Cooperation for Holistic Agriculture Innovation Nests in Sub-Saharan Africa (CHAIN)

Although many people think of agriculture as low tech and innovation field, those involved in agricultural education or industry know that it’s actually quite the opposite – year on year new solutions and efforts are being made towards bridging the gap between the real life and classroom in agricultural field that change the life of students, farmers and entrepreneurs across the world. More and more farmers are turning to data science to make informed decisions using precision technologies. However, this kind of initiatives are much less (if any) observed in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) that severely lags behind in their development despite the fact that most people are engaged in small farming as primary economic activity.

In addressing this imbalance, CHAIN steps up the agricultural innovation and collaboration potential in SSA targeting engagement of teaching and non-teaching university staff, agricultural students, farmers and industry representatives. It introduces a more holistic and human-centred approach to agricultural education, training and innovation in the region through: developing a master program in Food Value Chain (FVC) at beneficiary HEIs; building teacher capacity at beneficiary HEIs to use promote learning methods and use teaching methodology prone to entrepreneurial thinking and innovation, with emphasis on e-learning and digital tools; and establishing Collaborative Holistic Agriculture Innovation Nests offering support to innovation initiatives of students, farmers, and entrepreneurs.

While on immediate impact level the project brings modernized curricula prone to innovation and increased employability of students, CHAIN in the long run fosters efforts around food safety and security in targeted African countries and communities, by developing and promoting “careers of the future,” in the agricultural sector. It thus provides impetus to tackling some of the core global developmental issues including production of more food with less inputs.