New Funding for Foresight Modeling Under PIM

NEW FUNDING FOR FORESIGHT MODELING UNDER PIM

by mdefreese | September 5, 2013

Woman in Ethiopia Carrying Water Source: Flickr (IFPRI-Images/Badadha Kule)

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation recently approved a new three-year phase of funding for the Global Futures Strategic Foresight Program. The Program was developed to evaluate the potential impact of new technologies particularly important to poor consumers and smallholder farmers. Phase 2 will build upon initial efforts and will further develop the program as a flagship project within PIM.

The new funding will allow the team to expand upon existing analyses of scenarios and ex ante technology assessments, add new crops, initiate an increased focus on livestock and fish, and incorporate farming systems. The program partners will strengthen gender research and incorporate analyses at the household level by linking with ongoing work under HarvestChoice and other initiatives of the 11 partner centers of PIM. New data from the climate models will be sequentially integrated as they become available to simulate the changing agroecological challenges that smallholders face.