Agricultural Fair - Agricultural Society

A film to inspire young people to invest in agriculture, sustainably

 

The aim of the film was to get younger people on Anjouan to invest in agriculture rather than taking the dangerous option to try and get to the neighboring island of Mayotte. The film follows the story of Ismaël Issouf Abdallah from Adda. Over the last ten years he made six attempts to stay and work in Mayotte. Three times his boat was stopped by border controls during the crossing, and three times he made it, but was later caught by the police and sent back. In 2012 he decided he’d had enough and that he would stay in Anjouan and try farming.  He came to seek advice from the ECDD project on how to restore the fertility to the field he had inherited from his father, and with the help of Badroudine Ali and other technicians from the project he created a successful market garden and started to make a good living from it.

This was Kitty’s last project with ECDD. You can read her blog article about creating the film on our website.

You can now watch the film online here

We hope you enjoy the film – do let us know what you think!

Best wishes

ECDD Team 

Launch issue of Global Food Security Journal

"Food security is the key to achieving a world without hunger and poverty, and one in which natural resources are conserved for future generations,"

Global Food Security's Editor-in-Chief, Kenneth Cassman (University of Nebraska).
 
The journal publishes concise and timely reviews and synthesis articles about research covering the following elements of food security:

• Availability (sufficiency; quantity and quality)
• Access (affordability, functioning markets and policies)
• Nutrition, Safety and Sanitation
• Stability and Environment (resilience and ecosystem services)

 Try a free issue

Together with the First International Conference on Global Food Security, of which Global Food Security is the supporting journal, we aim to make a valuable contribution to the global food security challenge.

Zotero

 

In order to  help students in their referencing with respect to their project work and assignments, Zotero is one of the referencing software that is freely available.  It will allow undergraduate students to learn the basics of using same for referencing purposes as from Year 1.

What is Zotero?

It is the only research tool that automatically senses content, allowing you to add it to your personal library with a single click. Whether you're searching journal article,  a news story or a book from your university library catalog, Zotero can store the metadata of these articles.

Zotero collects all your research in a single, searchable interface. You can add PDFs, images, audio and video files, snapshots of web pages, and really anything else. Zotero automatically indexes the full-text content of your library, enabling you to find exactly what you're looking for with just a few keystrokes.

And it will allow to draw up your bibliographic index.

We hope to see all the students start to use it!!!!!!!

Mr Kamlesh Boodhoo will shortly give a demonstration on its use. Keep posted by visiting the notice boards.

Education Leadership in Agriculture Award to the Faculty of Agriculture

At the Africa Education Leadership Awards Ceremony held on 12 December 2012 at Le Meridien Hotel, the University of Mauritius has obtained the following: (i) Award for Outstanding Contribution to Education and (ii) Award for Best Educational Institute in Agriculture

Towards competence based Tertiary Agricultural Education

Continued globalization and digitalization are not only affecting how we think, what we know, who to believe and how we act, they also affect the role of education in society’. In this regard, they attempt to answer ‘what do we educate for in such a world when things change so fast and knowledge becomes obsolete before you know it?’ For example, Wageningen University started changing their identity by positioning themselves as life science universities, which aspire to contribute to a better world and improved quality of life.

In this article, Wals and colleagues provide a brief review of some trends in Tertiary Agricultural Education (TAE) within Europe and examines the world-wide shift from traditional transmissive to emerging  transformative development of more dynamic competencies in a real-world setting. They note that a number of new competencies are required including: interdisciplinary problem-solving, addressing multiple stakeholder interests, participatory approaches in innovation, interactive methods in conflict resolution, responsive actions regarding community needs, critical media literacy, and social responsibility in entrepreneurship, to name a few, along with those that still connect to specific content areas (e.g. animal science, plant science, environmental science and agro-technology).

This overarching innovation taking place in tertiary agricultural education in Europe is referred to as Competence-based Education and Training (CBET). A synthesis of the requirements for new graduates as defined by the public and the related competencies that are considered relevant is presented.

At the Faculty of Agriculture,  we have been selected to participate in a project for developing agricultural competences  and in the first phase a series of subject specific and generic competences were developed. As you would all agree we still have a long way to travel before we have a fully competence based agricultural degree.


Read more here

Organic Agriculture Offers Host of Benefits for Africa

Expanding Africa’s shift towards organic farming will be good for the continent’s nutritional needs, good for the environment, good for farmers’ incomes, and good for African markets and employment, UNCTAD’s Deputy Secretary-General said at a conference here today, “Mainstreaming organic agriculture into the African development agenda.” UNCTAD Deputy Secretary-General Petko Draganov told the opening session, “Organic agriculture can offer an impressive array of food security, economic, environmental, and health benefits for developing countries, especially in Africa.”
Mr. Draganov said UNCTAD strongly supports the growing use of organic farming practices on the continent – Africa already has more certified organic farms than any other continent – and noted that this form of agriculture comprehensively illustrates the central topic of UNCTAD’s just concluded quadrennial conference in Doha, Qatar: “Development-centred globalization: Towards inclusive and sustainable growth and development.”
“The conference emphasized the importance of food security, sustainable agriculture, and a transition towards a ‘green’ economy,” Mr. Draganov said.  “Clearly the subject of this meeting – organic agriculture – is very relevant to achieving sustainable and inclusive development.” For more information on the conference please see www.africanorganicconference.com

6th Forum for the Future of Agriculture Brussels on Tuesday 5th March 2013

5th March 2013. Brussels. 6th Forum for the Future of Agriculture. Following last year's successful event which saw over 1200 participants join distinguished speakers and interesting debates and discussions, the sixth edition turns the spotlight on Meeting the Food & Environmental Challenge and will focus on Africa. Last year the focus was on Brazil.

Themes will include Africa's new ways for food production and economic development, reform of the Common Agriculture Policy hanging in the balance, protection of the consumer, and the challenges around resource extraction, efficiency, and waste. 

International decision makers including President Barroso of the European Commission, and Bob Zoellick, former president of the World Bank, headline the event. The debates seek to uncover how best to boldly reconcile crop production with ecological preservation.

As world population hits the seven billion mark on its way to 9 billion by 2050, and Africa approaches critical mass in its capacity to become an agricultural powerhouse, FFA panellists will examine what these issues and others mean for the future of EU agriculture and the balance to be struck between production, ecology and EU consumer well-being.

eLibrary USA

eLibraryUSA gives members of Information Resource Centers, American Corners, and other American Spaces around the world access to information that Americans find at their public libraries. We have a broad range of resources about learning English, American history and culture, health, business, and more. Follow them on Twitter to find out about new resources and visit us on Facebook.

Intra ACP Project ( HAAGRIM), Mobility Scheme - FoA Partnership

Mrs Brinda Ramaswamy (on left)

The Intra ACP project , HAAGRIM (Harmonisation et Amelioration des Programmes de Master et de Doctorat en Agribusiness par la mobilite entre l'Afrique de l'Ouest, de l'Est et du centre pour un developpement socio-economique durable) has been approved for funding by EU. The Faculty of Agriculture is a partner to this project,together with other Universities with the University of Gaston Berger, Senegal as the lead partner. Mrs Brinda Ramasawm, academic staff in the Agricultural Ecomomics and Management Unit at the FoA is the local counter part and is supported by Assoc Prof M.F. Driver ( Former Dean)  and Mr K. Boodhoo ( Former OIC of teh APS Dept). More info can be accessed on the HAAGRIM website

Food Security Plan

The Ministry of AgroIndustry and Food Security  has published the second report on the Food Security Strategy for the next 3 years. It's a must read to all of our students. Food Security Plan 2013-2016

Agricultural Society Magazine

The Agricultural Society launched its FIRST ever online Magazine on last 13th of September 2012. The Magazine aims mainly at providing light of the Faculty of Agriculture and also about the past events organised by the Agricultural Society. Here is the link to view the magazine. 

Open Days at University of Mauritius

Dear Prospective Students,

The Faculty of Agriculture will present its programme of studies for the next academic year at the UOM open day. Academic staff will talk to you on the various programmes and provide advice on the procedures for application.  The members of the Agricultural Society will guide newcomers towards the FOA Stand in the main auditorium, POWA. 

Wish you all a fruitful interaction with our staff.

Web 2.0 Learning Opportunity - Final Training Workshop

Participants of the third and final Web 2.0 Training Session, January 2013

A Wonderful Experience in Use of Web 2.O Tools

3 training workshops on the use of Web 2.0 tools were held during the following periods: 9-13 July 2012, 23-27 July 2012, and 14-18 January 2013, at the Faculty of Agriculture, University of Mauritius. They were organized jointly by the University of Mauritius (UoM) and the Food and Agricultural Research Council (FARC) and were fully funded by the Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA), Netherlands.

The Web 2.0 Learning Opportunity has been a wonderful experience for participants, trainers and the organisers. The success of uptake of these Web 2.0 tools will depend on how the trainees will put them into use in their daily activities to contribute to agricultural development.

From the trainers’ point of view, upon completion of the training, the participants were confident in their ability to develop and exchange and disseminate contents, to increase their contacts with peers around the world, and are more confident in using online applications.

The series of practical based exercises had enabled them to grasp skills in the way information could be created, organised, shared and accessed. Their parent organisations will undoubtedly benefit from increased work efficiency, lesser communication costs and boosted outreach. While this is the start of a capacity building process in Web 2.0 technologies, it is expected that agricultural and allied institutions in Mauritius will appreciate the effectiveness of such tools and adopt them strategically for their own benefit and that of their stakeholders. The trainees have generally shown a keen interest in acquiring skills and knowledge on Web 2.0 tools. The Faculty  and the participants thank the CTA for their sponsorship and giving us an opportunity to discover Web 2.0 tools.