The Togolese Agricultural Research Institute (ITRA) is the largest entity conducting agricultural research. It accounts for more than 70 percent of Togo’s full-time equivalent agricultural researchers.

The Togolese Agricultural Research Institute (ITRA) has a mandate to research crops, livestock, fisheries, natural resource management, and food technology.

In addition to its headquarters and stations in Lomé, the institute operates research centers in each of the country’s four agroecological zones: the coast, forest, humid savannah, and dry savannah.In addition to ITRA, the Plant Protection Directorate (DPV) and the Agricultural Statistics, Information, and Documentation Directorate (DSID) are the only other government entities that conduct agricultural R&D, albeit at very limited levels.

The three higher education agencies that conduct agricultural R&D—the Advanced School of Agronomics (ESA), Faculty of Science, and Advanced School of Biological and Food Technology (ESTBA)—all fall under the University of Lomé (UL). ESA is the largest of the three and conducts research on plant virology, biotechnology, soil fertility management, farm mechanization, postharvest, conservation, and socioeconomics. No nongovernmental organizations or private-sector companies were identified as conducting in-house R&D; some, however, do outsource their research to ITRA and UL.