The National Research Fund of Kenya hosted a workshop in Nairobi to launch the new set of joint bilateral Kenya-South Africa research projects supported on the South African side by the National Research Foundation. Prof. Dave Berger of the Molecular Plant Pathogen Interactions research group in FABI and Department of Plant and Soil Sciences attended the workshop together with his counterpart, Prof. Mathews Dida, a well-known plant breeder from Maseno University in the west of Kenya.  Their collaborative project will address the population genetics of the fungal pathogen that causes grey leaf spot of maize in small-holder farms in both countries, and involves FABI PhD student David Nsibo, co-supervised by Dr Irene Barnes.  The workshop created the opportunity for fellow scientists from a broad range of fields to interact, a good step towards transdisciplinary thinking.