The CIRAWA project, coordinated by CARTIF, celebrates its kick-off meeting today at the centre’s facilities, located in the Boecillo Technology Park, (Valladolid,Spain), with the aim of laying the foundations that will guide the entire consortium towards the establishment of a more sustainable agro-food system in West Africa through the implementation of agro-ecology in Cape Verde, Chana, Senegal and Gambia.
The event has had the opportunity to join together in person and remotely the partners from Africa and Europe to set the next actions to be carried out by each of them during the four years of the project. CIRAWA will work on the development and implementation of new solutions that will be specifically designed for each of the test area considering their unique characteristics. Examples of these solutions would be the production of high quality seeds, waste valorisation and biofertilliser production, phytoremediation of saline soils and the adoption of sustainable soil and water management practices.
The aim of the project is to achieve a sustainable agro-food system in West Africa through the implementation of strategies appropriate to the condition of their crops, while also providing farmers with tools to enable them to select the best of these strategies at any given time. To this end, practical studies will be carried out on pilot plots in eight different regions in the countries of Cape Verde, Ghana, Senegal and Gambia.
CARTIF, coordinator of the project, has a fundamental role in this initiative since, among many other functions, it will be responsible for the definition of the study plots, the design and development of an integrated irrigation system (DSS) with recommendations for fertilisation adapted to each study site, as well as training for the farming community so that the results obtained throughout the project are assimilated as much as possible.