Darwin Initiative: Celebrating Sweet(potato) Success
A local farmer proudly stands in her sweetpotato patch in Madagascar. Photo: Marta Millere/Crop Trust
7 November 2025
The Crop Trust is proud to see the success of the Sweetpotato Project celebrated by the Darwin Initiative. The story highlights how farmers in Madagascar are now harvesting bigger, healthier sweetpotatoes thanks to clean planting material distributed by the project. The Crop Trust-led project was implemented together with the International Potato Center (CIP), Fiompiana Fambolena Malagasy Norvéziana (FIFAMANOR) and the Zambia Agricultural Research Institute (ZARI).
Over three years, partners collected, cleaned and conserved more than 300 traditional sweetpotato landraces from Madagascar and Zambia – now safely backed up in the CIP genebank in Lima, Peru, including through cryopreservation. This achievement strengthens food security for hundreds of farming families and ensures that this diversity remains available not just to them, but to the whole world, for generations to come.
Categories: For The Press, For Partners, The Sweetpotato Project, Sweetpotato