•Her improved vegetable varieties help farmers combat crop losses, cut production costs and expand commercial opportunities across Africa.
Plant scientist Pamela Afokpe has won the prestigious 2026 Norman Borlaug Award for Field Research and Application for her groundbreaking work in improving indigenous African vegetables and turning them into commercially viable crops for smallholder farmers.
Afokpe, Research and Development Operations Manager at East-West Seed in West Africa, is being honoured for demonstrating how scientific research into traditional African crops can strengthen food security, improve farmers’ incomes and support climate-resilient agriculture.
She is receiving the award from the World Food Prize Foundation in Des Moines, Iowa, United States. Endowed by the Rockefeller Foundation, the award recognises outstanding field research and practical agricultural achievements by scientists under the age of 40.
Her achievement brings international attention to indigenous vegetables such as Gboma, amaranth and jute mallow, which have sustained African communities for generations but have received limited investment from the formal seed industry.
Afokpe challenged the long-held assumption that these crops offered limited commercial opportunities, demonstrating that farmers’ reliance on saved seeds was largely driven by the lack of improved commercial alternatives rather than a preference for traditional planting methods.
From a rented field to a regional research platform
Afokpe began her research in 2017 on a rented field with manual irrigation, gradually building a research platform focused on indigenous vegetables and their potential to improve agricultural productivity.
Her work involved collecting more than 2,000 regional crop accessions across West Africa, creating a foundation for research into crop diversity, disease resistance and improved varieties.
While managing regional research operations, she also secured a competitive Sandwich PhD scholarship through Wageningen Graduate School to pursue doctoral research with Wageningen University & Research in the Netherlands.
Her academic work has produced peer-reviewed findings on the genetic diversity and pest resistance of jute mallow, connecting advanced plant science with practical challenges facing farmers.
One of her most significant achievements is the development of Sika Gboma, an improved variety of the indigenous vegetable that offers intermediate tolerance to bacterial wilt, a disease associated with historical crop losses of up to 100 per cent in affected fields.
The variety also has an extended post-harvest shelf life, helping to reduce spoilage and improve the commercial prospects of farmers and vegetable traders.
How improved seeds are changing farmers’ fortunes
Afokpe’s work goes beyond developing improved crop varieties. She has also focused on ensuring that the benefits of agricultural research reach farmers, particularly smallholders and women involved in vegetable marketing.
She replaced traditional seed broadcasting practices with more precise nursery management techniques, reducing farmers’ input costs by 40 per cent, according to the award announcement.
To demonstrate the commercial benefits of Sika Gboma, she conducted open-air shelf-life demonstrations with female market traders, showing how reduced post-harvest spoilage could translate into better daily earnings.
The results helped generate demand for the improved vegetable, with female retailers reportedly beginning to reserve harvests directly from farmers’ fields before production was completed.
In its first three years, Sika Gboma generated the equivalent of more than 3,000 tonnes of produce, reaching tens of thousands of smallholder farmers and female retailers across West and Central Africa, according to East-West Seed.
The achievement earned Afokpe the company’s global Platinum Helix Research and Development Award in 2025.
African indigenous crops and climate-resilient food security
Afokpe’s research aligns with the objectives of the Vision for Adapted Crops and Soils (VACS), an international initiative involving the United States Department of State, the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations and the African Union.
The initiative promotes underutilised and locally adapted crops, often described as opportunity crops, as part of efforts to strengthen food security, improve nutrition and build resilience to climate change.
Indigenous vegetables offer opportunities to diversify food production and strengthen local agricultural value chains. However, limited investment in improved seeds, crop research and commercial distribution has constrained their potential in many African markets.
By combining crop improvement with practical approaches to seedling management, post-harvest preservation and market development, Afokpe’s work illustrates how research can address several of these constraints simultaneously.
Her approach also highlights the importance of involving farmers and traders in agricultural innovation rather than treating crop development as a purely scientific exercise.
Recognition for women in agricultural science
Beyond her research achievements, Afokpe is a One Planet Fellow recognised for her leadership in addressing agricultural challenges associated with climate change.
She has balanced field research and doctoral studies with motherhood while navigating gender stereotypes associated with agricultural fieldwork in the region.
Her career has also made her an advocate for greater opportunities for women across agricultural value chains, from scientific research and seed production to farming and produce marketing.
In her acceptance remarks, Afokpe said indigenous African vegetables deserved greater recognition in global efforts to address food insecurity.
“African indigenous vegetables belong at the center of the global food security map,” she said.
She added that applying rigorous science to crops traditionally cultivated by African families was demonstrating how smallholder farmers and market women could build commercially viable value chains when given access to quality seeds.
Professor Eric Schranz, chair of the Biosystematics Group at Wageningen University & Research, praised Afokpe for combining scientific research with practical benefits for farmers.
He said her work had established a functioning research platform that was helping transform indigenous vegetable production systems across West Africa.
Continuing a legacy of agricultural innovation
Afokpe receives the award on the same Des Moines stage where the late Simon N. Groot, founder of East-West Seed and her mentor, received the World Food Prize in 2019.
Groot was recognised for his contributions to improving access to quality vegetable seeds for smallholder farmers, particularly through affordable seed packages suited to their needs.
Afokpe’s work builds on that approach by extending scientific research and commercial seed development to indigenous vegetables that have historically attracted less attention from the formal seed industry.
East-West Seed’s expanding presence in West Africa is expected to provide further opportunities to develop and commercialise improved indigenous crop varieties.
The company’s inclusion on Fortune magazine’s 2026 Change the World list has also recognised its approach to generating social impact through its core business activities.
Afokpe’s award therefore highlights not only an individual scientific achievement but also the growing importance of African indigenous crops in discussions about agricultural innovation, commercial farming, nutrition and climate resilience.
