China's economy has developed rapidly in recent years, achieved historic reductions in poverty, and has met the ambitious goal of creating a moderately prosperous society. In this new stage, the Chinese government has announced multiple development goals, including improving national nutrition and health, achieving green, low-carbon, and sustainable development, and achieving common prosperity, and made commitments to reach its carbon emission peak before 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality before 2060. Great changes have taken place in China's agrifood systems in this process, with a significant increase in agricultural productivity, extension of supply chains, an increased supply of agricultural products, and a significant improvement in residents’ food consumption, nutrition, and health. Agricultural support policies have played an important role in promoting agrifood systems transformation, increasing agricultural production, ensuring food quantity, and providing residents with abundant and diverse food.

Disappointment was widespread when rapid economic growth since 2005, coupled with a smallholder-targeted fertilizer subsidy program, failed to significantly reduce poverty in Malawi. Official estimates for 2011 showed a 1.7 percentage point decline in national poverty between 2005 and 2011, while rural poverty increased marginally. In this study we estimate an alternative set of regional poverty lines using a cost of basic needs method that allows the consumption bundle to vary spatially and temporally while ensuring utility consistency. Our poverty figures suggest a substantial 7.3 percentage point decrease in national poverty over the analysis period, driven largely by a sharp reduction in rural poverty. These results are more consistent with the observed level of economic growth and improvements in several non-monetary dimensions of well-being. However, we find that extreme poverty did increase, suggesting that the most vulnerable people continue to be excluded from the benefits of economic policy and growth.

Disappointment was widespread when rapid economic growth since 2005, coupled with a smallholder-targeted fertilizer subsidy program, failed to significantly reduce poverty in Malawi. Official estimates for 2011 showed a 1.7 percentage point decline in national poverty between 2005 and 2011, while rural poverty increased marginally. In this study we estimate an alternative set of regional poverty lines using a cost of basic needs method that allows the consumption bundle to vary spatially and temporally while ensuring utility consistency. Our poverty figures suggest a substantial 7.3 percentage point decrease in national poverty over the analysis period, driven largely by a sharp reduction in rural poverty. These results are more consistent with the observed level of economic growth and improvements in several non-monetary dimensions of well-being. However, we find that extreme poverty did increase, suggesting that the most vulnerable people continue to be excluded from the benefits of economic policy and growth.

Credible quantitative and qualitative information on existing capacities in agricultural higher education agencies in Africa are crucial for strategic planning, policy formulation, setting priorities and benchmarks, measuring progress toward benchmarks, and identifying capacity gaps. Decisionmakers require a solid understanding of existing staffing and student capacities in the higher education sector, as well as in the wider agricultural innovation systems in Africa south of the Sahara. Access to such information supports effective policymaking to address capacity issues in higher education, agricultural research, extension, and other areas. Such information remains extremely limited, however. To fill this need, the International Food Policy Research Institute’s Agricultural Science and Technology Indicators (ASTI/IFPRI) and the Regional Universities Forum for Capacity Building in Agriculture (RUFORUM) initiated a partnership to pilot the collection of this type of data for RUFORUM’s member universities. This factsheet presents the available data results for Africa University, Faculty of Agriculture and Natural Resources. An online version of the data is available via the Portal on Agricultural Capacity in RUFORUM Universities: www.asti.cgiar.org/RUFORUM.