Happy Monday, Mzansi! Get your calendars out and take note of this week’s agriculture events that are taking place throughout South Africa, as well as online to be accessed from the comfort of your own home.
Check out the calendar on Food for Mzansi’s homepage as well as this weekly article, published every Monday, giving you the low-down on informative, useful and even lucrative opportunities in the agriculture sector. Email info@foodformzansi.co.za to add your event to the calendar.
Monday, 12 April
Interactive web-based course for mushroom cultivation
This online training course is a two-day entrepreneurial, gourmet mushroom cultivation course provided by the South African Gourmet Mushroom Academy. It covers substrate design and mushroom cultivation on a semi-commercial scale.
The course costs are R3999 for the two days, but there is also an option to do just either of the two days. Visit the training website for more information and to book your place.
WOSA Insider Session: Climate change impact on wine industries
For wine farmers even small changes in climate can have enormous implications for successful grape growing. South Africa’s climatic challenges have been well documented in recent years, most significantly the three-year drought that resulted in lost vineyards.
This webinar aims to answer the following questions: How is the industry adapting to climate change? What challenges lie ahead and what tools are being used to face them?
The webinar starts at 11:00 today. Register here or contact Carissa@wosa.co.za for more info.
Tuesday, 13 April
Global Food Security Index briefing with a focus on South Africa
Corteva Agriscience and Agri SA is hosting a briefing on the 2020 Global Food Security Index, focusing on the implications for South Africa. The briefing will review insights from the new index, changes in performance, and the drivers behind the shifts and changes affecting food security in South Africa.
Join Corteva Agriscience, Agri SA and Food For Mzansi for a webinar featuring Pratima Singh, Global Food Security Index project lead at The Economist Intelligence Unit and Tony Esmeraldo, business director: Southern Africa for Corteva Agriscience.
Register here to tune in to the briefing, or view the live stream on Food For Mzansi from 09:00 to 10:00.
Rubizmo Café Talks: What is carbon neutrality in agriculture?
In three 30-minute sessions spread over April a group of international experts from GreenFlex and RISE will introduce you to innovative ideas for your rural business.
This is the second webinar in the series and it will present what fossil free energy solutions in agriculture exist today, and what is coming in the near to long term. The third and final session next week will focus on biochar and its practical uses for rural businesses.
Interested participants can register here.
Drivers of food choice in low- and middle-income countries
The purpose of the drivers of food choice competitive grants program is to generate evidence to understand how people make food choices in local food environments, specifically what, how, and why people eat the way they do among low- and middle-income countries.
Tune in at 15:00. Click here for more info.
Does your farm need a data manager?
As data-enabled agriculture is accelerating in adoption and impact, enabling rapid, simple interrogation of the data and rapid actionable insights has never been more important.
Virtual models of the real world are helping farmers, growers and breeders to understand the complex interconnections between crop, environment and markets. In this webinar speakers will discuss recent advances in data management and how these can be used on farms.
Join the webinar today from 15:00 to 18:00 by registering here.
Wednesday, 14 April
Young farmer of the year announcement
Free State Agriculture is announcing the 2020/2021 Free State farmer of the year today at 08:30!
Five finalists have been chosen to compete for, among other prizes, a cash prize and a spot in the Toyota Agri SA National Young Farmer of the Year competition. The finalists were chosen by a panel of judges under the leadership of Professor Pieter Fourie, head of Central University of Technology’s department of agriculture.
Read more about the finalists here.
Clanwilliam show
Over the next four days, from 14 to 17 April, there will be an agriculture show at Clanwilliam in the Western Cape. For more info contact info@clanwilliamexpo.co.za.
Africa Launch Event – STFC Food Network+
The STFC Food Network+ is launching their African network, bringing together scientists and technologists from the UK’s advanced research infrastructure with research and industry in the agrifood sector. They are an interdisciplinary community working to provide a sustainable, secure supply of safe, nutritious, and affordable high-quality food using less land, with reduced inputs, and in the context of global climate change and declining natural resources.
Anyone with interests in the agrifood sector, including researchers, industry and civil society organisations; scientists and technologists working in robotics, AI, sensing technologies, space science and astronomy, particle/nuclear physics, and data science should feel free to attend the event.
The event will take place from 14:00 to 15:00, click here to register.
Thursday, 15 April
Youth-led solutions to enhancing the resilience of Africa’s food systems
Generation Africa, in collaboration with Yara International, AGRA, USAID, AGRF, Syngenta Foundation, Corteva AgriScience, Heifer International and Econet, is hosting this youth-led dialogue on enhancing the resilience of Africa’s food systems.
The expected outcomes of this webinar is to highlight challenges that youth agripreneurs are facing in building resilient businesses, to identify existing opportunities that youth agripreneurs can take advantage of, to craft a vision of Africa’s food systems in the next ten years and identify action steps necessary in making the vision into reality.
The webinar takes place at 14:00 to 15:30. Register here to take part.
