The Platform provides a significant opportunity to leverage the data collected over 50 years in the CGIAR System to speed innovation, support informed decision making, and scale up science-based development solutions. It will drive CGIAR-wide efforts to provide global leadership in organizing open data, as well as convene a large number of external partners, to inspire new ways to approach agriculture, environment, and food security research and to achieve impact.

In Asia, CIAT continued to build on important priorities in several countries including Vietnam, Indonesia, Philippines, and China. Resilience and climate-smart agriculture were major themes in our new research projects.

A major highlight in Africa was the renewal of the Pan-Africa Bean Research Alliance (PABRA), which focuses on improving economic growth, nutrition, gender equity, and the natural resource base for better livelihoods of smallholder households in sub-Saharan Africa. Additionally, in 2016, sustainable solutions were scaled out through interventions to increase soil health and soil carbon sequestration, and research projects explored the economic and environmental potential of improved forages in crop–livestock systems.

Closer to CIAT headquarters in Latin America and the Caribbean, our work focused on scaling out climate-smart agriculture, and providing policy makers with decision support tools. Additionally, CIAT’s genebank, which provides vital raw material for our crop breeding programs, moved closer to a much needed revitalization through the Future Seeds initiative.

Global partnerships continued to play a central role in our activities. Our partners, whether donors, governments, private sector actors, or NGOs, contribute greatly to CIAT’s keen focus on innovation – as we put science to work in response to some of the most complex issues faced by society.