Welcome to the second issue of Growing Africa for 2023. Our mission is to publish research directed towards sustainable productivity, livelihood improvement, and resilience for African agricultural systems.
This issue begins with our feature, who’s authors address the long-standing problem of solving for sustainable production systems within biodiverse living landscapes in Africa, given the demands anticipated from within the continent and beyond. What is the evolving role of 4R Nutrient Stewardship in landscape-scale research? From the field, we present a long-term tillage case study from Tunisia that gives insight on the degree to which conventional intensive cultivation practices are impacting soil quality in its annual cropping systems, and the role no-till can play to reverse this carbon degrading trend. From Morocco, we highlight a study examining the relative effectiveness of phosphogypsum as a soil amendment for salt-affected soils.
We also like to tell stories of success. Such is our article describing the highly successful, women led Taymate Olive Cooperative operating in northcentral Morocco. This story gives key insights into the components of an inclusive, empowering, and sustainable agricultural production system that has much potential for scaling across North Africa.
This issue also allows us the opportunity to feature our class of award and fellowship recipients for 2023. It is APNI’s great honor to support these promising young researchers from across Africa as part of our commitment to developing excellence in crop nutrition research and outreach. Take a moment to review this impressive collection of innovative research projects. Our year-end issue is also a chance to announce the winners of our inaugural photo contest! This effort has been a huge success and is one that we will be sure to start-up next year. So, keep your cameras close by your side and keep us in mind as you are out amongst Africa’s diverse and most interesting agro ecosystems.
Other news centers around the return of AfCPA in December 2024. The 3rd African Conference on Precision Agriculture in Kigali, Rwanda, promises to be our most extensive ever. Organizers are working on program details, and we look forward to keeping you updated on the key dates and conference information as they become available early in the new year. Check in at the conference website http://paafrica.org regularly.
We greatly appreciate your interest in Growing Africa. Look to us for unique and practical information for those with a direct stake in agricultural knowledge for Africa. As always, I encourage you to take a moment to participate in one of the publication’s forums. We welcome submissions. Review our guide for authors at https://growingafrica.pub/about and contact us for more details on how you can contribute.
Sincerely yours,
Gavin Sulewski
Senior Editor | Communications Manager, APNI
