Tanzania's wheat guardians learn a colour-changing test that spots a killer fungus in under an hour

Wheat blast is a fungus that can wipe out half to all of a harvest, and it has already reached Zambia, Tanzania's neighbour — though not yet Tanzania itself. At the Tanzanian Agricultural Research Institute in Selian, 21 scientists from five institutions have now been trained to catch it early with a simple test developed by the UK's John Innes Centre: no expensive machines, just a small heating plate, and a sample that turns from pink to yellow if the fungus is present, in 30 minutes to an hour. The test also tells wheat blast apart from a look-alike disease experts can confuse it with by eye. 'How quickly we can respond depends on how quickly we can identify the fungus in the field,' says TARI-Selian director Dr Caresma Chuwa. The team leaves with enough materials to test suspect samples all season.

SDG 2 · Zero hunger — Mechanism: tech innovation