An on-line presentation of CIRAD's operations in this French overseas département.

Geneticists and physiologists are well advised to work hand-in-hand. This is what a CIRAD team set out to demonstrate, based on the merits of plant physiological modelling in integrating genetics into varietal breeding operations.

Geographical indications are on a roll: in the current climate of strong competition, they give products significant added value. During a two-week training course co-organized by CIRAD, 18 professionals from 13 countries were able to soak up French experience of designations of origin (AOCs).

Two books containing papers presented at a conference on agriculture and urban development in West and central Africa, held in Yaoundé, Cameroon, from 30 October to 3 November 2005.

As part of the QuaRES (Quality in Research and Higher Education) network, CIRAD and other public research organizations will be participating in the sixth Ecole qualité inter-organismes, from 15 to 17 September 2008, in La Grande-Motte (Hérault, France). The seminar is intended for anyone working in the research and higher education sectors who is interested in quality issues.

The University of Montpellier 2 (UM2) and Kasetsart University (KU) in Bangkok, in partnership with the Institut Pasteur and CIRAD, have launched a two-year binational Masters course in infectious, vector-borne and food-borne diseases: evolution, emergence, spread and control (called MIVA in France and "Bioveterinary Sciences" in Thailand). The course leads to a dual certificate: one French and one Thai. The last person to sign the relevant agreement was Gérard Matheron, CIRAD Director General, at a ceremony at Kasetsart University in Bangkok, on 26 May 2008.

Contrary to what one might think, cotton policy is not restricted to the subsidies issue, which usually dominates the debate, but encompasses a broad range of both problems and solutions. One aspect of that diversity was highlighted at an international conference organized at CIRAD in May 2008. Interview with Michel Fok, a cotton policy specialist with CIRAD.

Le Cirad en 2007: returning agriculture to its rightful place in the fight against poverty and inequality

A team from CIRAD recently identified the genes involved in the variability of carotenoid contents in various citrus species. These results are to be used to optimize citrus fruit carotenoid content and thus their nutritional and organoleptic properties.

The proceedings of the seminar of the same name, held in Montpellier in March 2006.