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The GLOBAL PLANT CLINIC (GPC) is managed by CABI in alliance with Rothamsted Research and the Food and Environment Research Agency (previously CSL). The GPC delivers plant health services around the world, working with extension, research, the private sector and governments to make technical support and advice available through plant health clinics. It trains plant doctors and scientists, links extension to research and promotes new ways to give poor farmers access to the best technologies. Training courses strengthen capacity and foster innovation needed to establish plant healthcare systems. Each year the GPC receives queries from around the world, publishes new disease records and extension material and supports more than 80 clinics in the poorest countries of Africa, Asia and Latin America.

Background:

Plants with pest and disease problems are a major source of concern for farmers around the world, and nowhere more so than in developing countries. For many subsistence farmers a healthy crop can mean the difference between a plentiful food supply and the possibility of going without.

Farmers will often turn to their peers or seek advice from pesticide dealers on managing their crop problems. The help they find here can be useful, but if it is inaccurate they run the risk of losing their crops and potentially jeopardising their livelihood.

Plant health clinics are the building blocks of a public plant health service, which in turn seeks to bring together extension and research, regulation and crop management under the one heading of 'plant healthcare system'. This concept is modelled directly on established human healthcare systems. Clinics and services are 'designed by demand' and not 'driven by capacity'.

CABI's Global Plant Clinic and partners have established plant health clinics to bring accurate, up-to-date information to farmers in developing countries; thus enabling them to care for their crops in the most effective way.

The plant health clinics advise farmers on pests and diseases the way a health centre does for humans. Consultations take place once a week in public places, such as markets or the village place (central meeting area). The farmers bring samples of their diseased plants for plant doctors to diagnose and prescribe safe, affordable and locally available pest management solutions. The GPC offers training courses for plant doctors and helps them set up and run clinics. It provides expert guidance on diagnosing the more challenging plant health problems and how to control problems.

Intended Outputs:

• To provide authoritative identifications on a range of pests and diseases including fungi, bacteria, nematodes, viruses and phytoplasmas.
• To provide expert advice on diseases, their control and the interpretation and application of diagnostic results.

Progress and Impact:

As of July 2009, the GPC supports 80+ plant health clinics in ten countries (Sierra Leone, Rwanda, Uganda, DR Congo, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Vietnam). It has run pilot clinics in Cuba, Indonesia, Peru, Pakistan, Cameroon, Benin, and Kenya. Each year it receives around 200 queries in the UK-based labs and processes around 500 samples. Uniquely, the GPC can accept all crops and can test for all major pest groups.

Numbers vary for overseas clinics but it is estimated that the GPC has around 50,000 unique users, most of whom have gained access to a previously denied source of technical support and advice. The potential outreach or audience of the clinics, which are run in public places, mostly markets, is over 100 000 people living in the poorest rural communities.

Nicaragua is the most advanced and mature scheme. It is now running independently and a major evaluation of impact and other results was published in early 2008 (See the report 'Nicaragua - Public Plant Health Services for All. Results and Lessons Learned 2005-2007' by S. Danielsen, and M. Fernández, available in English and Spanish).

The breadth of GPC activities include training of plant doctors, publishing fact sheets, developing new extension methods and participatory disease surveillance. The GPC works with NGOs, farmer organisations, formal and informal extension services, government research intitutes, universities and CG centres. For a full description of the outputs consult the annual reports. Two DVDs are available, one from Nicaragua and the other from Bangladesh. Please request copies using the email contacts given above.

General Notes:

The GPC has also received funding from DANIDA (Nicaragua) and ACIAR (Vietnam). Other organisations, such as World Vision International Nepal, don't fund the GPC directly, but have made significant contributions to local costs of clinics.

See also the project record for the CABI Development Fund (CDF)

See the articles A New Vision of Plant Health Services for the World's Poor and Support Farmers to Cut Crop Losses on SciDev.net.

Publications: