On April 27, 2021, SPIA was invited to present its work program to the Uganda Agriculture Development Partners' Group (AgDPG). SPIA Chair Karen Macours delivered a presentation on the “Measurement of Agricultural Innovations in National Surveys in Uganda”, which provided an overview of SPIA’s current work program in the country. Below are the five components that were covered during the meeting:
- Household-level data collection in the Uganda National Panel Survey (UNPS) – SPIA is working in partnership with the World Bank LSMS-ISA team and the Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBoS) on household-level data collection in the UNPS. The work includes a new refreshed sample of up to 5,000 households and the integration with the Annual Agricultural Survey of the 50x2030 initiative. One of the key deliverables from this work will be DNA fingerprinting-based estimates of the adoption of improved crop varieties for six crops.
- Community-level data collection in UNPS – Through the same partnership with the World Bank LSMS-ISA team and the Uganda Bureau of Statistics, this component addresses multiple agricultural innovations that are best measured at a community level (tree nurseries, milk collection centers, sustainable land management practices, etc.)
- Contributions to the National Service Delivery Survey – This component is centered around a different survey fielded by UBoS. SPIA has helped design instruments for data collection on topics such as agricultural extension, crop pests, and diseases, etc.
- Diffusion of biofortified crops – Under this component, SPIA has led a process of convening regional workshops to construct a database on the diffusion of orange-fleshed sweet potato and biofortified bean varieties. The goal is to construct a dataset that is spatially and temporally explicit and to try and link that with the forthcoming Demographic and Health Surveys to see if we observe impacts on consumption of biofortified foods (and possibly on nutritional outcomes).
- Seed systems survey – This project arose following the initial Uganda consultation meeting in October 2019, where the topic of poor-quality planting material was highlighted as a priority and major constraint to agricultural development. With support from the Ministry of Agriculture and National Agricultural Research Organization, SPIA Special Initiative Member Professor Travis Lybbert (UC Davis) is leading an effort to collect maize and bean seed samples at different seed system levels. These will be subjected to a range of quality tests (including genetic purity testing using genotyping methods) to understand at which points in the seed system seed quality may degrade.
The Uganda Agriculture Development Partners' Group (AgDPG) is a group of agriculture-focused donors comprising the World Bank, IFAD, ADB, Danida, the Netherlands, and the EU. USAID is currently chairing the group.
