Societal Impact Statement: Increasing crop productivity is often proposed as a key goal for meeting the food security demands of a growing global population. However, achieving high crop yields alone without meeting end-use quality requirements is counter to this objective and can lead to negative environmental and sustainability issues. High yielding feed wheat crops in the United Kingdom are a typical example of this. The historical context of UK agricultural industrialisation, developments in plant breeding and wheat end-use processing are examined.

Partnerships are widely applied to improve smallholder inclusivity in the value chain. The results are not always as expected. This study was conducted to analyze the factors influencing smallholder inclusivity. Oil palm smallholders were chosen, considering that palm oil is the largest agribusiness in Indonesia, and more than 40% of the total land area belongs to smallholders.

Biofortified beans are being promoted in Burundi to solve malnutrition issues among rural households. The study was conducted in Muyinga and Gasorwe communes, where biofortified bean varieties were disseminated. This study aims to understand gender roles and practices in households and farms and how these roles and practices influence participation and uptake of biofortified beans. Lastly, it looks at the role of extension in increasing the uptake of agricultural technologies like biofortified bean varieties.

Banana Xanthomonas wilt (BXW) is a major threat to banana production in Rwanda, causing up to 100% yield loss. There are no biological or chemical control measures, and little is known about the potential direction and magnitude of its spread; hence, cultural control efforts are reactive rather than proactive. In this study, we assessed BXW risk under current and projected climates to guide early warning and control by applying the maximum entropy (Maxent) model on 1,022 georeferenced BXW datapoints and 20 environmental variables.