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GRAIN LEGUMES AND DRYLAND CEREALS (GLDC)

Executive summary

The Grain Legumes and Dryland Cereals Agri-food Systems CGIAR Research Program will increase the productivity, profitability, resilience and marketability of critical and nutritious grain legume (chickpea, cowpea, pigeonpea, groundnut, lentil, soybean) and cereal (sorghum, pearl millet, finger millet) crops grown within the semi-arid and sub-humid dryland agroecologies of sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. These agroecologies are where poverty, malnutrition, climate change and soil degradation are among the most acute globally. By 2022-2030, as a consequence of this research, 8.9-21.7 million farm households will have adopted improved varieties, helping 4.4-11.8 million people to exit poverty and 12.7-24.8 million people meet daily nutritional requirements, with 50% of beneficiaries being women. The logic is that improved innovation capacities within agri-food systems of key cereal and legume crops will enable coherent and integrated research and development, production, market and policy reforms that deliver resilience, inclusion, poverty reduction, nutritional security, environmental sustainability and economic growth.

Sorghum, millets and the grain legumes are grown, eaten and traded together within the same agri-food systems. The CRP will coordinate research interventions that recognize and build on the synergies in these cereal-legume-tree-livestock systems. Prioritization for this research was based on metrics of poverty prevalence, agroecological alignment, value of crop production, foresight projections of significant demand and/or deficit in supply, ex-ante return on research investment, consideration of quality, market and environmental traits and alignment with stakeholder priorities. Consequently, first-order priorities for research consist of an incomplete matrix of the 9 crops grown in 13 countries of sub-Saharan Africa (Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Malawi, Mali, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia) and South Asia (India, Myanmar).

The CRP is logically structured on five Flagship Programs. Informed by purposeful monitoring and evaluation, research planning is driven by the analyzed needs of these agri-food systems (FP1: Priority Setting and Impact Acceleration). Through strategic partnerships, sector intelligence will identify and leverage value chain interventions that support dryland cereals and grain legume markets (FP2: Transforming Agri-food Systems). These analyses and innovation system engagements can inform and direct the cultivar requirements from crop improvement programs, seed and input supply systems (FP4: Variety and Hybrid Development) and the farming systems practices (FP3: Integrated Farm and Household Management) that lead to resilience and sustainable intensification outcomes. Modern breeding approaches will both underpin and increase the efficiency and effectiveness of crop improvement innovations that meet market demands (FP5: Pre-breeding and Trait Discovery).

This Program is a Research for Development investment of US$413 million over five years (2018-2022).