SEARCA Graduate Scholarships are open to applicants from Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Timor-Leste and Vietnam who are regular employees of academic, research or government institutions and not more than 35 years old. The topic of research for thesis/dissertation must be in line with SEARCA’s current priority themes:

1) Natural Resources Management
Focuses on management of land and water resources; biodiversity management for food security; and risk assessment and the impacts of climate change on agrobiodiversity

2) Agricultural Competitiveness
Addresses agricultural competitiveness, food security and rural poverty alleviation, natural resources management

Click here to see the universities that qualify for study posts.

Applicants may submit the applications to the respective Ministries of Education of their countries before 30 July 2012.

Click here for the detailed application procedure.

Prof Sayed Azam-Ali

Crops for the Future Research Centre (CFFRC) has announced the appointment of Professor Sayed Azam-Ali as its first Chief Executive Officer. We have previously reported on the launch of CFFRC.

Professor Sayed Azam-Ali assumed his new post  on 1st August, 2011, after CFFRC was launched by Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak, Prime Minister of Malaysia in June this year. He will manage and drive the research strategy and direction of the centre through an independent CFFRC Board and under the overall direction of the global Crops for the Future (CFF) organisation, which is jointly hosted in Malaysia by Bioversity International and UNMC. Dr Michael Hermann was appointed as the Global Co-ordinator of CFF in 2010.

Professor Azam-Ali was previously the Vice Provost of Research and Internationalisation at The University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus.  Prior to his appointment at UNMC, Professor Azam-Ali was Director of the University Tropical Crops Research Unit and Professor of Tropical Agronomy at The University of Nottingham’s Sutton Bonington Campus in the UK.

Professor Sayed can be contacted at email hidden; JavaScript is required.

For more information on CFFRC please consult here.

Read the Maya Nut Institute summer 2010 Newsletter!

During September 2009 a suite of meetings and events will take place in Fiji, related to plant genetic resources:

21-22 September: “Crops for the Future in the Pacific”. This consultation meeting aims to explore the potential of under-utilized species as crops for the future in the Pacific region and highlight the areas/gaps that would benefit from further action. The outcomes from this seminar will feed into the next phase of the Pacific PGR network (PAPGREN) project.

23-24 September: ITPGRFA meeting. This meeting is a follow up to the 3rd Session of the Governing Body of the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (ITPGRFA) meeting in Tunis, Tunisia (June 2009). At this 3rd Session meeting the Pacific officially placed the collections held in trust by the Secretariat of the Pacific Community Centre for Pacific Crops and Trees into the Multilateral System of the Treaty. At the two day workshop in Fiji participants will cover the following issues related to ratification and implementation of the Treaty, namely (a) using the SMTA (b) how to fulfill your obligations under the Treaty (c) issues related to accession to the Treaty (d) international and regional cooperation in the implementation of the Treaty

25 September: Opening of the new Centre for Pacific Crops and Trees (CePaCT) in Suva.

26 September – 2 October: PAPGREN meeting and training. This is the annual meeting of the Pacific Plant Genetic Resources Network (PAPGREN) during which PAPGREN members will present their country activities for the last year. The role that diversity plays in climate change, nutrition and trade will be discussed as these are key issues in the Pacific. Three days of this week long meeting will be spent conducting training in genebank management to include morphological and molecular characterization.

The above meetings are co-organised by the Secretariat of the Pacific Communities (SPC), the Asia-Pacific Association for Agricultural Research Institutions (APAARI) and Crops for the Future. For more information contact email hidden; JavaScript is required.

UA Magazine No. 23: Urban Nutrient Management will be published in December 2009.
Please send your contribution before 15 September 2009 to: email hidden; JavaScript is required

Urban food demand, especially for fresh perishable food products, is increasing with population growth. Urban agriculture responds to this demand through intensive and continuous production taking advantage of market proximity. Such intensive production is highly dependent on nutrients and water. Rapidly growing cities face the challenge of providing basic services such as drinking water and sanitation on the one hand, and sustainably managing urban wastes and wastewater on the other. UA Magazine no. 20 focused on water, and the following issue, no. 23, will focus on the equally important aspect of nutrient management.

For more information about the call for contributions and about RUAF, visit the RUAF website (www.ruaf.org).

UA Magazine is published two times a year on the RUAF website and in hardcopy version. This English version is translated into Spanish, French, Arabic, Chinese and Portuguese.  The UA Magazine welcomes contributions on new initiatives at individual, neighbourhood, city and national levels. Attention is given to technical, socio-economic, institutional and policy aspects of sustainable urban food production, marketing, processing and distribution systems. Although articles on any related issue are welcome and considered for publication, each UA Magazine focuses on a selected theme.