The year-long curriculum included intensive training in seed production, plant breeding and

business administration, capped by six months of independent research. Graduates came from
institutions like RICA and the University of Rwanda, alongside representatives from local seed
companies.

Dr. Joseph Moughan, director of the RICA Seed Center, praised the graduates’ dedication:
“Their hard work inspires hope for the future of Rwanda’s seed industry.” With plans to train
over 60 professionals in the next three years, the RICA Seed Center is shaping the future of
Rwanda’s agricultural sector.

Designed to improve farmer resilience and farm productivity, the RICA Seed Centre makes it
easier for Rwandan seed companies to effectively serve more farmers with better seed. It is
working to enable seed companies to produce high-quality seeds for at least one million
Rwandan farmers within five years.

The Center was established in 2022 with funding from the Foundation, in partnership with the
Government of Rwanda, One Acre Fund and RICA to address the critical needs of farmers and
the seed industry in Rwanda.

RICA Seed Center marks a significant milestone with the graduation of its inaugural cohort of
16 professionals, equipped with advanced skills in seed technology, quality assurance and
business management to advance Rwanda’s seed sector. (Photo courtesy of RICA)

Elevating Conservation Agriculture in Rwanda

In 2024, the Foundation provided a grant to the Farm Journal Foundation (FJF), a nonprofit
organization that champions agricultural innovation, farmer livelihoods and sustainable food
systems, to boost RICA’s ability to communicate its conservation agriculture mission to Rwanda
farmers. FJF’s work covers two areas:

 Communications: Elevating conservation agriculture across all externally facing

communications platforms at RICA, producing conservation agriculture content for farmers,
 extension agents, students, faculty, staff and other important stakeholders, and developing
strategies for engaging with media.
 Government Affairs: Developing and supporting the implementation of an organization-
wide strategy for engaging with the Rwandan government and important policy
stakeholders, elevating conservation agriculture in Rwandan government policy and
providing messaging, specialized content and events support to encourage the scaling of
conservation agriculture.

FJF has developed communications and government affairs strategies to position RICA as
Rwanda’s premier thought leader on conservation agriculture and is now working with RICA to
implement broader plans. This work has included developing streamlined messaging about
conservation agriculture and its impact, tailored for farmers, government, students, faculty, staff
and external audiences. It has also involved working with the Rwandan government to embed
conservation agriculture into the country’s five-year strategic plan for agricultural transformation,
known as the PSTA 5 2024-2029.

FJF is now working with RICA to overhaul its communications materials and produce thought
leadership content tailored to the Rwandan context. This includes redesigning RICA’s website,
creating an online resource library for conservation agriculture materials, producing videos and
written content, and developing materials to teach on-campus visitors, including farmers and
government officials.

Measuring the Impact of the Nasho Irrigation Cooperative

In 2016, the Foundation funded the Nasho Irrigation Project in partnership with the Government
of Rwanda through the Ministry of Agriculture and Animal Resources to support small-scale
farmers in drought-prone areas of the Eastern Province. The project worked with local farmers
to deploy modern irrigation infrastructure to reduce farmers’ dependence on rainfall to increase
production, productivity, incomes and food security. A total of 63 center pivots powered largely
by solar energy were installed on 1,173 hectares (2,898 acres) belonging to about 2,000
households, with farmers retaining full ownership of their land. Farmers benefiting from the
project were organized into a farmers’ cooperative called the Nasho Irrigation Cooperative
(NAICO) to improve collaboration in managing and maintaining the irrigation infrastructure and
coordinating the purchases of inputs and the sale of production. The Foundation provided the
initial capital investment to construct the irrigation and related infrastructure and a four-year
sustainability grant, which tapered each year to support the cooperative’s operations and
promote their financial sustainability. NAICO has been financially self-sufficient since 2021. It
also retains close ties with RICA to benefit from its research and extension programs.

The cooperative is promoting conservation agriculture practices to improve soil health, increase
soil organic matter and reduce erosion, while improving yields and resilience. The three main
principles of conservation agriculture which NAICO promotes are: minimal soil disturbance,
continuous soil cover and crop rotations. The Foundation provided NAICO with four 4-row no-till
planters to support their adoption of minimum tillage. The farmers retain the majority of their
crop residues in their fields to support continuous soil cover, and they rotate between maize and
soybean each season.

In 2024, the Foundation commissioned an independent impact assessment of the Nasho

Irrigation Project. The assessment surveyed NAICO farmers and non-NAICO farmers in the
surrounding areas and utilized NAICO’s historical data to assess the impacts of the project. The
study surveyed farmers in March 2024, which was immediately following the harvest of
Rwanda’s agricultural season 2024 A, and found that NAICO’s irrigated plots achieved
significantly higher yields than the rainfed plots nearby. On average, NAICO plots achieved a
maize yield of 6.27 metric tons per hectare (MT/ha) (99.9 bushels per acre), which was 109
percent higher than the non-NAICO average. Similarly, NAICO achieved a bean yield of 1.44
MT/ha (21.4 bushels per acre), which was 20 percent higher compared to the non-NAICO plots,
and a soybean yield of 2.18 MT/ha (32.4 bushels per acre), which was 180 percent higher than
the non-NAICO plots. (See Figure 1)

NAICO’s center pivot irrigated farm plots achieved significantly higher yields on average
compared to neighboring non-NAICO plots.

These increased yields (and NAICO’s collective bargaining power) led to increased revenues for
the NAICO farmers as compared to the non-NAICO farmers near the project. NAICO farmers
earned $1,687 per hectare (135 percent higher than non-NAICO farmers) for maize; $475 per
hectare (48 percent higher than non-NAICO farmers) for beans; and $1,173 (221 percent higher
than non-NAICO farmers) for soybeans. These increased revenues and agricultural incomes
are lifting NAICO farmers out of poverty. The study found that the likelihood of NAICO farmers
falling below the national poverty line was 23.3 percent, compared to 28.8 percent for the non-
NAICO farmers who live and work nearby.

The assessment showed similar results when comparing NAICO plot yields over time. Before
the installation of the irrigation, NAICO farmers achieved average yields of 1.24 MT/ha (19.8
bushels per acre) of maize and 0.99 MT/ha (14.7 bushels per acre) of beans. None of the
NAICO farmers produced soybeans prior to the project. By the time of the impact assessment
endline survey, nearly 9 years later, NAICO farmers increased their maize yields by 404 percent
and their bean yields by 45 percent. (See Figure 1)

Between 2015 and 2024, NAICO’s farmers added soybeans to their crop mix and achieved
substantial increases in their maize and bean yields.
Finally, the impact assessment showed that NAICO farmers utilize better agricultural practices
than the non-NAICO farmers, although the agricultural practices of the non-NAICO farmers
have improved after they observed the benefits of the improved practices on the neighboring
NAICO plots. NAICO farmers were more likely to practice conservation agriculture through
minimum tillage, maintaining soil cover and crop rotation. NAICO farmers also applied the
knowledge and skills taught to them by cooperative extension agents and partners, such as
planting in rows with proper spacing and depth, and using improved seeds. These agricultural
trainings and the NAICO farmers’ increased revenues also led them to invest more in their
farms by increasing their use of agricultural inputs to the government’s recommended levels,
which in turn have further supported their higher yields.

[CALLOUT]
NAICO
Farmer Testimonials

Leonidas Muhirwa, NAICO farmer

“Before joining the cooperative, my harvest was only enough to feed my family, but
when I joined the cooperative, the harvest increased, and we grew enough for ourselves
and could sell the surplus to get money for the education of our kids. In selling the
surplus, we also received money that helps us to farm in the non-irrigated areas. The
importance of the irrigated area is that whenever I plant, I am sure that I will get a good
harvest, but in the non-irrigated area, I just plant with little hope of harvesting because
the crops get dry when there is a lot of sun. In the irrigated area, I am sure that I will
harvest if I do everything on time.”
 Beatha Musabyima, NAICO farmer
“Before the project, we couldn't earn money because we could only harvest two bags of
sorghum. Now, on that same land, we can harvest eight bags of maize. That is a great
improvement. We used to plant without fertilizers and compost, and we depended on the
rainfall. Look at the drought right now–do you think they have hope of getting food from
the rainfed plots? The drought may not stop, but for those of us who plant in the irrigated
area, we don't have any problem.”
UNITED STATES
PROMOTING BEST PRACTICES IN FARMING AND FOOD DISTRIBUTION
Challenging Lessons from the Green Revolution
The goal of this Foundation-run experiment is to demonstrate that relying solely on genetically
modified (GMO) or improved hybrid seeds is inadequate for achieving long-term gains in
production.

The genesis of this experiment was to counter ag development assistance programs that ran
the risk of being counterproductive. At the time we started the experiment, USAID was
advocating for programs that promoted hybrid seeds without educating farmers about soil health
or a balanced approach to soil amendments. This approach is dangerous for smaller-sized
farmers who are primarily growing crops for their subsistence. Our experiment was designed to
show that improved seeds alone would deplete the fields of required nutrients. (See Figures 1
and 2)

The Foundation first conducted the experiment on farm ground in South Africa and then
replicated it in Illinois starting in 2010. Utilizing only GMO or improved hybrids without fertilizer
or herbicides led to a near-zero yield, as seen in years 2010 through 2015, to the point of
depleting the nutrients in the zero-fertilizer plot.

Beginning in 2016, we introduced a summer cover crop and later added a soybean crop as a
rotation with corn to demonstrate the rehabilitating effects that this rotation has on soil health.
The cover crop was not as successful as it would be in a more nutrient-conducive environment;
however, it did demonstrate that by using natural techniques, the soil could begin to recover.

Advancing Soil Health and Science Research in North Dakota

The Foundation issued a $360,000 grant to North Dakota State University (NDSU) to support
three early-career women scientists working to advance soil research in the state. The project
led by Dr. Kelsey Griesheim seeks to identify practices that maximize synthetic nitrogen fertilizer
uptake efficiency, the fate of synthetic inputs not absorbed by the crop and innovative soil-
based approaches to managing fertilizer additions for row-crop production.

Dr. Kristin Butcher’s research seeks to build identity-function relationships across different
operational taxonomic units in the soil microbial community. These relationships will lead to the
development of a conceptual model that integrates the individual and interactive effects of
different microorganisms on soil health and function and ecosystem services. Dr. Lindsay
Malone’s project emphasizes sustainable approaches for increasing yield, building resilience
and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Exploring New Approaches to Food Distribution in Nebraska

In a large state with few densely populated urban areas like Nebraska, small independent
grocery stores are essential for rural households to procure fresh produce and goods. These
grocery stores also serve as community hubs, supporting local economies and social groups.
Between 2016 and 2021, Nebraska lost nearly 30 percent of its rural grocery stores, going from
290 stores down to 204 stores. Losing a local grocery store can increase food insecurity, reduce
access to fresh food, lead to declines in the local economy and erode the basic social fabric of a
community.

The Center for Rural Affairs (CFRA) developed the Rural Cooperative Grocery Support Program
to strengthen local food security and reinforce Nebraska’s rural grocery stores by addressing
critical needs, including equipment repair, workforce training and marketing, as well as
supporting sustainable growth by strengthening local food procurement and connection.

In partnership with the Sherwood Foundation, the Foundation provided $350,000 worth of
grants for rural grocery stores, with Sherwood providing complementary funding to support
CFRA’s learning and technical assistance work and update the “Nebraska Food and Farm
Economy” study. Ten stores have joined the cohort of grocery stores eligible to receive grants
through this program, with eight more expected to join in 2025. Recipients will receive the
necessary capital to improve operations and address critical financial, technical and systemic
challenges at their stores. Cohort participants will gain additional skills in customer engagement
and financial management through site visits, workshops and conferences. These efforts
collectively aim to strengthen food access and foster economic resilience in Nebraska's rural
communities.