From solar dryers to cold storage, the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Horticulture delivers on practices and technologies to ensure nutritious produce gets to the people who need it most.

30 September 2021 — The World Vegetable Center has joined a consortium of partners led by the University of California, Davis to implement a US $15 million program for global horticulture research.

Funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Horticulture will advance fruit and vegetable production, handling, and consumption to benefit communities across the globe. The five-year program will focus on horticultural and social innovations for nutritional and financial security.

Other consortium members include Florida A&M University, Michigan State University, Texas A&M, and specialists from Penn State University and Making Cents International. All bring expertise in horticulture, agronomics, agri-sociology, agribusiness, and agri-policy to the program.

“For 50 years, the World Vegetable Center’s research has provided small-scale farmers with the knowledge, skills, technologies, and opportunities to boost vegetable production and increase their incomes,” said Marco Wopereis, WorldVeg Director General. “We are honored to partner with the Horticulture Innovation Lab to expand on and extend our expertise.”

The Horticulture Innovation Lab will consult with consortium members to determine research needs in West Africa, East Africa, South/Southeast Asia and Central America.

To build community resilience, a holistic, inclusive, locally-led approach will be followed to develop environmentally sustainable, market-oriented production and postharvest handling methods that can provide smallholder farmers and other stakeholders in fruit and vegetable value chains more income, as well as improved access to fruits and vegetables to better nourish their families and communities.

WorldVeg contributions will be coordinated by Dr. Pepijn Schreinemachers, Flagship Program Leader – Enabling Impact based in Bangkok, Thailand. Other staff will provide vegetable-related expertise in genetic resources, breeding, value chains, seed systems, safe production methods, impact evaluation, food systems research, and gender and equity.

“Horticulture offers big health, economic, and environmental benefits,” said Elizabeth Mitcham, program director and a UC Cooperative Extension specialist in the Department of Plant Sciences. “UC Davis will be leading an outstanding global consortium that will be able to make big impacts on developing sustainable, local expertise and innovative technical and social solutions to empower horticulture producers and their communities.”

As a direct result of the Horticulture Innovation Lab’s work over the past decade, more than 750 horticultural technologies are now available for transfer and scaling in communities across the globe.

Take the CoolBot, for instance: it’s a simple device that tricks an air conditioner into achieving colder temperatures and costs less to buy and maintain than commercial refrigeration. With CoolBots, producers in Cambodia and elsewhere have set up cost-effective cold storage rooms to protect the quality of their vegetables prior to distribution. Postharvest cooling prevents waste and helps to ensure more of what is grown can reach consumers.

More than 32,000 farmers are applying or using the Horticulture Innovation Lab’s technologies, and more than 13,000 hectares of land are under new management practices.

The Horticulture Innovation Lab is a part of Feed the Future, the U.S. government’s initiative to combat global hunger and poverty. It brings partners together to help some of the world’s poorest countries harness the power of agriculture and entrepreneurship to jump-start their economies and create new opportunities.

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 For more information, visit feedthefuture.gov