A push to accelerate agricultural innovation across the Global South took centre stage in New Delhi on 12 September, as the United Nations Day for South-South Cooperation was commemorated at the Global Drylands Congress 2026 amid mounting climate, water and food-security pressures on the world's drylands. The commemoration focused on how proven solutions can move faster across borders — particularly between countries facing similar agricultural and climate conditions — be adapted to local realities and deliver more for farmers and food systems.

The congress, organised jointly by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) and the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), brought together agricultural scientists, policymakers, research leaders, development institutions, private-sector actors and practitioners to shape the future of dryland agriculture and strengthen cooperation across the Global South.

It showcased the reach of the ICRISAT Centre of Excellence for South-South Cooperation in Agriculture (ISSCA), a platform for adapting and scaling proven solutions: ISSCA now works with 19 partners, has identified more than 100 validated and scalable solutions and has supported over 300 professionals from more than 40 countries, across climate-resilient crops, soil and water management, digital agriculture, agribusiness, nutrition, livelihoods and environmental sustainability.

That approach carries particular urgency for the drylands, home to hundreds of millions of people and among the regions most exposed to climate variability, water scarcity, land degradation and food insecurity — yet also, the organisers argue, emerging frontiers for innovation in climate-resilient agriculture. ICAR, one of the world's largest national agricultural research systems, and ICRISAT, a CGIAR centre with more than five decades of work in the drylands of Asia and Africa, have a long record of collaboration in crop improvement, resilient farming systems and natural resource management.

The commemoration culminated in the presentation of the Delhi Declaration on Drylands, setting out a shared ambition to strengthen South-South cooperation, accelerate the uptake and scaling of proven innovations, deepen institutional partnerships and reposition the world's drylands as landscapes of resilience, opportunity and sustainable growth.

Source: ICRISAT