| Sumario: | Under the HealthyDiets4Africa (HD4A) project—Combating Malnutrition in Africa Through
Diversification of the Food System—the Africa Rice Center (AfricaRice) has delivered
substantial, evidence-based contributions to the design, testing, and scaling of nutrition
sensitive rice-based food systems across multiple African countries. Funded by the
European Union under Horizon Europe, HD4A positions food system diversification as a
central pathway to addressing malnutrition, diet-related non-communicable diseases, and
food system resilience.
During the reporting period, AfricaRice’s contributions progressed decisively from research
and piloting toward Scaling for Impact, anchored in Living Labs, youth-led agribusiness
development, improved processing and storage technologies, and policy-relevant nutrition
evidence. AfricaRice’s work focused on strengthening the nutritional quality, safety,
affordability, and market uptake of rice and diversified food products, while ensuring
institutional embedding and scalability.
Guided by CGIAR-aligned Scaling for Impact principles, AfricaRice demonstrated how
nutrition-sensitive rice value chain upgrading—combined with diversified foods, youth
employment, and institutional demand—can deliver measurable nutrition, economic, and
social outcomes at scale.
Major Scaling Achievements Led by AfricaRice
Across Côte d’Ivoire, Nigeria, Cameroon, Kenya, Liberia, and Uganda, AfricaRice delivered
the following key scaling results:
• Generation of large-scale scientific evidence on the nutritional superiority of Oryza
glaberrima, based on the analysis of 5,219 rice accessions, demonstrating
significantly higher protein (mean 15.2%, up to 28.3%) and superior iron and zinc
content compared with O. sativa. This evidence underpins nutrition-sensitive
breeding, product development, and donor investment strategies.
• Development of nutrition-sensitive rice products, including:
o Iron–zinc fortified parboiled rice,
o Low-glycaemic-index (low-GI) parboiled rice,
o Fortified rice crackers enriched with indigenous African crops (moringa,
baobab, hibiscus, soybean, tiger nut), achieving protein levels up to 20.2%
and high mineral bioavailability.
• Operationalization of Living Labs in Bouaké (Côte d’Ivoire), Abuja (Nigeria), Dschang
(Cameroon), Liberia, Kenya (Nairobi and Makueni), and Uganda, serving as
platforms for co-design, production, processing, consumer testing, and market
uptake of healthy diets.
• Youth skills development and employment creation, with:
o Over 400 youth trained directly across AfricaRice-supported Living Labs,
o Dozens of youth-led agribusinesses established, including 72 enterprises in
Nigeria, and
o Permanent jobs created through operational processing units (e.g. five
permanent positions at the Bouaké Living Lab rice processing unit).
• Large-scale production of healthy foods, including:
o ≈697 tonnes of diversified healthy foods produced in Côte d’Ivoire,
o 57,390 kg of healthy foods produced by youth enterprises in Nigeria,
o 70,124 kg reported from Cameroon Living Labs.
• Strengthening of nutrition-sensitive processing and post-harvest systems, through:
o Deployment of GEM parboiling systems,
o Solar–gas hybrid dryers (with 10 technicians trained from eight countries),
o Hermetic storage systems shown to double seed viability and improve milling
returns by ~2%.
• Consumer acceptance and behavior-change evidence, including a large-scale study
in Uganda involving 765 households, showing strong acceptance (mean score
4.18/5) of nutrient-dense black rice despite >93% prior unfamiliarity.
• Policy and financing influence, notably AfricaRice’s catalytic contribution to
mobilizing CAD 1 million in innovative financing from IDRC/CRDI for the AlimSco
school feeding–local production model in Côte d’Ivoire, linking school canteens
with local rice and vegetable value chains.
Progress Toward Scaling and Sustainability
AfricaRice’s HD4A contributions are firmly positioned within the expansion and
institutionalization phase of Scaling for Impact. Innovations are no longer confined to
research settings but are embedded within:
• Youth-led enterprises and vocational hubs,
• Operational rice processing units and Living Labs,
• School feeding systems and institutional procurement,
• National research and extension platforms,
• Donor-financed follow-on initiatives (e.g. CRDI-funded AlimSco).
By integrating nutrition science, processing innovation, youth entrepreneurship, and
institutional demand, AfricaRice has demonstrated a replicable and scalable model for
transforming rice-based food systems toward healthier, safer, and more inclusive diets in
Africa.
|
|---|