1. CIMMYT and IMAGINE Project
Kindie Tesfaye
International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT)
Kickoff workshop
Integrated assessment of the determinants of the MAize yield Gap in Sub-Saharan Africa: towards farm INnovation and Enabling policies (IMAGINE))
10-12 March 2015
Wageningen, the Netherlands

2. CIMMYT: What it is and what it does
Spanish: Centro Internacional de Mejoramiento de Maíz y Trigo (CIMMYT)
English: International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center
CIMMYT is one of the 15 CGIAR centers with a global mandate on maize- and wheat - based systems research and development (R4D)
The HQ is in Mexico with regional offices in
Africa (Ethiopia, Kenya, Zimbabwe)
Asia ( Afghanistan, Bangladesh, China, India, Iran, Kazakhstan, Nepal, Pakistan)
South America (Mexico, Colombia)
Europe (Turkey)
It works with several national partners in many courtiers and globally advanced research centers and universities
(e.g. WUR)

3. Maize R4D in Sub-Saharan Africa
Maize is a major food security crop in SSA where population is projected to reach 1.3 billion by 2025
Maize production is constrained by several biophysical and socioeconomic factors in the region
CIMMYT is running several projects that are addressing the problems and increase maize productivity in the six maize mega environments in eastern and southern Africa (ESA) including Ethiopia.

4. Overall Goal of Maize R4D and Interventions
To double productivity, and significantly increase the incomes and livelihood opportunities from more productive, resilient and sustainable maize-based farming systems on essentially the same land area, and as climates change and the costs of fertilizer, water, and labor increase.
MAIZE interventions:
Improved maize germplasm
Sustainable intensifications of farming systems
Improve targeting and accelerate adoption

5. Maize importance and distribution in Ethiopia
grown on 2.01 million ha
by 9.3 million smallholders
annual (main season) production is million metric tonnes.
only second  (16.4%) to tef  (22.2%) in area coverage, but ranks first in production and productivity  among the 23  grain crops grown in the country.
Importance increased over time (between 2001/02 and 2012/13 alone)
no. of growers increased by 58%
area coverage increased by 49%

6. The linkage between CIMMYT’s maize research in Ethiopia and IMAGINE project
CIMMYT’s Maize work in Ethiopia
IMAGINE project
Improved maize germplasm (improved new maize varieties)
Sustainable intensification of maize-based farming systems (agronomy)
Targeting and adoption of maize technologies
Analysis of policies, markets and institutions
Identify and link the main biophysical , socio-economic, institutional, infrastructural and policy factors that explain the maize yield gaps in SSA (case study countries)

7. Linkage…
There is a strong linkage between what CIMMYT is doing on maize in Ethiopia and what IMAGINE project aims to accomplish
Besides a shared goal, the major strength is data availability and sharing (this will be addressed in presentation that follows later).

8. Thank You!