How are we helping millions of Africans feed themselves? How will we one day feed the world when we’ve run out of new farmland?
The answer to both questions is simple: It’s in the bag.
Or PICS bags, to be more accurate.
PICS (Purdue Improved Crop Storage) bags, the result of a 30-year effort by our research team at Purdue University, USAID grants and generous contributions from groups like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, were the answer we came up with when we asked ourselves how we could help African farmers store their crops without losing them to insects or poisoning them with insecticides.
We were able to develop simple low-cost effective non-chemical technologies that would allow impoverished farmers to store their grain after harvest.
While we started out looking for ways for farmers to safely store their cowpea harvests without using chemicals, the number of crops that can be stored has since expanded to more than a dozen. Lives are being saved and changed.
And it’s a sustainable program. We don’t just airdrop the bags or send them in the mail.
What we have created is a system where we teach people in Africa how to manufacture the bags, truck drivers have learned how to be a cog in the wheel of distribution, farmers buy the bags with the money they get from selling more crops and mothers and fathers reap the benefits of knowing that their children are eating healthy food.
We’re not just teaching people how to fish. We’re showing them how to make fishing rods.
Our belief was that by building not just a product, but a system where everyone profits, we ensure that the system will continue to thrive if the grant money disappears.
And what we’ve built is working.
We’ve made countless trips to various countries in Africa to listen to the people and hear directly from them what they need.
In April 2015, we visited a village in northwestern Burkina Faso, a region of arid land where cowpeas are very important. Clémentine Dabire, a colleague we had engaged with there had begun about seven years earlier to organize women’s groups with the objective of teaching women how to use technologies that could preserve food to feed their families.
She started her group with seven people. When we returned in 2015, there were 10,000 people there for a PICS bags ceremony.
Often when we visit a village that has been dramatically impacted by the technology, we’re greeted by songs the people have written about PICS bags.
The first time that happened, we were flabbergasted. The excitement, the dancing, the music, the songs warmed our hearts. It was like being in a dream. And we’ve seen this in many other places.
We estimate that distributors and manufacturers have already sold more than 7.5 million PICS bags, and we expect them to sell 2 million more this year.
PICS bags are making the difference between life and death for millions of people, but we have so much more work to do.
There are currently 500 million low-resource farmers around the world. They all have a need to store their crops in ways that are durable and free of insecticides.
And the need doesn’t stop there.
Current estimates project that there will be billions more people on Earth in just a generation. Such an enormous increase in population will create an equally enormous demand for food.
And as harrowing as it is to contemplate, there is simply not enough farmland on Earth to keep planting fencerow to fencerow. But there is a way to make more food available without putting more land into production – more and better storage.
That’s food that will never be damaged by insects or lose its value. And it is technology that the poorest farmers in the world can learn, use and afford.
The need for these bags is there, and it is growing exponentially.
The challenge we have now is what it has always been: We need help to raise awareness and get these bags in the hands of farmers around the world.
If you’re interested in partnering with us to make a difference, please visit our website at picsnetwork.org.
Hunger continues to be an epidemic, and unfortunately, it will only get worse with each generation.
But with your help, we can help spread the tools to combat this plague.
After all, it’s in the bag.
Dr. Murdock is a distinguished professor of entomology and Dieudonné Baributsa is an entomology research assistant professor at Purdue University