Louise Sperling
Biographic Data
| ID | 190054 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Louise Sperling |
| GIVEN NAMES | Louise |
| FAMILY NAME | Sperling |
| SIGNATURE | SPERLING L |
| AFFILIATIONS | International Center for Tropical Agriculture |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-2134-2638 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 16 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 58 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 16 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1981 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 5 |
Enhancing farmers’ access to neglected crop seeds for healthy diets in a changing climate
Food insecurity and poor diets undermine human health, livelihoods, and aspirations. Climate change further exacerbates the problem of achieving zero hunger. Promoting the production of a diverse portfolio of nutrient-dense, climate-resilient crops enables food supply for healthy diets in the coming years and decades. Many are underutilized even though they are considered opportunity crops, with an unrealized potential to improve food security an…
Viewpoint
Making seed systems more resilient to stress
The role of evidence in humanitarian assessment
This paper reviews advances in the development and use of two evidence-based assessment toolkits: the Seed System Security Assessment (SSSA) and the Emergency Market Mapping and Analysis (EMMA). Both were created in the past five years and have been employed in a range of acute and chronic stress contexts across Africa, Asia, and parts of the Americas, in periods of civil strife, displacement, and drought, as well as following earthquakes, floodi…
The links between food security and seed security
The food price crisis has led to assumptions that food price rises are due to inadequate food production, and that such food insecurity is linked to seed insecurity. Hence, in response to high food prices, seed resources worth hundreds of millions of US dollars are being shipped into vulnerable farming systems across the world. This article examines the evidence for linking food security to seed security, particularly in acute contexts, and shows…
Bean Seed Delivery for Small Farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa
New bean varieties translate into increased on-farm yields only if farmers obtain access to desired seed. Conventional models of legume seed delivery in Africa, centralized with the National Agricultural Research Systems (NARS), prove to be slow and of limited reach. This article describes a novel strategy for seed outreach, the Wider Impact Program, initiated within the 18 countries of the Pan-Africa Bean Research Alliance. Select technical resu…
Persistent myths about emergency seed aid
Moving Towards More Effective Seed Aid
Seed aid is increasingly applied as an emergency response throughout Africa. This article describes its rise, its goals and the seed security principles which should shape it. Drawing on evidence of the effects of disaster, the article reviews the appropriateness of current seed aid responses and suggests ways to link the type of seed security problem with the type of response employed. Direct seed distribution, the dominant form, seems suited fo…
Leveraging farmers’ strategies for coping with stress
The Role of Research Institutions in Seed-related Disaster Relief
The article describes the efforts of a coalition of agricultural research centres, Seeds of Hope (SOH) in the rebuilding of Rwanda, after the genocide and war of 1994. Research involvement in emergency relief and rehabilitation was unusual at the time and SOH had to forge its unique complementary role. Focusing on crop and variety development and conservation it: provided technical advice to relief agencies on seed procurement; used its baseline …
Emergency Seed Aid in Kenya
This article reviews the effectiveness of seed-aid distributions in Kenya during the 1990s. It analyses the internal process and effects, i.e. the performance of the aid itself as well as the external process and effects, i.e. how seed-aid intervention affected farmers' broader agricultural management strategies. During the drought emergency of 1997, Kenyan farmers favourably judged many of the immediate seed-aid features such as crop and variety…
Improving technology delivery mechanisms
Institutionalizing Participatory, Client-Driven Research and Technology Development in Agriculture
This article identifies key characteristics of participatory research and development(R&D) in the agricultural sector: it is client-driven, requires decentralized technology development, devolves to farmers the major responsibility for adaptive testing, and requires institutions and individuals to become accountable for the relevance and quality of technology on offer. Through case study material drawn from Latin America, Asia and Africa, the art…
Food acquisition during the African drought of 1983-1984
In 1983 and 1984, drought spread across the northern rangelands of Kenya and herders in lowland Samburu lost substantial portions of their livestock. Food aid arrived when 50 to 75% of the cattle had already died, and after poorer pastoralists were hungry enough to sell their remaining productive animals. No pastoralists died of the immediate effects of the drought, but many were so impoverished that their longer-term prospects for remaining as h…
Cattle as capital
Livestock have been seen either as a source of subsistence or as commodities in a process of capital accumulation. Is the association of cattle with capital just a poetic metaphor or the grounds for a serious analysis of third world herding communities? Economists are divided between an orthodox notion of capital as physical equipment and a Marxist emphasis on social relations dominated by money. Nevertheless, some anthropologists assert that her…
A General Bibliography of the Gambia (Up to 31 December, 1977)
Cattle as capital
Livestock have been seen either as a source of subsistence or as commodities in a process of capital accumulation. Is the association of cattle with capital just a poetic metaphor or the grounds for a serious analysis of third world herding communities? Economists are divided between an orthodox notion of capital as physical equipment and a Marxist emphasis on social relations dominated by money. Nevertheless, some anthropologists assert that her…
Making seed systems more resilient to stress
Improving technology delivery mechanisms
Persistent myths about emergency seed aid
Food acquisition during the African drought of 1983-1984
In 1983 and 1984, drought spread across the northern rangelands of Kenya and herders in lowland Samburu lost substantial portions of their livestock. Food aid arrived when 50 to 75% of the cattle had already died, and after poorer pastoralists were hungry enough to sell their remaining productive animals. No pastoralists died of the immediate effects of the drought, but many were so impoverished that their longer-term prospects for remaining as h…
Institutionalizing Participatory, Client-Driven Research and Technology Development in Agriculture
This article identifies key characteristics of participatory research and development(R&D) in the agricultural sector: it is client-driven, requires decentralized technology development, devolves to farmers the major responsibility for adaptive testing, and requires institutions and individuals to become accountable for the relevance and quality of technology on offer. Through case study material drawn from Latin America, Asia and Africa, the art…
The links between food security and seed security
The food price crisis has led to assumptions that food price rises are due to inadequate food production, and that such food insecurity is linked to seed insecurity. Hence, in response to high food prices, seed resources worth hundreds of millions of US dollars are being shipped into vulnerable farming systems across the world. This article examines the evidence for linking food security to seed security, particularly in acute contexts, and shows…
Leveraging farmers’ strategies for coping with stress
Emergency Seed Aid in Kenya
This article reviews the effectiveness of seed-aid distributions in Kenya during the 1990s. It analyses the internal process and effects, i.e. the performance of the aid itself as well as the external process and effects, i.e. how seed-aid intervention affected farmers' broader agricultural management strategies. During the drought emergency of 1997, Kenyan farmers favourably judged many of the immediate seed-aid features such as crop and variety…
Viewpoint
The role of evidence in humanitarian assessment
This paper reviews advances in the development and use of two evidence-based assessment toolkits: the Seed System Security Assessment (SSSA) and the Emergency Market Mapping and Analysis (EMMA). Both were created in the past five years and have been employed in a range of acute and chronic stress contexts across Africa, Asia, and parts of the Americas, in periods of civil strife, displacement, and drought, as well as following earthquakes, floodi…
Bean Seed Delivery for Small Farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa
New bean varieties translate into increased on-farm yields only if farmers obtain access to desired seed. Conventional models of legume seed delivery in Africa, centralized with the National Agricultural Research Systems (NARS), prove to be slow and of limited reach. This article describes a novel strategy for seed outreach, the Wider Impact Program, initiated within the 18 countries of the Pan-Africa Bean Research Alliance. Select technical resu…
A General Bibliography of the Gambia (Up to 31 December, 1977)
Food acquisition during the African drought of 1983-1984
In 1983 and 1984, drought spread across the northern rangelands of Kenya and herders in lowland Samburu lost substantial portions of their livestock. Food aid arrived when 50 to 75% of the cattle had already died, and after poorer pastoralists were hungry enough to sell their remaining productive animals. No pastoralists died of the immediate effects of the drought, but many were so impoverished that their longer-term prospects for remaining as h…
Cattle as capital
Livestock have been seen either as a source of subsistence or as commodities in a process of capital accumulation. Is the association of cattle with capital just a poetic metaphor or the grounds for a serious analysis of third world herding communities? Economists are divided between an orthodox notion of capital as physical equipment and a Marxist emphasis on social relations dominated by money. Nevertheless, some anthropologists assert that her…
Institutionalizing Participatory, Client-Driven Research and Technology Development in Agriculture
This article identifies key characteristics of participatory research and development(R&D) in the agricultural sector: it is client-driven, requires decentralized technology development, devolves to farmers the major responsibility for adaptive testing, and requires institutions and individuals to become accountable for the relevance and quality of technology on offer. Through case study material drawn from Latin America, Asia and Africa, the art…
Improving technology delivery mechanisms
The Role of Research Institutions in Seed-related Disaster Relief
The article describes the efforts of a coalition of agricultural research centres, Seeds of Hope (SOH) in the rebuilding of Rwanda, after the genocide and war of 1994. Research involvement in emergency relief and rehabilitation was unusual at the time and SOH had to forge its unique complementary role. Focusing on crop and variety development and conservation it: provided technical advice to relief agencies on seed procurement; used its baseline …
Emergency Seed Aid in Kenya
This article reviews the effectiveness of seed-aid distributions in Kenya during the 1990s. It analyses the internal process and effects, i.e. the performance of the aid itself as well as the external process and effects, i.e. how seed-aid intervention affected farmers' broader agricultural management strategies. During the drought emergency of 1997, Kenyan farmers favourably judged many of the immediate seed-aid features such as crop and variety…
Moving Towards More Effective Seed Aid
Seed aid is increasingly applied as an emergency response throughout Africa. This article describes its rise, its goals and the seed security principles which should shape it. Drawing on evidence of the effects of disaster, the article reviews the appropriateness of current seed aid responses and suggests ways to link the type of seed security problem with the type of response employed. Direct seed distribution, the dominant form, seems suited fo…
Leveraging farmers’ strategies for coping with stress
Bean Seed Delivery for Small Farmers in Sub-Saharan Africa
New bean varieties translate into increased on-farm yields only if farmers obtain access to desired seed. Conventional models of legume seed delivery in Africa, centralized with the National Agricultural Research Systems (NARS), prove to be slow and of limited reach. This article describes a novel strategy for seed outreach, the Wider Impact Program, initiated within the 18 countries of the Pan-Africa Bean Research Alliance. Select technical resu…
Persistent myths about emergency seed aid
The links between food security and seed security
The food price crisis has led to assumptions that food price rises are due to inadequate food production, and that such food insecurity is linked to seed insecurity. Hence, in response to high food prices, seed resources worth hundreds of millions of US dollars are being shipped into vulnerable farming systems across the world. This article examines the evidence for linking food security to seed security, particularly in acute contexts, and shows…
Making seed systems more resilient to stress
The role of evidence in humanitarian assessment
This paper reviews advances in the development and use of two evidence-based assessment toolkits: the Seed System Security Assessment (SSSA) and the Emergency Market Mapping and Analysis (EMMA). Both were created in the past five years and have been employed in a range of acute and chronic stress contexts across Africa, Asia, and parts of the Americas, in periods of civil strife, displacement, and drought, as well as following earthquakes, floodi…
Viewpoint
Enhancing farmers’ access to neglected crop seeds for healthy diets in a changing climate
Food insecurity and poor diets undermine human health, livelihoods, and aspirations. Climate change further exacerbates the problem of achieving zero hunger. Promoting the production of a diverse portfolio of nutrient-dense, climate-resilient crops enables food supply for healthy diets in the coming years and decades. Many are underutilized even though they are considered opportunity crops, with an unrealized potential to improve food security an…
Business (12 works) · Political science (11 works) · Agricultural Innovations and Practices (9 works) · Geography (9 works) · Agriculture (8 works) · Biology (7 works) · Agricultural risk and resilience (6 works) · Computer Science (6 works) · Economics (6 works) · Agriculture, Land Use, Rural Development (5 works)