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ICARDA News International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas P.O. Box 5466, Aleppo, Syria Phone: (963-21) 2213433, 2213477, 2225112, 2225012 Fax: (963-21) 2213490, 2225105; E-mail: ICARDA@CGIAR.ORG Website: www.icarda.org
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Media
contacts:
Fawzi Karajeh, icarda-cairo@cgiar.org or Ayman Abou Hadid, abouhadid@arc.sci.eg
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Memorandum
of Understanding with
Egypt Agriculture Research Center |
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| Cairo,
Egypt. On 18 July ICARDA Director General Dr. Mahmoud Solh
and Dr. Ayman Abou Hadid, President of Egypt's Agriculture Research
Center, agreed to sign a Memorandum of Understanding to launch a 10-year
Wheat Improvement Program in Egypt. The objective of the new program
is to develop wheat germplasm with the attributes (high yield potential,
heat tolerance, good grain quality, resistance to diseases and insect
pests) suitable for irrigated agriculture in Central and West Asia
and North Africa; and to make the germplasm freely available, in the
form of international nurseries, to national wheat breeding programs
throughout the region. Activities are scheduled to begin this crop
season (2009-2010) at Sids Research Station, Middle Egypt. The anticipated
outcome of this collaboration is adapted wheat varieties that can
produce grain yields substantially higher (up to 30% more) than currently
used varieties. The new varieties are also expected to be more resistant
to the major wheat diseases, including yellow and black rusts. Established in the in the early 1970s, the Egypt Agricultural Research Center (ARC) aims to maximize the economic return per unit of land and water. ARC's work covers various areas: applied and basic research to generate a continuous flow of technologies that help increase productivity and reduce production cost; transfer of new technologies to farmers through extension service; monitoring their adoption; and human capital development. Established in 1977, the International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA) is one of 15 centers supported by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR). ICARDA's mission is to contribute to the improvement of livelihoods of the resource-poor in dry areas by enhancing food security and alleviating poverty through research and partnerships to achieve sustainable increases in agricultural productivity and income, while ensuring the efficient and more equitable use and conservation of natural resources. ICARDA has a global mandate for the improvement of barley, lentil and faba bean, and serves the non-tropical dry areas for the improvement of on-farm water use efficiency, rangeland and small-ruminant production. In the Central and West Asia and North Africa (CWANA) region, ICARDA contributes to the improvement of bread and durum wheats, kabuli chickpea, pasture and forage legumes, and associated farming systems. It also works on improved land management, diversification of production systems, and value-added crop and livestock products. Social, economic and policy research is an integral component of ICARDA's research to better target poverty and to enhance the uptake and maximize impact of research outputs. Additional information about ICARDA and ARC can be found at www.icarda.org and www.arc.sci.eg. |