(From left): Alfred Mwanyika, James Bernhardt, Annie Mapulanga, Jeffrey Appiagyei, Huong Luu, Josh Neiderman meet at ASA's headquarters in St. Louis. 

ASA/WISHH recently hosted a group of visiting professionals from Africa and Southeast Asia currently residing at the University of Missouri (UM). The group visit was facilitated by Dr. Ken Schneeberger, director of the College of Agriculture, Food & Natural Resources (CAFNR) International Programs in Columbia.

ASA/WISHH Regional Director for Africa Josh Neiderman, Program Assistant for Special Projects Theresa Fang and Director of Monitoring & Evaluation James Bernhardt welcomed the visitors from the university, including three Borlaug Fellowship residents from Tanzania, Malawi and Vietnam and one Soy Innovations Lab partner from Ghana at the ASA/WISHH offices in St. Louis. The group was given a presentation and overview of ASA/WISHH’s work and answered questions concerning the organization’s program and geographic focus areas.

As resident Borlaug Fellows at the University of Missouri, Alfred Mwanyika (Tanzania), Huong Luu (Vietnam) and Annie Mapulanga (Malawi) are working toward innovative solutions to issues ranging from food safety, biotechnology, epidemiology, animal health and natural resource management.

Soybean Innovation Lab team member Jeffrey Appiagyei (Ghana) works on cost effective mechanization of agricultural processes, specifically through local soybean threshing machinery developed along with Dr. Kerry Clark of UM.

The two have recently implemented six-day workshops on the construction of the threshing equipment in Ethiopia, Malawi, Burundi, Rwanda, Tanzania, Kenya and Zimbabwe.