His Excellency Prof. Monty Jones, Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Food Security of Sierra Leone, speaking during his visit to AfricaRice Headquarters in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, on 8 April 2016. Prof. Jones was co-winner of the prestigious "World Food Prize" in 2004, awarded for the development of the New Rice for Africa (NERICA) as a researcher at AfricaRice (ex-WARDA). AfricaRice Director General Dr Harold Roy-Macauley led H.E. Prof. Jones on a guided tour of the AfricaRice Headquarters.

Video : https://youtu.be/c1--IWjkpho

Podcast by : R.Raman, AfricaRice

Rougie Thomasi, Head of Legal Unit, AfricaRice speaking on behalf of the AfricaRice women staff on the occasion of the International Women’s Day 2016 at AfricaRice HQ, Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire.

Our distinguished guest, Dr. Kanayo Nwanze, President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), and his delegation 

The Director General of Africa Rice Center (AfricaRice), Dr. Harold Roy-Macauley and Members of Executive Management

Colleagues, Ladies and Gentlemen,

It is a great honor and privilege for me to represent the women of AfricaRice and speak on their behalf on this auspicious occasion marking the first visit of the IFAD President to the AfricaRice Headquarters in Abidjan on this special day of the year, “International Women’s Day”, when we celebrate and show appreciation for all women around the world. Institutions, big and small, all over the world (including AfricaRice in Benin, Senegal, Tanzania, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Madagascar and Cote d’Ivoire) are galvanized and come together on this day to recognize the accomplishments of women and to congratulate them on their achievements.

The campaign theme for this year’s 2016 International Women’s Day celebration is “Pledge for Parity”. We are calling on everyone—men and women---each in our own spheres of influence to commit to taking pragmatic action to accelerate gender parity. What we are calling for today is:

1. Pledge to help women and girls achieve their    ambitions (i.e. encourage daughters, wife and female colleagues to reach their full potential)  

2. Pledge for gender balanced leadership, (i.e.  In your positions of leadership give women the opportunity to lead) 

3. Pledge to value women’s and men’s contributions equally (i.e. respect and value our differences)

4. Pledge to create inclusive flexible cultures (i.e nurture a home and workplace environment which recognizes our needs) 

5. Pledge to challenge conscious and unconscious bias (i.e. Root out work place bias and help women advance to higher positions)

IWD 2016 is extra special because we have in our midst the presence of one of the most distinguished sons of AfricaRice, Dr Nwanze, coming back home to celebrate this day with us. Dr. Kanayo Felix Nwanze, President of IFAD, Akwaaba, welcome home. We are thankful for your visit to witness AfricaRice transition from Cotonou, Benin, to Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire. AfricaRice is very proud and honored to be associated and working closely in partnership with your institution. On behalf of all the women of AfricaRice, I wish to seize this opportunity to acknowledge the significant strides made by IFAD under your able and dynamic leadership. Your record of achievements at IFAD suggests that Women from the developing world cannot have a better patron to champion the cause of “Parity for Women”. 

Distinguished guests, colleagues and my dear sisters let me take a little time to also acknowledge the important strides made by AfricaRice under the leadership of the DG, Dr Harold Roy-Macauley, to respond to the concerns of gender inclusiveness and parity. AfricaRice has a gender action plan which progresses well. The Board of Trustees has set a target of a minimum of 30% employment of female scientists by the year 2018 and we celebrate the appointment of Dr. Rita Agboh-Noameshie as Country Representative, heading the AfricaRice Cotonou Station. This is the first time in the history of AfricaRice that a woman is heading an outstation. We thank Dr. Roy-Macauley for this groundbreaking decision.

Distinguished ladies and gentlemen, the African Union has declared the years 2010-2020 as the African Women’s Decade, which aims to accelerate the implementation of the education focused Dakar Framework for Action and the gender equality focused Beijing Declaration. Yet as we celebrate IWD 2016 recognizing the global effort to lift our women folk, challenges still remain. The 2014 World Bank report and ONE campaign revealed deep rooted gender gaps in African agr

The Africa Rice Center (AfricaRice) received the 70th anniversary commemorative medal of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) for outstanding contributions and remarkable collaboration in support of FAO’s mission. On behalf of the FAO Director General, the FAO Representative in Côte d’Ivoire Mr Germain Dasylva handed over the medal and the commemorative publication “70 YEARS OF FAO 1945-2015” to the AfricaRice Director General Dr HaroldRoy-Macauley at a simple award ceremony held on 14 December 2015 at the FAO Office in Abidjan. “We are very pleased to announce that AfricaRice was selected for this award based on a rigorous and competitive process,” stated Mr Dasylva. Highlighting the important work of AfricaRice, he gave the example of the emergency projects in Côte d’Ivoire carried out from 2006 to 2012, where seed of improved rice varieties developed by AfricaRice were distributed by FAO to vulnerable households. The award ceremony was attended by FAO and AfricaRice representatives as well as by the Director General of Scientific Research and Innovation, Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research Prof. Séraphin Kati-Coulibaly, who is also AfricaRice Board Member.Gratefully accepting the award on behalf of AfricaRice and its 25 member States, Dr Roy-Macauley said that AfricaRice considers FAO as a strategic development partner in its quest to realize Africa’s huge rice potential to contribute to poverty alleviation and food security in the continent.“We are convinced that Africa has the human, physical and economic resources to produce enough quality rice in a sustainable manner to feed itself and in the long run to export to other regions,” reiterated Dr Roy-Macauley.He explained that to achieve this goal more attention needs to be paid to improving the entire value chain. AfricaRice is developing a business model around this concept based on the solid experience of Côte d’Ivoire and other leading countries in the region.Both Mr Dasylva and Dr Roy-Macauley referred to the COP21 climate agreement and its relevance for Africa, which is most vulnerable to climate change.“AfricaRice is increasingly putting emphasis on the development of climate-smart and gender-sensitive technologies for a productive, resilient rice sector in Africa, based on a sustainable management of natural resources,” Dr Roy-Macauley said.He added that efforts are also being put on rice innovation that will respond to the creation of employment and incomes especially for women and youth.Speaking on the different institutional strengths of FAO and AfricaRice to make a more significant contribution to Africa’s food security needs in terms of rice, Dr Roy-Macauley said that FAO has vast networks, strong technical expertise and long-term commitment to rice research and development in Africa.AfricaRice and FAO are actively participating in several important initiatives such as the Coalition for African Rice Development (CARD). Moreover, the Declaration of the Third Africa Rice Congress held in October 2013 requested FAO to stimulate national, regional and global partnerships to help develop Africa's rice sector.Dr Roy-Macauley mentioned that discussions during his recent meeting with the FAO Director General focused on the need for strong demonstration and visibility of the partnership efforts.“That is why AfricaRice and FAO are especially conceptualizing the organization of an African Heads of State summit in 2016, which we are convinced will play a critical role in boosting rice sector development, in cross-cutting areas, and in particular related to the policy domain,” explained Dr Roy-Macauley.Congratulating AfricaRice for the FAO award, Prof. Kati-Coulibaly said that this sends out a strong signal of encouragement to the Center to continue in its efforts to help African countries, including Côte d’Ivoire, attain their ambition of rice self-sufficiency. “Cote d’Ivoire needs the strong support of both FAO and AfricaRice

An in-depth discussion involving the African Development Bank (AfDB) delegation, AfricaRice and INRAB researchers, actors of the rice value chain engaged in the AfDB-funded project on CGIAR-Support to Agricultural Research for Development of Strategic Crops in Africa (SARD-SC) was held during the project mid-term review meeting, 5-6 May 2015, at AfricaRice, Cotonou, Benin. Dr Samuel Bruce-Oliver, AfricaRice Director of Partnerships and Capacity Strengthening Dr Samuel Bruce-Oliver delivered the opening remarks on behalf of AfricaRice Director General Dr Harold Roy-Macauley at the SARD-SC Review Meeting. Dr Bruce-Oliver underlined that the SARD-SC project is extremely important for AfricaRice and that it has the full support of the AfricaRice management. "Thanks to the SARD-SC project, promising rice tools, technologies and innovations have been developed and the priority now is to put them in the hands of the end-users. We also need to ensure that the innovation platforms function very well within the rice value chain." (Listen to the audio)Participants included members of the AfDB delegation comprising Dr Ibrahim Amadou, Task Manager,  Mr Mohamed Usman, Principal Procurement Manager, Abbah Jafar, Principal Disbursement Manager), SARD-SC Project Coordinator Dr Chris Akem, Coordinator of the rice component of the SARD-SC project Dr Sidi Sanyang, INRAB Focal Points of Rice Task Force and coordinator of Africa Rice Task Forces as well as representatives of rice millers, parboilers, traders, extension workers, micro-credit organization, farmers, seed producers, equipment services, fabricators and officials.Dr Sidi Sanyang made a presentation on the ‘Highlights of achievements and perspectives of the rice value chain’ (see PowerPoint presentation), which was followed by presentations on baseline report, procurement and finance. The AfDB perspectives on fine-tuning the project represented a major highlight of the program.The delegation had a guided tour of the rice parboiling demonstration by women rice processors from the Glazoué Rice Hub in Benin and the postharvest machinery section of AfricaRice.

Impressed

with the outputs of the AfricaRice Regional Station in Saint Louis, Senegal, in

terms of high-yielding and stress-tolerant varieties, improved agronomic packages, policy options

and knowledge, AfricaRice Director General Dr Harold Roy-Macauley said, “The

work that is being done at this Regional Station by a very dynamic team is focused

and relevant. However, more efforts need to be made to integrate rice science

in the regional policy agenda.”

Dr

Roy-Macauley made these remarks to the staff during his first visit to the Saint

Louis Regional Station. “This Station has made significant contributions to the

rice sector development in the Sahel region and it is clear that the Sahel

countries need you.”

After

receiving a warm welcome from the scientists and support staff of the Regional

Station, Dr Roy-Macauley visited the experimental fields and the laboratories

for biotechnology, grain quality and soil science. The Acting Regional Station

Head Dr Kabirou Ndiaye gave a brief overview of the Station’s activities which

was complemented by presentations by scientists.

Dr

Roy-Macauley took the opportunity to explain the principles and pillars of his

vision in order to help AfricaRice grow into a big pan-African international Center

of Excellence for research, development and capacity strengthening.Scenes from the visit of AfricaRice Director General Dr Harold Roy-Macauley to the Center's Regional Station in Saint Louis, SenegalCliquez ici pour écouter le discours du Dr Roy-Macauley / Click here to listen to Dr Roy-Macauley’s speech.

The Stress Tolerant Rice for Africa and South Asia (STRASA) phase III Africa annual meeting was held on the 13th of February 2015 in Cotonou, Benin. Forty six (46) participants from 19 countries (Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cote d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Gambia. Ghana, Japan, Kenya, Madagascar, Mali, Mozambique, Nigeria, Philippines, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, Uganda and USA) attended this meeting. Sixteen countries which are involved in the project were represented by their focal points.Key personalities present at the meeting were Dr Gary Atlin of the Bill Melinda Gates Foundation; Dr Marco Wopereis, Deputy Director General-Research and Development, AfricaRice; Dr Mathew Morell, Deputy Director General, IRRI; Dr Abdelbagi Ismail, Overall STRASA Coordinator, IRRI; Dr Baboucarr Manneh, STRAS-Africa Coordinator; and Dr Issoufou Kapran, Program Officer, Seed Production and Dissemination, AGRA. Representatives of several STRASA development partners such as CORAF/WECARD (West and Central African Council for Agricultural Research and Development) and NAFASO (Private company in Burkina Faso) were also present.The presentations and discussions focused on progress made by AfricaRice and IRRI-ESA project scientists and NARS partners in identifying and developing scalable products such as abiotic stress tolerant genes, breeding lines and varieties as well as dissemination strategies for the newly released stress tolerant varieties. In 2014, three drought tolerant lines were submitted for release in Mali (WAB 358-5-2-3-3-P, CNAX3031-78-2-1-1, WABC265) and 6 cold tolerant lines (Scrid 006-2-4-2-3, HR 17570-21-5-2-5-2-2-1-5, ARICA 9, WAS 62-B-B-14-1, PSBRC 96, WAS 203-B-B-1) were also submitted for release in Burundi and Mali. The need for greater integration of gender issues into the strategic results framework of the project was also emphasized at the meeting. Drafts Seed Road Maps developed by NARS partners for the newly released stress tolerant varieties were updated at the meeting. Dr Baboucarr Manneh highlights the achievements of the STRASA-Africa component. Listen to this podcast.

Dr Kazuki Saito, AfricaRice agronomist from Japan, was awarded the Agropolis Foundation’s Louis Malassis Young Promising Scientist Prize in a ceremony held on 16 March 2015 in Montpellier, France, during the Global Science Conference on Climate-Smart Agriculture 2015.Named after Louis Malassis, a renowned French agronomist and agricultural economist who was an ardent supporter of farmers’ cause, the Prize recognizes exemplary and promising contributions of scientists in the field of agriculture and food. It consists of two categories – Distinguished Scientist and Young Promising Scientist.Accepting the Louis Malassis Prize from Mr Henri Carsalade, Chair of the Board, Agropolis Foundation, Saito said, “I want to thank Agropolis Foundation for this incredible honor. This honor must be shared with all those who have worked with me and supported me. I recognize that our work within the Africa rice agronomy network with national partners has just begun. We have a huge challenge in front of us. I will continue to work hard to make a positive difference in rice production in Africa and in farmers’ livelihoods.”Saito is the driving force behind the Africa-wide Rice Agronomy Task Force, convened by AfricaRice, which is conducting activities in 21 countries across Africa. Yield-gap survey protocols for the Agronomy Task Force, developed under Saito’s leadership, are currently being used in these countries by national research institutions in sub-Saharan Africa. The results from the surveys are enabling AfricaRice and its partners to identify the opportunities available to introduce technologies to close yield gaps.Saito is involved in climate risk assessment and RD priority setting for rice in Africa. He has developed a decision support application (app) for providing African farmers with field-specific management guidelines called ‘RiceAdvice.’ He is also leading a team that has developed the first version of a yield gap map for rice in nine African countries in the ‘Global Yield Gap Atlas’ website.AfricaRice Deputy Director General Dr Marco Wopereis said “Saito has always shown determination, stamina and leadership in conducting field research in close collaboration with researchers and farmers, leading to tangible results often under difficult circumstances.”Saito has been actively involved in training researchers, extension workers and students in themes relating to agronomy, including making use of smart phones to facilitate data entry and recognition of symptoms of pests, diseases and nutrient disorders in the field.“Saito is a worthy recipient of the prestigious Louis Malassis Young Promising Scientist Prize and the AfricaRice family is very proud of his achievements,” AfricaRice Director General Dr Harold Roy-Macauley said.Related links :Listen to audio podcast of Kazuki Saito – Winner of Louis Malassis Young Promising Scientist PrizeThe Story Behind the Science of Dr. Kazuki SaitoShould technological innovation be the last piece of the “yield gap” puzzle in Africa?L’innovation technologique devrait-elle être le dernier morceau du casse-tête de « l’écart de rendement » en Afrique ?A game changer in Africa’s rice agronomy

Describing the 2011-2020 strategic plan of the Africa Rice

Center (AfricaRice) to boost the rice sector in Africa as “evidenced-based and

therefore very solid and powerful,” the new Director General of AfricaRice Dr

Harold Roy-Macauley urged AfricaRice staff “to be adventurous and ingenious in

the way we roll out our rice science.”

He stated that although AfricaRice’s mandate covers the rice

sector in Africa, it is global in its approach, because of the growing

importance and opportunities of the African rice sector in the global rice

market. “Rice is global and it is big business,” said Dr Roy-Macauley. “It is

the white gold of the future. We at AfricaRice should consider ourselves

fortunate to be in big business already.”

Dr Roy-Macauley made these remarks in his first speech to

the AfricaRice staff during the handover ceremony on 12 March 2015 at

AfricaRice temporary headquarters in Cotonou, Benin, in which the Interim Director

General Dr Adama Traoré handed over office to him.

Dr Roy-Macauley, a Sierra Leonean national, was appointed as

the new Director General of AfricaRice at an Extraordinary Session of the

Council of Ministers of AfricaRice held on 6 February 2015, in Kampala, Uganda.

After thanking Dr Traoré for ably steering the Center during

the interim period, Dr Roy-Macauley outlined his first priorities that include

the following:

•                

Rendering partnerships more efficient around

rice science and sector development

•                

Strengthening capacity for rice science and

sector development

•                

Improving access of small-holders rice producers

to markets

•                

Reintegrating rice science in the policy agenda

of countries

•                

Increasing investments in rice science and

sector development           

To realize his vision for AfricaRice, he highlighted the

need for AfricaRice Management and staff to focus on the implementation of four

main pillars: 

1.     

“Consolidation, which implies consolidating

existing scientific and development activities to respond directly to the

weaknesses observed in the rice value chain with special focus on integrating

functional Innovation platforms (IPs) in rice value chain in the rice hubs and

striking a better balance between varietal development and dissemination and

agronomy.

2.     

Efficiency/Efficacy, which implies improving the

following key systems – monitoring, evaluation and learning; data and

information collection and analysis; knowledge management; information and

communication; cooperate services and quality delivery; and governance

policies, leading to increased credibility of AfricaRice, the interest of

development partners including the private sector and their investments and the

sustainable funding of AfricaRice’s activities.

3.     

Punctuality, which implies anticipating

consequences (proactivity and rapidity), having great consideration of our

clients, inspiring confidence in staff, and being polite, which will lead to

improved client relationship and the reputation of AfricaRice Management.

4.     

Excellence, which implies being very

progressive, having a sense of responsibility and a spirit of openness, and

recognizing diversity, merits and talents, which will lead to improved work

environment.”

Listen to AfricaRice Director General Dr Harold Roy-Macauley’s

maiden address.

Gaudiose Mujawamariya received the Young Rice Scientist Award at the International Rice Congress held in Thailand, Bangkok in November 2014, for her research on “Demystification of consumer preferences for rice in urban areas of Dar es Salaam”.

Esther Leah Achandi received the Young Rice Scientist Award at the International Rice Congress held in Thailand, Bangkok in November 2014, for her research on  “Market participation by small holder rice farmers in Tanzania: A double hurdle analysis”.