Putri Erna Abidin

Reputed AGRIC4DEV Stichting · Agriculture for Development

Sweetpotato (Ipomoea batatas L.) was known as a minor root crop in Ghana. Starting in 2010, the International Potato Center (CIP) and multiple partners implemented orange‐fleshed sweetpotato (OFSP) projects to reposition this crop in Ghana. CIP‐led projects from 2010 to 2021 were identified as Research for Development Initiative projects. These pro...

Gender responsiveness in breeding programs to meet client and end user preferences for crops is essential. This case study analyzes the implementation experience of gender-responsive breeding and variety dissemination in Malawi and Ghana, focusing on good practices and challenges encountered. In Malawi, a training-of-trainers approach was employed...

Sweetpotato (Ipomoea batatas (L) Lam) is prioritized among crops that enhance food security and reduce malnutrition in Ghana. The production is expanding faster than other food crops owing to its superior nutrient composition. This study evaluates integrated approaches to increase on‐farm productivity, income, and utilization of sweetpotato. The fi...

The triadic comparison of technologies (tricot) method is a participatory, citizen science method for evaluating a number of technologies (e.g. varieties) in groups of three, with analysis based on ranking. The tricot method is supported by the ClimMob platform (ClimMob.net) which enables the design of on-farm experiments, collection of data (using...

Matching crop varieties to their target use context and user preferences is a challenge faced by many plant breeding programs serving smallholder agriculture. Numerous participatory approaches proposed by CGIAR and other research teams over the last four decades have attempted to capture farmers' priorities/preferences and crop variety field perfor...

Sweetpotato was a relatively minor root crop in Ghana. Since 2010, in partnership with NARES and building on their previous efforts, the International Potato Center implemented a number of projects which sought to strengthen and promote sweetpotato (particularly OFSP) in Ghana, using a multi-partner approach. The Sweetpotato Action for Security and...

Promoting the consumption of locally available food crops such as orange-fleshed sweetpotato (OFSP) that are rich in beta carotene, a precursor for vitamin A, has been shown to be a highly effective means of fighting against vitamin A deficiency at the community level when combined with nutrition education. After a three-year intervention promoting...

Children’s diets can have major implications for a wide range of diseases and their development outcomes. In Africa, micronutrient deficiency remains a major challenge and affects the health and development of vulnerable populations, especially children. A major effort to combat micronutrient deficiency has targeted biofortification of staple foods...

Tricot (triadic comparisons of technologies) is a citizen science approach for testing technology options in their use environments, which is being applied to on-farm testing of crop varieties. Over the last years, important progress has been made on the tricot methodology of which an overview is given. Trial dimensions depend on several factors bu...

Despite sustained economic growth and reduction in some of forms of malnutrition, Ghana still faces a national prevalence rate of 20.8% vitamin A deficiency (VAD) among for children 6–59 months old. Orange-fleshed sweetpotato ( Ipomoea batatas L.) (OFSP) can significantly improve vitamin A intake and contribute toward reducing VAD, especially in No...

Commonly used innovation adoption models indirectly assume homogenous information flow across farmers, which is often not the case. For new and or not widely known technologies, such as orange-fleshed sweetpotato (OFSP) varieties, exposure plays an important role in farmers’ decision to adopt. OFSP varieties have been shown to be highly effective m...

This study estimated the amount of loss in storage roots caused by various levels of damage caused by sweetpotato weevils (Cylas spp). Seven varieties of sweetpotato (Ipomoea batatas L. (Lam)) were evaluated in three production sites in northern Ghana for two years (2014 and 2015). Yield data for each experimental plot were collected. A regression...

Goal To effectively evaluate and disseminate information on production and storage of sweetpotato in northern Ghana and Burkina Faso to serve for home consumption, commercial sales, and as a source of planting material.

Goal To effectively evaluate and disseminate information on production and storage of sweetpotato in northern Ghana and Burkina Faso to serve for home consumption, commercial sales, and as a source of planting material.

In this document, we analysed the costs of sand storage technique at the household level.

The document showed valuable results on the radio programs as one of scaling tools used by the USAID-OFDA sand storage scaling project.

Mobile: +233 555 009 189 Cover Photo: Farmers and CIP staff evaluating cooking quality of OFSP storage roots after 4 months in sand storage, Navrongo, Upper East Region, Ghana. Photographer: Erna Abidin The strategy of encouraging collaboration between farmer groups from different communities has proven to be even more effective than we had anticip...

Mobile: +233 555 009 189 Cover Photo: Farmers and CIP staff evaluating cooking quality of OFSP storage roots after 4 months in sand storage, Navrongo, Upper East Region, Ghana. Photographer: Erna Abidin The strategy of encouraging collaboration between farmer groups from different communities has proven to be even more effective than we had anticip...

This presentation aims at helping farmers who can't read (illaterate) but want to improve their practices by seeing the pictures.

The presentation showed the results from the MLE of USAID-OFDA sand storage project for scaling in Ghana and Burkina Faso.

This document showed some valuable findings from the endline evaluation on the USAID-OFDA sand storage project for scaling.

This poster described some findings from a series of research projects on sand storage technology for sweetpotato roots, as the root has a short-life, 2-3 weeks in drought-prone areas, such as Ghana and its surrounding. The results showed n Ghana, roots could be stored at least for 4 months, the agricultural losses were 21% per unit number of roots...

There is a need for suitable “seed” systems that assure planting material access when farmers need to plant, to maximize yields. Farmers can also benefit from improved storage systems for table stocks, ideally up to the next harvest season. Using the sand storage technique, vine producers generated income from vine sales and farmers had improved f...

OFSP significantly contributes to combat VAD in SSA. Erratic rainfalls, poor soil fertility, virus diseases, weevil incidence, animal destruction are big problems, particularly in drought-prone areas. It can disrupt crop production. Seed systems are needed to supply sweetpotato planting material in-time, so farmers can plant and harvest this crop e...

Based on qualitative research conducted in Chikwawa and Phalombe in Malawi, this article discusses how gender relations shape men and women’s access to and participation in agricultural training. It also examines how men and women justify or challenge gender inequalities in relation to access to agricultural information and knowledge. Data on gende...

Malnutrition, particularly vitamin A deficiency, is a major public health problem in many developing countries. This study investigated whether priming or self-generation of goals, or whether attention to instrumental or experiential goals together with use of a reminder condition or not, promotes dietary behaviour intentions and change. A set of 5...

This paper adopts a feminist approach to analyse how processes of scaling up of technologies to promote adoption can reinforce or reduce gender inequalities. It focuses on sweetpotato vine multiplication in Phalombe and Chikwawa districts in Malawi, and uses data from focus group discussions and individual interviews with men and women farmers and...

During the dry season in the tropics, sweetpotato storage roots naturally remain dormant in the dry soil, and sprout when the rains come. This natural tendency of sweetpotato to remain dormant in dry soil has been exploited to produce planting material through the so-called “Triple-S” method: storage in sand and sprouting. From 2013 to 2015, we con...

Sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas L.) was not an important crop in Ghana, Burkina Faso and Nigeria, West Africa, in the past decades. An effort has been made to reposition the sweet potato crop in West Africa. Orange-Fleshed Sweet potato (OFSP) cultivar was used as an entry point while properly designing a market-driven approach in the research project...

This document describes how scaling readiness to evaluate the USAID-OFDA sand storage innovation package. We are based on four assumptions, and in this document, we emphasised on the 4th assumption with the envisaged change process in scaling out of Triple S (-'storage in sand and sprouting' for vine production) and Double S ('storage in sand' for...

The implementation of a one-year USAID-OFDA sand storage scaling project was based on theories of change and scaling. This presentation has given detailed guidance on how to manage this project to achieve its accomplishment.

We are exploring orange-fleshed sweetpotato (OFSP) seed systems for the first time in West Africa through various markets, value chains, and awareness demand creation campaigns. It was successful in changing the image of the sweetpotato from an orphan crop into a commercially important crop in Ghana, Nigeria, and Burkina Faso.

Commercialization of sweetpotato vines is persistent if multipliers show evidence of superiority of their vines. This study aimed at evaluating the effects of net tunnel source and of pathogen-tested planting material compared to “apparently” healthy vines on yield and health status at three defined environments in Northern Ghana during the rainy s...

This presentation is meant to promote the work on orange-fleshed sweetpotato in West Africa, and particularly in Ghana. Through diversified markets, the planting material can be valued; it benefits resource-poor farmers to generate income (poverty alleviation), improved nutrition of vulnerable people including people living with HIV and AIDS, and f...

A uni-modal rainfall pattern causes a fairly short harvest season, where the sweetpotato is abundant and cheap in the markets, followed by a long dry season during which the sweetpotato is scarce and if it is there it will be extremely expensive. Generally, the crop is consumed, processed, or sold shortly after harvest. In Malawi, ambient temperatu...

Malawi is a land locked country with limited availability of agriculture land. It is one the poorest countries in the world, of which one fourth of Malawians were “ultra-poor” having an income below the estimated cost of food providing the minimum daily recommended calorie intake. Intercropping practices are commonly used by farmers in developing c...

This book is based on papers presented at the Ninth Triennial African Potato Association Conference, Naivasha, Kenya, 30 June-4 July 2013.The book focuses on the policies for germplasm exchange, food security and trade in Africa, seed systems, breeding and disease management and postharvest management, processing technologies and marketing systems...