GBU formed the Agronomy, Aquaculture and Food Technology Unit in 2010, which forms part of the university’s efforts to engage in the regional development of the Senegal River valley through agriculture and sustainable development. The unit focuses on reducing risk to support increased food security in Senegal and the rest of west Africa. It draws on the experience and expertise of a multidisciplinary team with diverse backgrounds in the fields of agriculture, economics, hydrology, geography, environment, rural sociology, biostatistics, law and jurisdiction, biomathematics and modelling.
GBU has also adopted an experiential and interdisciplinary learning approach which integrates classroom theory with field research and practice. The university maintains a 240 ha, including a 30-ha experimental farm, which is located in the Valley and presents similar environmental and agronomic conditions to those faced by SRV farm households. As part of a 2008 expansion plan, GBU has approved its UFR in Agricultural Sciences, Aquaculture, and Food Science. The faculties are called “Training and Research Units” (Unités de Formation et de Recherche – UFR), under which interrelated departments are clustered. The establishment of this agricultural technology competency within GBU contributes to an important complement to the research programs in rural development based on the social sciences.The University is in the process of developing its distance-learning capabilities, and it intends to reach 5000 students through distance-learning pedagogy by 2015.
Commissioned research
- Managing soil Fertility within the Watershed as strategy for Disaster Risk Reduction in the semi-arid zones of Senegal (February 2013) commissioned by USAID PERIPERI U
- Dynamics of farmlands in the Niayes region and its relationship to food insecurity in Senegal (2014) commissioned by USAID PERIPERI U
- Commission from UNOCHA/FAO for research into Future Humanitarian Trends (2012) commissioned by UNOCHA/FAO
- Survey on climate change, food security in urban and rural areas(2012) commissioned by Africa Rice Commission
Academic Courses
MSc in Prevention and DRR in Food Security in West Africa
Short Courses
The partners at GBU have hosted several unique short courses, largely centred around agricultural risk which have included;
- Agro-business and major risks in the River Valley
- Water Management for Crop Production in DRR in the River Valley of Senegal
- Food production risk due to salinization processes in croplands
- Food production risk due to locust and bird invasion in the Senegal River Valley
- Managing flood risk in relation to food production
- Food production risks due to floods
