Abdoul Aziz Niane

This experiment evaluated the productivity and economic viability of wheat under an integrated net house with a closed hydroponic irrigation system versus an open field. The objective was to assess this water-saving innovation under the Arabian Peninsula’s resource-constrained environments. The integrated system achieved markedly superior results, producing a grain yield of 13.0 t/ha—a 117% increase over the open-field yield of 6.0 t/ha. Biomass yield reached 40.0 t/ha versus 16.0 t/ha in open fields, a 150% improvement. These gains were attributed to controlled growing conditions and balanced nutrient delivery, which optimized plant performance and reduced environmental stress. The system also demonstrated significant savings in resources, offering enhanced resource-use efficiency per unit of production. The estimated total values of productivity and resource savings were substantial when adjusted to the land area conserved. For ROI, BCR, and IRR, hydroponic wheat production scored 3.13, 4.13, and 312.8% in season (1) vs. 1.97, 2.97, and 197.1% for open-field production. In season (2), hydroponics scored 1.62, 2.63, and 163.0% vs. 0.043, 1.04, and 4.32% for open fields. Higher yields in 2022/2023 resulted from 30 vs. 10 min/day of irrigation due to higher relative humidity reflecting higher rainfall in the first season.

This study assessed six tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) cultivars within an integrated solar-powered closed hydroponic system in Al Dhaid, UAE (25°16′11.2″ N, 55°55′52.2″ E). The system combined an insect-proof net house, closed hydroponics, root-zone cooling, ultra-low-energy drip irrigation, and a cost-effective solar-powered reverse osmosis (RO) desalination unit to address salinity constraints. The cultivars, selected for their adaptability to controlled environments in the UAE, were evaluated for yield, water-use efficiency (WUE), and fertilizer-use efficiency (FUE). Among them, Torcida recorded the highest mean yield (0.619 kg/m²/harvest), WUE (27.1 kg/m³), FUE (26.5 kg fruit/kg fertilizer), and marketable fruit ratio (66.3%), followed by Roenza, Eviva, and SV 4129 TH; Lamina was intermediate, while Saley, a bushy type, produced the lowest yield. The top cultivars achieved cumulative yields exceeding 7 kg/m²—surpassing regional open-field benchmarks (4–5 kg/m²; 3–6 kg/m³). Compared with conventional cooled hydroponic greenhouses (3.5 kg/plant; 8 kg/m³), the system demonstrated similar productivity using three times less water. The RO unit produced water at baseline 1.05 USD/m³—58–68% below regional tariffs—while minimizing reliance on grid electricity and mechanical cooling. Overall, the integrated solar-powered hydroponic–RO model proved technically reliable, resource-efficient, and economically viable, offering a scalable solution for sustainable vegetable production in hyper-arid regions.

This study assessed six tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) cultivars within an integrated solar-powered closed hydroponic system in Al Dhaid, UAE (25°16′11.2″N, 55°55′52.2″E). The system combined an insect-proof net house, closed hydroponics, root-zone cooling, ultra-low-energy drip irrigation, and a cost-effective solar-powered reverse osmosis (RO) desalination unit to address salinity constraints. The cultivars, selected for their adaptability to controlled environments in the UAE, were evaluated for yield, water-use efficiency (WUE), and fertilizer-use efficiency (FUE). Among them, Torcida recorded the highest mean yield (0.619 kg m⁻² harvest⁻¹), WUE (27.1 kg m⁻³), FUE (26.5 kg fruit kg⁻¹ fertilizer), and marketable fruit ratio (66.3%), followed by Roenza, Eviva, and SV 4129 TH; Lamina was intermediate, while Saley, a bushy type, produced the lowest yield. The top cultivars achieved cumulative yields exceeding 7 kg m⁻²—surpassing regional open-field benchmarks (4–5 kg m⁻²; 3–6 kg m⁻³). Compared with conventional cooled hydroponic greenhouses (3.5 kg plant⁻¹; 8 kg m⁻³), the system demonstrated similar productivity using three times less water. The RO unit produced water at 1.05 US$ m⁻³—58–68% below regional tariffs—while minimizing reliance on grid electricity and mechanical cooling. Overall, the integrated solar-powered hydroponic–RO model proved technically reliable, resource-efficient, and economically viable, offering a scalable solution for sustainable veg-etable production in hyper-arid regions.

Several research and development efforts have been made to ensure food security in developing countries. Dissemination of improved agricultural technologies was used as the main avenue through which some increases in food supply have been achieved. However, food insecurity remains a major challenge. This paper argues and provides empirical evidence that reducing food loss and waste can be an effective food and energy security, and natural resource, and environmental conservation strategy. Following the life cycle framework, the annual amount of wheat-based food lost or wasted from farm-to-fork in Morocco was estimated at 4 million tons (equivalent to 36% of total supply) valued at US$1.0 billion. Among all nodes, the magnitudes of farm management-related losses, wastage during consumption, and storage losses rank first to third accounting for about 17.4%, 7.92%, and 7.06%, respectively of total wheat supply in the country. Were these losses and wastes entirely prevented, Morocco would have been able to feed 29.3 million more people, or save 1.79 million hectares of land, 2.66 billion m3 of water, and 64.28 million GJ of energy, and prevented the emission from landfills of at least 16.61 million kg of methane annually. Besides the ongoing efforts to disseminate agricultural technologies, the Moroccan government needs to develop short- and medium-term national strategies to reduce food losses and wastage particularly targeting the storage and consumption nodes. Replacing bread subsidy with food vouchers targeting only the needy and creation of public awareness about the magnitudes and consequences of food loss and wastage alone may go long way in reducing them.

Conservation agriculture (CA) is becoming increasingly attractive to farmers due to advantages such as lower production costs and less destruction of soil structures compared to the conventional tillage. The cultivars introduced for the conventional systems may not be suitable under CA environments, and newly adapted cultivars need to be developed. Accordingly, four separate field experiments were conducted over two cropping seasons (2018–2019 and 2019–2020) to study the agronomic performance of seven barley genotypes under three tillage systems: conventional tillage (full tillage with residue removed), reduced tillage (chisel plowing with residue retained) and CA system (no tillage with residue retained on soil surface). The genotypes were grown under rainfed conditions in two different agro-ecological regions (Kamyaran and Hosseinabad locations) in the west of Iran. Significant genotypic differences were observed for grain yield and yield components except 1000-kernel weight. The results of this study showed that rainfed barley genotypes under a CA system produced yields equal to, or better (0.7%) than, the conventional tillage; while reduced tillage system decreased their performance by 4.9%. Regarding genotype × tillage interaction, the barley genotypes Catalhuyuk 2001 and Bulbule positively interacted with conventional tillage and showed higher performance than other genotypes, whereas genotypes Çumra 2001, Ansar and Abidar expressed highest performance under CA system. Consequently, genotypes Bulbule, Catalhuyuk 2001 and Gumharriyet 50 outperformed the domestic performance and the amount of grain yield and showed the highest adaptation to the tested environments. The results of the present study could be useful to improve the efficiency of a CA system in rainfed cultivation of barley and open new windows for the cereal production in arid and semi-arid regions with food security concerns.

Agriculture and agri-food systems of the highly vulnerable Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region needs a radical transformation under a changing climate. Based on a two-year effort, initially we developed a mega hypothesis on how to achieve climate-smart agri-food transformation in the region. In the study, we hypothesized that “Climate-Smart Lifts” implemented in the enabling environments can rapidly facilitate agri-food transformation in the region. In order to gather the stakeholders’ perception about this, we organized a collective conversation among ~400 stakeholders that represent various scales and sectors within the agriculture sector in MENA. These “listening cum learning consultations” were conducted through a survey followed by a series of webinars. The webinar discussions were strategically guided based on our hypothesis, the responses from the surveys and the regional needs. These discussions provided a forum to bring-out the stakeholders’ perspective on what new knowledge, partnerships, instruments and projects were needed in the MENA. The deliberation focused on the opportunities of public–private partnerships focusing in all the four major agroecosystems in MENA (irrigated, rainfed, rangelands, and deserts). In result, we developed an effective framework for strategic resource mobilization in the region, keeping in view the strong regional needs for climate actions and the requisite long-term commitments for the SDGs implementation.

Pushing yield frontiers of cereals and legumes is becoming increasingly difficult, especially in drylands. This paper argues and provides empirical evidence that food loss and wastage constitute a sizeable proportion of the total wheat supply in Egypt. By following the life cycle of food and using standard measurement protocols, we estimated the levels of food loss and wastage along the wheat value chain in Egypt and their socioeconomic, biophysical, and environmental implications. About 4.4 million tons (20.62% of total wheat supply from domestic production and imports in 2017/2018) is estimated to be lost or wasted in Egypt which is also associated with the wastage of about 4.79 billion m³ of water, and 74.72 million GJ of energy. This implies that if Egypt manages to eliminate, or considerably reduce, wheat-related losses and wastage, it will save enough food to feed 21 million more people from domestic production and hence reduce wheat imports by 37%, save 1.1 billion USD of much-needed foreign exchange, and reduce emissions of at least 260.84 million kg carbon dioxide-equivalent and 8.5 million kg of methane. Therefore, investment in reducing food loss and wastage can be an effective strategy to complement ongoing efforts to enhance food security through productivity enhancement in Egypt.