M-BoSs: building on the successes of the Marketplace

M-BoSs is an international initiative supported by several partners, especially the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the United Kingdom Department of International Development (DFID), and the Forum for Agriculture Research in Africa (FARA), which is designed to strengthen and deepen cooperation between African and Brazilian institutions, strengthening our international presence in that continent through research projects with a focus on development.

M-BoSs was born out of the expectation that the good results obtained in the projects funded via the Agricultural Innovation Marketplace or MKTPlace (www.mktplace.org) could be adjusted, adapted and disseminated on a large scale, creating means to expand the impact of agricultural innovation on improvements to farmers' quality of life and well-being.

The program has three main building blocks:

  1. Discussion of ideas related to the themes of the initiative, as well as discussion on the program's own efficiency and effectiveness, with the presence of participants and partners, in addition to the main stakeholders involved in support of agricultural research for development;
  2. Strengthening of capacities in planning, management, monitoring and assessment of research for development projects, essential skills to the successful implementation of the projects supported by the initiative, and;
  3. Collaborative research for development projects in the following theme areas:
  • Technologies to increase productivity in chains that are relevant for food security;
  • Technologies for adaptation or mitigation of the effects of climate change;
  • Public policy, institutional and market strengthening, and knowledge management, and;
  • Specific technologies for family farming and poverty reduction.

Program Rationale

As it is an initiative that builds on the successes of the Marketplace, M-BoSs shares the same rationale of the previous program:

  • Agriculture is vital for the economies of Africa and Brazil. The exchange of knowledge and technologies is facilitated due to similarities in their cultures, climate, ecosystems, and agricultural practices;
  • The growth and development of Brazilian agriculture has been based in the generation of technologies and in the conversion of technology into innovation;
  • The role of agriculture in development has been recognized in Africa and Brazil through initiatives such as the New Partnership for Africa's Development's (NEPAD's) Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP).