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Dr. Sako Dramane

sako

My wish is to pursue research that will create several elite varieties of sorghum to be introduced to farmers and help increase farmer income. Born to a family that believed strongly in agriculture Dramane Sako from Maliis the third son of eighteen children with three mothers who were all house wives and a father who was a civil servant. His interest in agriculture began at a young age.I remember when I used to accompany my mothers and father to the field where we grew sorghum cowpea okra and groundnut. he discloses. Dramane holds a Degree in Agricultural Engineering from the Farming Polytechnic Institute of Formation and Applied Research (IPR IFRA) in KatibougouMali. After his studieshe worked for one and a half years in the same institution on the characterisation and mutational breeding of sorghum. He was sponsored by the Francophone Universities Agency to further his education at the Regional Centre for Specialised teaching in Agriculture (CRESA)NiameyNiger. Upon completionDramane was awarded a Dipl me d'Etudes Suprieures Spcialises (DESS) in Agriculture in the Protection of the Environment and the Improvement of the Sahelian Agrarian Systems. Dramane has been working at the Research Institute of Mali as a Researcher since 2005. There he worked on projects such as the Integrated Pest Management in VegetablesNew Rice of Africa (NERICA) FarmersField Tests and Demonstration as well as Forest Resource Management in the Domain of Acacia senegal Improvement by Grafting for High Arabic Eraser Production. The Generation Challenge Programme (GCP) is sponsoring his entire PhD programme to work on Quantitative Trait Loci (QTL) analysis for yield components and panicle architecture in sorghum at WACCI. He hopes to contribute positively to sorghum yield and other desired traits such as seed quality and improved biomass production. The methodologies for QTL analysis that have been proven to provide significant improvement of breeding efficiency for complex traits will permit the genotype and phenotype characterisation of sorghum with high precision in a short time. This will generate several sorghum populations which can be developed and introduced to farmers and agriculturalists in Africaparticularly in Mali.I believe my research will contribute significantly to food security in Africa and in the world at large. I also hope to pursue research which will improve the quality of sorghum meals by biofortification.