Frank van Steenbergen

The Raya Valley in Tigray, Ethiopia is a picture of fertile plains, diverse plant genetic resources and relatively untapped ground water potential. But although the valley is known for its endowment in natural resources, it is also known for its reoccurring droughts.

The government of Tigray, a region home to a growing population of over 4.5 million farmers, continues to promote food security through improved production and expanding land use for agriculture.

In October, by good fortune, two WLE projects met in the polders of Bangladesh. Improved water management in the polders goes hand in hand with a higher value cropping system, observes van Steenbergen and Mondal.

Climate science has a large interest in ‘average weather’. There is an obsession with predicting larger climate trends: regional long-term patterns of rainfall, temperature peaks and averages. How this pans out locally in time and space in less understood.

Situated in the far east of Sudan, the Gash Die is where the ‘wild’ Gash River comes to a stop in a desert territory – a so-called inland Delta. Since the 1970's, the fortunes of Gash Die have been on a steep decline.

They are the large overlooked agricultural potential: the extensive flood plains of Sub Saharan Africa. In Asian countries the flood plains are converted into food baskets and densely populated population hubs, in Africa the flood plains are largely unchartered terrain.