Insect Resistant Cowpea
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Cowpea farmer
[photo courtesy of ScientificNG]
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Cowpeas for sale in a Nigerian market
[photo by Nkechi Isaac]
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"GM" insect protected cowpeas offer the best chance for small farmers in sub-Saharan Africa to incease yields and improve livelihoods.
Two hundred million people in sub Saharan Africa depend on cowpeas, a legume that is the most important food grain in the region. Grown on 12.5 million hectares (31 million acres) it provides a good source of protein for people and high quality feed for livestock. One of the main threats to cowpea production is the pod borer, an insect pest that can destroy as much as 80% of the harvest. Such lepidopteran pests are often managed in industrial nations with pesticide sprays. This is usually not practical for small farmers in developing countries for both economic and safety reasons. This means there is significant potential in cowpeas for economic uplift if practical pest control can be developed.
Researchers funded by the public sector have developed biotechnology improved insect resistant cowpeas based on methods long used by organic growers (Cowpea Protected From A Devastating Pest, Free For Smallholder African Farmers, https://phys.org/news/2017-10-cowpea-devastating-pest-free-smallholder.html; Transgenic cowpeas expressing Bt proteins are protected against the Maruca pod borer, https://eprints.qut.edu.au/109633/2/109633.pdf ). Cowpeas improved in this way have already been shown effective in field trials in Nigeria, Burkina Faso, and Ghana, and could be made commercially available by 2018.
"It will help alleviate the problems farmers face with Maruca, boost cowpea production and income of cowpea farmers, and our seed companies are well supported and capable of delivering this technology to the doorsteps of each farmer in Nigeria" says Mr. Auwalu Balarabe of Nigerian seed company Maina Seeds Limited Kano (Researchers inventing pod borer resistant cowpea for Africa, https://www.aatf-africa.org/researchers-inventing-pod-borer-resistant-cowpea-africa). It is estimated they could improve yields by as much as 20% on average.
FURTHER READING:
Researchers inventing pod borer resistant cowpea for Africa
https://www.aatf-africa.org/researchers-inventing-pod-borer-resistant-cowpea-africa
Nigeria Prepares for Commercialisation of BT Cowpea, Cotton
https://aatfnews.aatf-africa.org/?p=862
http://thebftonline.com/business/agribusiness/21607/confined-field-trials-of-pod-borer-resistant-cowpea-makes-progress.html
Pod Borer Resistant (PBR) Cowpea
http://paepard.blogspot.com/2014/04/pod-borer-resistant-pbr-cowpea.html
Cowpea Protected From A Devastating Pest, Free For Smallholder African Farmers
https://phys.org/news/2017-10-cowpea-devastating-pest-free-smallholder.html
How GM cowpea, rice can improve yield in sub-Saharan Africa
http://www.tribuneonlineng.com/gm-cowpea-rice-can-improve-yield-sub-saharan-africa/
Researchers develop pod-borer resistant cowpea
https://guardian.ng/features/researchers-develop-pod-borer-resistant-cowpea/
Pod borer-resistant GM cowpea 'to be ready by 2017'
http://www.scidev.net/sub-saharan-africa/gm/news/pod-borer-resistant-gm-cowpea-to-be-ready-by-2017.html
Bosibori Bett, Stephanie Gollasch, Andy Moore, William James, Joel Armstrong, Tom Walsh, Robert Harding, Thomas J. V. Higgins, Transgenic cowpeas (Vigna unguiculata L. Walp) expressing Bacillus thuringiensis Vip3Ba protein are protected against the Maruca pod borer (Maruca vitrata), Plant Cell Tiss Organ Cult DOI 10.1007/s11240-017-1287-3
https://eprints.qut.edu.au/109633/2/109633.pdf
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