Sustainable Agricultural Intensification Research and Learning in Africa

To meet the global challenge of food security and in particular to support Sub-Saharan Africa’s growing population with sufficient and nutritional food, agricultural production must increase but in a sustainable fashion. The Sustainable Agricultural Intensification Research and Learning in Africa (SAIRLA) programme will commission research and facilitate multi-scale learning to understand different ways of achieving SAI and their developmental implications. SAIRLA will focus on assessing how SAI can be promoted in ways that enable women and poorer smallholders in Africa to participate in and benefit from agricultural development. This five-year programme, running from 2015 to 2020, will focus on Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), with a particular, but not exclusive, emphasis on six countries (Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Ghana, Malawi, Tanzania and Zambia). The programme will function through two processes: a competitive research call for grants, and facilitation of a Learning Alliance between research organisations and other stakeholders.