A collaboration to advance the soil health agenda in Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, and Tanzania through soil knowledge exchange

In 2024, CIFOR-ICRAF and Varda piloted a soil knowledge exchange initiative in Kenya and Tanzania, funded by the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (NORAD). The pilot focused on identifying barriers and opportunities for building a collaborative soil data ecosystem and directly shaped the design of this project.

Building on the pilot initiative, CIFOR-ICRAF and the Varda Foundation, with support from NORAD, are now launching a new three-year initiative to create a dynamic ecosystem of soil data-driven services across Kenya, Ghana, Malawi, and Tanzania. The initiative seeks to create a scalable collaborative platform that facilitates the exchange of soil data, information, and knowledge among key stakeholders, including researchers, policymakers, youth and women organizations, farmers and pastoralists, conservation organizations and agri-food private sector companies. A central focus of the initiative is the creation of a comprehensive soil data infrastructure that will support the development of data-driven soil information services tailored to meet the specific needs of stakeholders in Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, and Tanzania.