{"id":16988,"date":"2026-06-20T12:54:28","date_gmt":"2026-06-20T12:54:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dev.iita.org\/news-item\/global-partnerships-for-improving-cassava\/"},"modified":"2026-06-29T18:18:47","modified_gmt":"2026-06-29T18:18:47","slug":"global-partnerships-for-improving-cassava","status":"publish","type":"news-item","link":"https:\/\/iita.org\/fr\/news-item\/global-partnerships-for-improving-cassava\/","title":{"rendered":"Global partnerships for improving cassava"},"content":{"rendered":"Cassava is a tough plant. It can withstand drought and grow in marginal soils while still yielding its crop of starchy roots. Its roots can stay in the ground, waiting for harvest until other food sources run low. But breeders and scientists in Africa are working to make cassava even tougher, developing varieties that are resistant to pests and disease.\n<div id=\"attachment_1944\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\">\n\n<a href=\"https:\/\/iita.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/242_Dr-Rabbi_2.jpg\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1944\" src=\"https:\/\/iita.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/242_Dr-Rabbi_2.jpg\" alt=\"Picture of Rabbi Ismail\" width=\"242\" height=\"262\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1944\" \/><\/a>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-1944\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Rabbin Isma\u00ebl<\/p>\n\n<\/div>\nOne of those researchers is Ismail\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/iita.org\/fr\/rabbi-ismail\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Yusuf Rabbi<\/a>, a cassava geneticist at IITA in Ibadan, Nigeria. He visited the\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/bti.cornell.edu\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Boyce Thompson Institute<\/a>\u00a0(BTI) and Cornell University last week to discuss his ongoing collaboration with\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nextgencassava.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Prochaine G\u00e9n\u00e9ration Manioc<\/a>, a Cornell-led project funded by the\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.gatesfoundation.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Fondation Bill &amp; Melinda Gates<\/a>\u00a0and the Department for International Development (UKaid). The project aims to use Big Data to accelerate cassava breeding.\n\nCassava is vital to food security and serves as a major staple crop in Africa, Latin America, and some parts of South Asia. But its production is threatened by cassava mosaic virus and cassava brown streak disease as well as several pests. Rabbi and colleagues are working to develop varieties of cassava that are resistant to these diseases. They also aim to increase the starch content of the tubers and to develop high-yielding varieties which will reduce pressure on the limited land and water resources.\n\n\u201cI can say that there has not been a more exciting time to be a researcher on the continent and to work on a crop that feeds more than 500 million people,\u201d said Rabbi.\n\nCassava breeding is a slow process, but Rabbi and colleagues from IITA, the National Root Crops Research Institute (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nrcri.gov.ng\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">NRCRI<\/a>) in Nigeria, and the National Crops Resources Research Institute in Uganda hope to speed things up using the genetic resources in NextGen\u2019s\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/cassavabase.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">cassavabase.org<\/a>, which can help breeders to pick the best parental varieties and provides a unified platform for sharing cassava breeding information.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s a great tool to have because, first of all, it\u2019s open access meaning that the data that we produce can be used not only by ourselves, but by the cassava breeding community worldwide.\u201d They can also record their field observations directly using handheld tablets or phones.\n\nRabbi is working with BTI\u2019s Associate Professor Lukas Mueller to develop efficient ways to collect and store data and with Geneticist Jean-Luc Jannink of the USDA Agricultural Research Service to use that data to better predict the performance of new varieties. IITA also partners with national breeding programs in Nigeria, Tanzania, and Uganda to improve cassava crops.\n\n\u201cThere\u2019s an African saying which goes like this: \u2018walk alone and go faster, or walk together and go farther,\u2019\u201d said Rabbi. \u201cWe\u2019re happy to work with BTI and anyone else who is willing to come with us on this journey.\u201d\n\nTo improve cassava crops, IITA partners with the\u00a0 NRCRI breeding centers in Nigeria, the National Crops Resources Research Institute\u00a0(NaCRRI) in Uganda, and, most recently, the Department of Research and Development in Tanzania. Other partners include the US Department of\u00a0Energy, and educational and training programs at the West African Centre for Crop Improvement in Ghana and Makerere University in Uganda.\u00a0 \u2013<em>contributed by Patricia Waldron, BTI<\/em>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Cassava is a tough plant. It can withstand drought and grow in marginal soils while still yielding its crop of starchy roots. Its roots can stay in the ground, waiting for harvest until other food sources run low.<\/p>","protected":false},"featured_media":16989,"template":"","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}}},"tags":[2053],"science-area":[],"program":[],"location":[32],"news-type":[],"hub":[61],"crop":[66],"impact-areas":[],"item-year":[195],"class_list":["post-16988","news-item","type-news-item","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-cassavaiita-news-no-2364","location-nigeria","hub-western-africa","crop-cassava","item-year-195"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Global partnerships for improving cassava - IITA<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/iita.org\/fr\/news-item\/global-partnerships-for-improving-cassava\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"fr_FR\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Global partnerships for improving cassava - IITA\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Cassava is a tough plant. 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