Background of East Africa Programme

The Eastern Africa programme of the World Agroforestry Centre (formerly ICRAF) was initiated in 1987 as a regional agroforestry research network that aims at improving livelihoods of smallholder farmers and other users of tree products and strengthening national programs through collaborative research, education and development.

Since its inception, the programme has developed a wide range of agroforestry technologies that are being used by thousands of farmers. In addition, it continues to develop methods and tools that can help characterize land use, recommend appropriate interventions, catalyze wide-scale dissemination and assess impact on the environment and livelihoods.

The programme also supports capacity building and institutional development in agroforestry research among partners.
ICRAF Eastern Africa Region has five distinct programmes which address various Global Research Priorities for the World Agroforestry Centre.These include: The African Highlands Initiative (AHI, initiated in mid 90's to strengthen Research and Development (R&D) agenda for Eastern Africa integrated natural resource management; The Water Management Unit that hosts the Southern and Eastern Africa Rainwater Network (SearNet) as well as specifically developing ICRAF strategies on improved water use efficiency at farm level; Shed Coffee; Biofuels; and Conservation Agriculture.

Eastern Africa (EA) region is amongst the poorest in the world with more than 60% of the population living below the poverty line. It is characterized by low agricultural productivity and thus food insecurity, low incomes and consequent increase in poverty levels. These are attributed to factors such as:

• environment degradation;
• reduction in the quality of the natural resource base associated with increasing population densities;
• Poor marketing structures;
• Inadequate access to and exchange of information amongst various farming stakeholders
• Poor physical and institutional infrastructure;
• Inappropriate government policies
• Diseases such as AIDS and malaria which destroy families and communities thus reducing the amount of labour available for productive activities;
• Restrictive trade policies in the region and between the region and other countries.