Funding is sought to develop a high-profile Global Challenge Research Fund proposal and associated pathways to impact. The bid involves collaborators across three N8 universities on ‘Building Resilience of Smallholder coffee farmers and their communities’. This novel project involves senior scholars collaborating as an interdisciplinary team spanning Biology, Management, Environment/Geography, and Engineering across Newcastle, Manchester and York. Grieve and Doherty have been working on different parts of the coffee supply chain independently via respective Newton Fund projects and other team members have complementary expertise in areas such as plant genetics and rural entrepreneurship. This bid will bring together this team for the first time to map out a programme of work to add significant economic, social and environmental value to smallholder highland communities in the South who are faced with increasing pressures. Embedded in the bid are Universities in ODA-listed countries, smallholder coffee organizations, industry organisations plus government representatives.
PI: Professor Bruce Grieve, The University of Manchester
Contact: bruce.grieve@manchester.ac.uk