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Africa Rice Centre (WARDA)
“Africa Rice Center (WARDA) is an autonomous intergovernmental
research association of African member states. It is
also one of the 15 international agricultural
research Centers supported by the Consultative Group
on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR).”
“Since January 2005, the Center has been
working from Cotonou, Benin, having relocated from
its headquarters in Bouaké, Côte d’Ivoire, because
of the civil conflicts in the country. It has
regional research stations near St Louis, Senegal
and at the International Institute of Tropical
Agriculture (IITA) in Ibadan, Nigeria.”
Mission
“WARDA’s
mission is to contribute to poverty alleviation and
food security in Africa, through research,
development and partnership activities aimed at
increasing the productivity and profitability of the
rice sector in ways that ensure the sustainability
of the farming environment.”
Go to
WARDA’s website.
Genetic resource
activities
“Since its inception in 1970, WARDA has been
involved in genetic resources activities,
specifically collection, preservation,
characterization, evaluation, multiplication and
distribution of promising germplasm to rice
scientists in Africa and throughout the world.
To strengthen genetic-resources activities, WARDA
formally created a Genetic Resources Unit in 1999,
within which the International Network for Genetic
Evaluation of Rice for Africa (INGER-Africa) is
nested. Today, the genebank contains close to 20 000
rice accessions. Long-term conservation is
undertaken at IITA (Ibadan, Nigeria) and medium-term
at WARDA’s temporary headquarters in Cotonou, Benin.
Duplicates are planned to be kept in Fort Collins,
USA.
Germplasm characterization and evaluation are
on-going activities. Most of the glaberrima and
modern sativa accessions have been characterized and
the data included in the CGIAR’s SINGER database.”
Find out more about
WARDA’s genebank.
Inter-Centre Working
Group on Genetic Resources
Each of the CGIAR Centres has a representative on
the Inter-Centre Working Group on Genetic Resources,
SGRP’s steering committee. The Committee sets the
strategy and priorities for SGRP and meets annually
to review its workplan.
To find out who is WARDA’s representative, please go
to our
Contacts page. |
