icipe's four major Divisions - Human Health, Animal Health, Plant Health and Environmental Health - work closely with the three Research Departments, whose role is to contribute specialised expertise in the key areas of behavioural and chemical ecology, molecular biology and biotechnology and population ecology and ecosystems science. Apart from providing support to the Divisions, the well-staffed Departments conduct research and development and carry out capacity building activities in their own right.
Environmental sustainability, a prerequisite to social and economic development, is a concept that icipe has wholly embraced since its founding 37 years ago.
In tropical Africa, the main roadblock to environmental conservation is poverty. Most farmers in the continent are too poor to rejuvenate the soil with nutrients or allow a fallow period. In other cases they are forced to over-harvest forests and natural vegetation for income, thereby over-stretching demands on the environment and consequently disrupting nature's regenerative potential. Removing people's reliance on the forest by engaging them in commercially viable projects, such as sericulture and apiculture and cultivation of medicinal plants, is one of icipe's latest ventures.
