Andrew Kabwama

Andrew Kabwama is a Research Associate under Crops for Nutrition and Health lever. He has a good background in Agricultural Crop sciences. He supports the Common Bean breeding program for PABRA, and his primary role involves the management of a Gene bank for Common Bean germplasm resources of approximately 9800 accessions. This collection consists of 65% breeding lines, 20% are landraces, 14% are released varieties, and 1% wild relatives. He also supports several activities along the breeding process, including conducting quantitative analyses of micronutrients in beans, experiments on bean cooking properties, and bean canning quality processing and assessments.

Andrew has contributed to several successful studies including; Canning quality of popular common bean germplasm in Eastern and Central Africa. His key contributions in this involved conducting canning experiments and evaluating test lines. In a study on the Gain and performance in yield and micronutrient concentration in common bean improvement, he played a vital role in conducting field evaluations of test lines. In another study, The cooking properties and nutrient retention of biofortified common bean varieties. The case of Burundi, his responsibilities centered on determining cooking properties and analyzing Iron and Zinc levels in the test lines.

In his current engagement, Andrew is involved in the ACIAR-Rapid Cooking Bean Project, which targets a 30% reduction in cooking time and an enhancement of iron and zinc levels in newly biofortified beans. In this project, his role includes analyzing and quantifying the two mineral micronutrients among the developed bean lines and distribution of trials among the six participating partners in East Africa. (Burundi, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania, and Uganda)

During his experience with germplasm resources, Andrew developed a keen interest in Bean Entomology and Agronomy. This shift was motivated by the challenges associated with managing insect pests in seeds. As a result, his training and career are aligned with Agronomy and Entomology to provide research-based insights such challenges. His particular interest lies in integrating insect pest host plant resistance into the breeding program and enhancing the use of Integrated Pest Management strategies in bean production systems.