Impacting Sustainable Development in subSaharan Africa: Unlocking the Potential in Food and Non-food Crops Eric Y. Danquah, PhD Professor & Director WACCI/Biotechnology Centre Presentation, Workshop on “Scoping the potential for IB interventions to add value to nonfood and dual purpose crops”, University of York, England, United Kingdom January 9-10, 2017

Outline • Context - The Zero Hunger challenge - Grand challenges: Food and Energy security • The Food vrs Fuel dilemma? - Flex crops/commodities • Unlocking the potential of African Flex crops/commodities • Plant Breeding capacity building at WACCI, University of Ghana • Conclusion

From the MDGs to the SDGs “Scoping the potential for IB interventions to add value to non-food and dual purpose crops” •

MDG1: Eradicate Extreme Hunger and Poverty (2000 - 2015)

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SDG2: End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture (2015 - 2030)

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SDG 7: Affordable and Clean Energy- Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all (2015 - 2030)

Africa is a continent of opportunities • Current population of 1.23 billion (16% of total world population) - highest growth rate of 2.5% p.a. - youngest population with median age of 19.5 years - about 60% of population is under the age of 25 years - 40% of population in urban centres

• Relative peace and stability in Africa in recent times • Increased demand for food and energy (power)

Grand challenge - food insecurity • Food insecurity and hunger are widespread in SSA - Low productivity makes Africa a net food importer - Over 233 million people are hungry - Africa’s population will double to 2.5 billion by 2050 - Food production will have to more than double to meet the needs of the burgeoning population

Grand challenge -–energy Grand challenges energy(power) (power) Poverty reduction efforts in Africa hampered by erratic power supply Widening energy gap between Africa and the rest of the world

621 million people lack access to electricity

USD 55 billion/year needed until 2030 to meet energy demand

Affordable and Clean Energy (Can bioenergy play a role?)

Food versus fuel dilemma • Ethical question: should we divert farmland or crops for biofuels production to the detriment of food supply? • Flex crops/Commodities with multiply functions address concerns Maize

Cassava

Sweet sorghum

Sugar cane

Oil palm

Shea tree

Integrated resource development for genome-enabled improvement of Shea tree (Vitellaria paradoxa) for SSA Collaboration with the University of New Hampshire, USA and other partners • Build and annotate the gene space of a publiclyavailable genome for Vitellaria paradoxa • Develop a comprehensive collection of SNPs for the species by resequencing 100 diverse collections • Create a nested association mapping population and a replicated mapping panel for long-term trait validation and fine mapping • Build regional capacity to make full use of developed resources in shea improvement programmes

Some Key Questions • Have we interrogated the political economy of these crops as flex crops? - Deeper analysis in the context of land grabs and agarian change, land conversion and deforestation • How do these crops fit the flex-crop framework? - Analysis of enabling material and ideational bases • Who informs, decides and controls the nature of flexing? - Government, Corporate (Private) and Social actors globally

Unlocking the potential of African flex crops • Investments in R&D (with Public-Private-Partnerships) - Scale up the use of modern technologies for trait discovery and the development of plants/crops with multipurpose traits - Adding value to the value chain (IB applications e.g efficiencies in oil extraction from oil palm, improved processiong of shea, sugar, ethanol in sweet soughum, residue materials from sugar cane etc.) - Metabolite engineering: transfer of seed oil biosynthesis into leaves

• Capacity building - new programmes in IB and Biosecurity (split site training of a new generation of scientists for SSA) • Legislation and Policies - Public acceptance of IB technologies - Land Reform Policies

• Investments in low-carbon pathways where renewables replace fossil fuels; Africa should become the global leader in lowcarbon development

Capacity building at the West Africa Centre for Crop Improvement (WACCI)

Established in June, 2007 to train plant breeders over a 10-year period (AGRA-PASS grant); now a World Bank Africa Centre of Excellence Investments to date: USD 27 million

Vision To become the foremost Centre for the training of Plant Breeders for Africa

PhD in Plant Breeding, WACCI, UG Enrollment to date 98 Students enrolled (52 completed)

35 Female (35.7%) 55 Anglophone (56.1%) 43.9 Francophone (43%)

Visiting Scientists

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8

2

5 15 5

7

8

10 9 11

12

6 13

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1. Prof. Margaret Smith, 2. Prof. Elizabeth Earle, 3. Dr. Aline Funk, 4. Dr. Susan McCouch, 5. Dr. Craig Yencho, 6. Dr. Hernan Ceballos, 7. Dr. Jeff Ehlers, 8. Dr. Thomas Debener ,

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1. 9. Dr. Issoufou Kapran,10. Dr. Acar Toure, 11. Dr. Abdou Tenkouano, 12. Mr. Sam Ofodile,

Conclusion • SSA needs political will for game changing innovations to move to the next level • Opportunities exist for harnessing the potential of flex crops/commodities through R & D and government policy to impact bioenergy generation among others for sustainable development in SSA • Urgent need for the training of commodity value chain actors and game changers (synthetic biologists, plant breeders, plant engineers etc) who will be history makers in an imminent IB revolution • Collaborations with scientsits in advanced laboratories will fasttrack SSA’s capability to adopt, adapt and innovate technologies to unlock the potential in a range of commodities 1/20/17 14

Conclusion

Thank You 1/20/17

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