| Welcome to the last Podcaster of 2015. While this is a busy time for everyone, it is also a time to take some rest, to reflect on the past year and to make plans for the coming year. For N2Africa, the coming year is particularly important as the United Nations have launched the 2016 International Year of Pulses – celebrating the benefits of legumes (UN link and FAO link). |  |
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For N2Africa the most important event will be the Pan-African Grain Legume and World Cowpea Conference - http://gl2016conf.iita.org to be held in Livingstone, Zambia from 28th February to the 4th of March 2016. N2Africa will have a large presence at the conference and we have submitted a host of abstracts for presentation. We will have our annual planning at the other side of the Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe after the conference. |
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In this issue of the Podcaster we highlight our N2Africa Learning Loops 2.0 – through use of tablets for data collection we are now able to generate automatic statistical summaries and reports! We report on women’s training events from Borno State, Nigeria and highlight recent journal articles that have been published, along with a series of news items.
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A very special thank you to Greta van den Brand who is leaving N2Africa at the end of 2015. Greta has worked behind the scenes in data analysis and reporting. We will sorely miss her superb ability to distill short highly-readable reports from hundreds of pages of text, her diligence and accuracy in her work and her willing and helpful attitude. No matter what the pressure, she always responds with a big smile. We wish Greta and partner a fair wind on their travels through Latin America and hope to see her back in the N2Africa team in future. On behalf of the N2Africa team I wish you a peaceful and relaxing holiday and we’ll be in touch again in the New Year of the Pulse! |
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Ken Giller