About AIK
Resources for African Indigenous knowledge of agriculture and food systems
The AIK project is designed primarily to enhance the impact of the UK STFC’s (Science and Technology Facilities Council) data science and citizen science work in Africa to benefit users and beneficiaries, both inside and outside the scientific and research community. It does so by developing the first innovative African indigenous knowledge management platform to rescue and share traditional agriculture and food production, processing and consumption techniques, through extensive engagement with smallholder farmers, SMEs, policy and wider stakeholder communities.
The study is initially carried out in Sierra Leone to generate useful data on existing and emerging practices embodied in AIK agriculture and farming practices and develop together with stakeholders a prototype documentation of the knowledge platform. Sierra Leone relies on about 80% of smallholder farming for food production and up to 60% of the country’s labour force is employed in this sector.
Learning from AIK, by investigating what local communities know and have within and across Africa, can improve understanding of food production and consumption, particularly in times of stress or shocks affecting the food systems and communities. Thus, the AIK platform offers free open access dataset uploads on research, publications and learning resources on African Indigenous knowledge of agriculture and food systems. Most importantly, the platform enables researchers, authors and contributors to share and manage their valuable data, publications and learning resources, promote AIK. Data and resources uploaded can be reused, which enables authors, researchers and contributors to gain exposure and citations. Everyone is welcome to use the platform.