This open access book shares the experiences of Tropical Legumes III (TLIII) project in facilitating access to seed of improved legume varieties to smallholder farmers through innovation platforms. It highlights practices and guiding principles implemented in eight developing countries of sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. This book details key processes that respective teams employed to create an innovation space that delivers seed, other inputs, knowledge and financial services to agricultural communities and most importantly, the underserved farmers in remote areas of the drylands. It offers valuable insights into the pathway to establishing, promoting and operating innovation platforms to enhance the performance and competitiveness of legume crops’ value chains, and addresses critical issues that must be considered to make innovation platforms more sustainable and attractive to beneficiaries. The book offers a wealth of practical insights for development workers, technical staff, and project managers. This publication is all about TLIII community of practice. It will definitely inspire other development workers and scientists to share their own experiences for others to learn from.

This open access book shares impact stories - testimonies from various value chain actors who have been part of the Tropical Legumes (TL) projects, over the past twelve years. The Tropical Legumes projects led by ICRISAT in three parts (TLI, TLII and TLIII), constitute a major international initiative supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) and jointly implemented by the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT), International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) and National Agricultural Research Systems (NARS) partners from Sub-Saharan Africa and India. The project developed improved cultivars of common bean, cowpea, chickpea and groundnut (but also soya bean and pigeon pea cultivars in its initial phases) and delivers their seed to smallholders in BMGF-focus areas. It also strengthens the NARS and CGIAR's breeding programs and seed platforms to enhance their ability to deliver high and sustained outputs to smallholder farmers. The book compiles the experiences of a diversity of actors within the grain legume value chains, with a focus on groundnut and common beans in Tanzania and Uganda, groundnut and cowpea in Nigeria, and groundnut in Ghana. All stakeholders involved share their thoughts on being part of a decade-long development project family. National agricultural research institutes, knowledge brokering organizations, NGOs, public and private seed companies, agro-dealers, individual seed entrepreneurs, farm-implement makers, farmer cooperatives, farmer groups, individual men and women farmers, middlemen, processors, traders and consumers were all involved in this project, and as such this book provides valuable insights for development workers, technical staff, and project managers. This work was published by Saint Philip Street Press pursuant to a Creative Commons license permitting commercial use. All rights not granted by the work's license are retained by the author or authors.

The book offers a rich toolkit of relevant, adoptable ecosystem-based practices that can help the world's 500 million smallholder farm families achieve higher productivity, profitability and resource-use efficiency while enhancing natural capital.

Innovation Platforms (IPs) form the core of many Agricultural Research for Development programmes, stimulating multi-stakeholder collaboration and action towards the realization of agricultural development outcomes. This book enhances the body of knowledge of IPs by focusing on mature IPs in agricultural systems research, including the crop and livestock sectors, and innovations in farmer cooperatives and agricultural extension services. Resulting from an international IP case study competition, the examples reported will help the many actors involved with agricultural IPs worldwide reflect on their actions and achievements (or failures), and find tools to share their experience. Chapters feature case studies from Central Africa, Ethiopia, India, Kenya, Nicaragua and Uganda. Authors reflect critically on the impact of IPs and showcase their progress, providing an important sourcebook and inspiration for students, researchers and professionals.

Community seed banks first appeared towards the end of the 1980s, established with the support of international and national non-governmental organizations. This book is the first to provide a global review of their development and includes a wide range of case studies. Countries that pioneered various types of community seed banks include Bangladesh, Brazil, Ethiopia, India, Nepal, Nicaragua, the Philippines and Zimbabwe. In the North, a particular type of community seed bank emerged known as a seed-savers network. Such networks were first established in Australia, Canada, the UK and the USA before spreading to other countries. Over time, the number and diversity of seed banks has grown. In Nepal, for example, there are now more than 100 self-described community seed banks whose functions range from pure conservation to commercial seed production. In Brazil, community seed banks operate in various regions of the country. Surprisingly, despite 25 years of history and the rapid growth in number, organizational diversity and geographical coverage of community seed banks, recognition of their roles and contributions has remained scanty. The book reviews their history, evolution, experiences, successes and failures (and reasons why), challenges and prospects. It fills a significant gap in the literature on agricultural biodiversity and conservation, and their contribution to food sovereignty and security.

The humid highlands in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) are characterized by high population densities and require intensification. The Consortium for Improving Agriculture-based Livelihoods in Central Africa (CIALCA) has set up a research for development platform in various mandate areas in DR Congo, Burundi, and Rwanda, aiming to identify improved production, market, and nutrition options and facilitating the access for development partners to these options. This platform is supported by capacity building, multi-stakeholder dialogue, and monitoring and evaluation efforts. The conference, facilitated by CIALCA, aimed to (i) take stock of the state-of the art in agricultural intensification in the highlands of SSA and (ii) chart the way forward for agricultural research for development in the humid highlands of SSA, and more specifically in the recently launched Humidtropics Consortium Research Programme, through keynote, oral and poster presentations, and strategic panel discussions.