Thesis subject
Socio-economic Impact Assessment of Africa Harvest interventions in drylands value chains in Kenya
Sorghum and millets (finger and pearl) are staple foods to more than 100 million people living in the semi-arid areas of eastern Africa where the effects of global warming are already evident. The project is supporting initiatives to reduce food and nutritional insecurity and alleviate poverty through strengthening sorghum, millet and dry land legumes value chains. Working with partners, ICRISAT and Africa Harvest are upscaling the deployment of sorghum, millet and legume varieties with highly desirable characteristics (high yield and tolerance to disease and drought) identified through SMU, HOPE and earlier projects.
The project’s implementation is aimed at achieve the following milestones: (a) Enhanced household food security from adoption and use of improved cultivars of sorghum and millets (b) Improved nutrition through consumption of diversified and nutritious sorghum and millet products and (c) Increased incomes from sale of surplus sorghum and millet grain and products.
Africa Harvest is thus seeking masters level students to help evaluate the impacts of these interventions in dryland cereals based value chains which the institution and its partners have undertaken since 2009. The evaluations will take the form of socio-economic studies/surveys targeting sorghum/millets/dry-land legumes value chains in the various counties, in Kenya, where the projects mentioned above were/are implemented.
- The socio-economic status of smallholder housholds in arid and semi-arid lands capturing in detail their current incomes, food security and nutrition status and technology usage as compared to the status in 2009.
- Nutritional/food and income contribution of sorghum, millets and dry-land legumes in the household diets and incomes.
- Characterized dryland cereal based value chains (seeds and product markets) capturing Africa Harvest’s contribution.
- A market analysis defining consumer demand for the sorghum and millets products, ascertaining the market share of these products, identifying the different product manufacturers and competitive products and identify problems and opportunities that Africa Harvest have attempted to address and what more needs to be done.
The project will host interested students as interns for a period not exceeding six months within which the student will conduct the survey and finalize the reports under the guidance of their supervisors, and with technical support from ICRISAT, Africa Harvest, KALRO and other relevant stakeholders.
The Call
This is an invitation to students and/or university faculties to submit research/study/survey proposals that address at least one of the four main thematic areas of interest from the list above. The results are expected to contribute to the documentation of the interventions and impacts of Africa Harvest’s work.
These requests should be sent to Africa Harvest as soon as possible. The studies should be completed and final reports submitted by December 2020.
Attention your request to;