interaction between the distance between the rows and plants on cotton yield, number of bolls per plant and plant height. In addition, as the distance between the plants increased, the number of bolls per plant also increased. This experiment empathize that the combination of 70 cm between the rows and 20 cm between the plants, with a total density of about 71400 plants per hectare resulted in a highest yield.