News
Tracing impact: A joint mission through Kenya’s BRAINS project
By Warren Arinaitwe1, Ayuka Fombong2, Emmanuel Peter2, Dennis Ongor1, Eileen Nchanji1, Anastacia Wanjiru1, Sunday Ekesi2, Jean Claude Rubyogo1 1...
Rwanda Champions Nutritious Beans, Fruit Trees, and Vegetables on African School Feeding Day
By Janviere Umurungi, David Muhawenimana, Yvonne Munyangeri, Eliud Birachi Rwanda joined other African countries to celebrate African School Feeding...
Developing and Scaling breakthrough bean varieties across Africa
By Anastacia Theuri What makes a bean “breakthrough”? Is it a higher yield? Faster cooking time? Resistance to drought and disease? Or is it...
Waithera beans help Kenyan female farmer beat drought
By Dennis Ong'or, Warren Arinaitwe, Jean Claude Rubyogo If you ask Lucy Wairimu Mbugua about beans, she does not start with the technical details or...
Beans, bees, bold dreams: Mercy Loko’s path to agricultural success
By Warren Arinaitwe, Dennis Ong'or, Jean Claude Rubyogo On a family farm in Kenya, Mercy Loko, a young farmer from Katumani in Kenya, grew beans the...
From survival to smart business: Julie Ishara’s leafy vegetable enterprise in Bukavu
By Jeremiah Sigalla1, Napoleon Kajunju2, Adebola Awotide2, Jean Claude Rubyogo2 1World Vegetable Center 2Alliance of Bioversity International and...
From despair to hope: How beans are restoring a future for women in Eastern DRC
By Napoleon Kajunju, Lydie Mulonda, Jean Claude Rubyogo In the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, life is often shaped by uncertainty. In the...
Strengthening production and expanding markets at Cherubet Foods
By Yohane Chideya, Eliud Birachi, Dennis Ong'or, Jean Claude Rubyogo In Kenya’s rapidly growing cities, demand for convenient, nutritious food...
How market activation is strengthening nutrition access and job creation at Totahara in Burundi
By Yohane Chideya, Eliud Birachi, Dennis Ong'or, Jean Claude Rubyogo Great ideas often grow out of small experiments; sometimes planned, sometimes...
Strengthening seed systems through Multi Stakeholder Platform (MSP): How Afriseed grew into a regional bean enterprise
By Yohane Chideya, Eunice Magwaya, Wilson Nkhata, Dennis Ong'o', Jean Claude Rubyogo When Grace Mijiga Mhango talks about Afriseed, she does not...
Women-led seed innovation: PABRA boosts Emma’s high-iron bean expansion in Rwanda
By Yohane Chideya, Dennis Ong'or, Keta Mwangala, Yvonne Munyangeri, Eliud Birachi, Jean Claude Rubyogo If you take a moment to sit with Emma Uwera,...
Grain trader seed delivery model for groundnut in Tanzania: The case of Mavuno Improvement for Community Relief and Services
Joachim Madeni¹, Anthony Bujiku¹, Gerald Alex¹, Justus Ochieng², Radegunda Kessy², Atupokile Mwakatwila², Rickards Chima³, Jean Claude Rubyogo², and...
Beans that heal: Journey to better nutrition in Rwanda’s Western Province
By Eliud Birachi, Yvonne Uwase Munyangeri, Blanche Murera At the break of dawn in Rwanda’s Western Province, life stirs into motion. The sun lifts...
From baking to building: Esther’s transformational seed-driven agri-food venture
By Justus Ochieng, Radegunda Kessy, and Atupokile Mwakatwila (Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT/PABRA); Esther Majija (Fortlene) When...
PABRA at 30: If beans could speak, what would 30 years sound like?
Colleagues, As we look ahead to PABRA’s 30th Anniversary in September 2026, this moment invites reflection on how far the network has come, and the...
Tanzania advances seed digitization with Research Business Management System
By Martin Majambele1, Yohane Chideya1, Victor Leseedy1, Edith Kadege2, Joachim Madeni2, Lilian N. Gichuru3 and Justus Ochieng1 1International Center...
How bean seed distribution is changing lives in Eastern DRC
By Lydie Mulonda, Bola Amoke Awotide, Jean Claude Rubyogo, Nepomuscene Ntukamazina, Napoleon Kajunju, Hosny Dunia, Lulu Lwamba, Richard Kataliko...
The Business of Plant Breeding in Africa
From the original post published on Crawford Fund for Food Security The Crawford Fund for Food Security and ANU’s Fenner School of Environment and...
Beans driving change: Malawi smallholder farmers turning yields into wealth
By Yohane Chideya, Eunice Magwaya, Wilson Nkhata, Jean Claude Rubyogo In Malawi, bean production among smallholder farmers is often marked by low...
From hard labor to higher profits: Tanzania’s smallholders win big through mechanized threshing power
By Yohane Chideya, Justus Ochieng, and Radegunda Kessy For years, smallholder farmers across Tanzania toiled under the sun from dawn to dusk, their...
Read our 4th Edition of PABRA Friends Newsletter!
Catch up on the latest updates from PABRA Friends — including a new project update, a World Food Day Q&A, and much more! Read here