A charitable foundation owned by Microsoft founder Bill Gates has put almost $20m into a Wageningen University project to boost food production, the university said on Thursday.

The project will allow farmers in parts of Africa to improve the fertility of the soil by spreading a bacteria which boosts nitrogen levels. These bacteria form colonies in nodules they create on the roots of peas, beans, and related species which are able to convert nitrogen from the atmosphere.
‘The soil then improves and farmers can then start growing corn and other arable crops,’ project leader Ken Giller said in the Telegraaf.
Wageningen says more than 200,000 farmers in Ghana, Mozambique, Nigeria, Rwanda and Zimbabwe will benefit from the four-year project.