Project

Great Lakes Cassava Initiative: Monitoring, Evaluation and Reporting System

Client

Catholic Relief Services, under a Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Project

Year

2008

Description

The Great Lakes Cassava Initiative is intended to mitigate the impact of cassava mosaic disease on food security among rural households across a large swath of Central and East Africa. While the disease has been around for more than 100 years, in the last 20 years new, more virulent strains are wiping out cassava across the Great Lakes Region. As cassava is a primary staple food for more than 20 million people in the region, mitigating the impact of the disease on food security is a major undertaking requiring coordinated management and monitoring among dozens of local and international organizations.

Kimetrica is coordinating the development and management of computer based tools that will help CRS and its partners better manage the mitigation effort. Our approach has been directed at two levels. The first is to develop systems for the easy collection of time sensitive data at the farmer level and the second is to develop procedures, methods and tools to help track the spread and mitigation of cassava mosaic. The integrated monitoring, evaluation and reporting system will help CRS and its partners to better manage the implementation of this activity.