This five-year associate award uses the feed the future innovation lab for crop improvement leader award (LWA) awarded to cornell university

This five-year Cooperative Agreement award, totaling $1,000,000, was issued by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) under the USAID Foreign Assistance for Programs Overseas (CFDA 98.001) program. The purpose is to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of global coffee breeding programs to generate disease-resistant, high-quality coffee varieties for smallholder farmers.

Cornell University, the prime awardee, will lead this effort in collaboration with World Coffee Research, a non-profit sub-awardee. Key activities include: 1) developing genetic markers for coffee berry disease and coffee leaf rust resistance, 2) establishing high-throughput methods for evaluating coffee quality and flavor, and 3) building capacity within national coffee research programs globally. This award aims to accelerate the development and deployment of innovative coffee breeding tools and technologies to support smallholder farmers in coffee-producing regions.

Specifically, the purpose of this associate award is to help USAID achieve feed the future objectives by improving existing global breeding efficiency and effectiveness by upgrading the performance of key national coffee research programs.