jonathan muriuki: evergreen agriculture in east africa #beatingfamine
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Evergreen Agriculture in East AfricaTRANSCRIPT
Jonathan MuriukiPresentation at the Beating Famine Conference
ICRAF, Nairobi 11 April 2012
EVERGREEN AGRICULTURE IN EAST AFRICA
Presentation summary
• Farming as usual – is it sustainable?• CAWT• Evergreen agriculture• Characterisation• Germplasm supply• Extension approaches• Knowledge management
HUMID HIGHLANDS
High Pop. Density(Home to > 50 % of region’s pop)
Supply > 50 % of regions staple & cash crops
Important water towers
Rainfed & irrigated agriculture
Major crops: Maize, potato, banana, wheat, coffee, tea, arrow roots
DRYLANDS
81 % of total land mass
Significant in Kenya (75 %);
Tanzania & Ethiopia (50 %)
Pastoralism / Agro-pastoralism
Irrigated and rainfed agriculture
Major crops: Sorghum, millet & cassava, cotton
Eastern Africa Main features
Conventional Farming – This is how we produce food
Trees are kept off cropland and soil is turned over leading to :- - Disruption of soil life- High surface area for moisture loss
Intensive Tillage destroys the biological and ecological integrity of the soil system.
Before Primary Tillage
After Primary Tillage
After Secondary Tillage
“Earthworms are allergic to cold steel!”Credit: Mike Bell 15 July, 2003
Our high potential land is sloppy and vulnerable!
Conventional farming on sloppy lands without conservation leads to • Huge soil losses due to run-off• Quick degradation• Landslides and floods especially
due to lack of tree roots
81% of the land is semi-arid and cycles of floods and droughts together with overgrazing leads to massive degradation
Conservation Agriculture
Minimum Soil Disturbance
Permanent Soil Cover
Crop Rotations and Associations
CA is a Concept
about
Inclusiveness and Integration
Simultaneous Application of Practices
Conservation Agriculture provides beneficial ecosystem services:
1. Food, fiber and biofuels
2. Less erosion, less pollution, clean water, fresh air, healthy soil, natural fertility, higher production, carbon credits, beautiful landscape, sustainability etc., etc. ……
True Conservation is
carbon management.
Soil carbon is a priceless key to the planet’s health and our environmental quality.
Agroforestry
A collective name for land use systems and practices in which woody perennials are deliberately integrated with crops and/or animals on the same land management unit either in a spatial mixture or in a temporal sequence resulting in both ecological and economic interactions between woody and non-woody components.
Types of Agroforestry
1. Agroforests: combinations of perennial species on arable land
2. Home gardens with perennials3. Woodlots or farm forests4. Sylvopastoral systems: Trees in pastures5. Trees on field and farm boundaries6. Evergreen Agriculture: Trees intercropped with field
crops
What is Evergreen Agriculture?
A form of more intensive farming that integrates trees with annual crops, maintaining a green cover on the land throughout the year.
Evergreen farming systems are ‘double- story’ systems that feature both perennial and annual species (food crops and trees).
Trees incorporation into crop fields and agricultural landscapes may contribute to
i. maintaining vegetative soil cover year-round (Boffa,1999),ii. bolstering nutrient supply through nitrogen fixation and nutrient
cycling (Barnes and Fagg, 2003),iii. enhanced suppression of insect pests and weeds (Sileshi et al. 2006), iv. improved soil structure and water infiltration (Chirwa et al. 2007), v. greater direct production of food, fodder, fuel, fiber and income from
products produced by the intercropped trees (Garrity, 2004),vi. enhanced carbon storage both above-ground and belowground
(Makumba et al. 2007),vii. greater quantities of organic matter in soil surface residues
(Akinnifesi et al. 2007), and viii. more effective conservation of above- and belowground biodiversity
(Scherr and McNeeley, 2009).
Types of Evergreen Agriculture
Regeneration method / practice
Conventional agriculture
Conservation agriculture
Deliberate planting
Planned CoAWT Planned CAWT
Assisted natural regeneration
Managed CoAWT
Managed CAWT
Some examples of Evergreen Agriculture in EA
• Fodder shrubs for balanced dairy nutrition (eg Caliandra in the East African Dairy Project)
• Mango and other fruits intercropped in maize systems• Grevillia robusta intercropped in maize for timber,
fodder & fuel• Faidherbia albida in maize production systems (CA being
tested)• Intercropped coppicing leguminous trees in maize
(eg Gliricidia in Malawi tested in Western Kenya and KIbwezi)
• Relay-cropped leguminous species managed as annual green manure (eg Tephrosia)
1. Minimum soil disturbance. The roots of tree/shrub species and the soil fauna take over the tillage function, soil nutrient mobilization and balancing
2. Adequate soil cover. The trees add biomass, which protects the soil and feeds the soil biota (i.e. biological plough). This also ensures better carbon storage than CA alone
3. Trees in the rotation/ intercrop reduce weeds, insect pests and diseases; Thus increasing savings from inputs such as fertilizer and herbicides
When integrated with CA, trees ensure
For successful scaling up, an Evergreen agriculture programme needs
Tree management spacing, niches, CA,
tree crop interactions, etc
Right species, Seeds, and seedling
systems
Favorable policies, extension networks,
capacity building at all levels
Germplasm Practices
Enabling environment
Knowledge to Action with further research
(Rural resource centers)
Characterization of typologies
Support for national scaling up programmes
What have we learned from the impacts already achieved, and about the key farmer incentives
for adoption?
1. There are multiple benefits and repercussions on crop productivity, yield resilience, fodder production, fuelwood availability, timber as an income source, and systems sustainability.
2. Scaling-up models will differ across agro-ecological zones and countries
A portfolio of projects in EA1. Sida funded CAWT – Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia
and Ghana2. IFAD funded scalign up evergreen agriculture
– Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Lesotho3. IFAD funded through CIMMYT - Enhancing
total farm productivity – Building on SIMLESA - Kenya and Ethiopia
Characterizing typologies
Large heterogeneity in performance of any particular AF technology, and hence the need to understand that ‘technology x context’ interaction
• Socio-economic baselines• Land health baselines• Tree diversity surveys• Characterizing seed/seedling supply systems
including testing potential of FMNR
Machakos Mbarali Small farms average size of 1ha and 60%
experience food deficit at some point in the year
Farmers plant exotic species Little knowledge of fertilizer trees Half of seedlings sourced from own or
private nursery and one-fifth of trees naturally regenerated
Demand for seedlings of some species outstrips supply and purchases are common
Farmers lack knowledge on CA and little on AF
Several private nurseries recorded Farmers in collective action groups but
more focused on rural finance than agriculture
Bigger farms average size of 3ha but 41% experience food deficit at some point in the year
Farmers protect indigenous species but many trees are old
Few exotic species planted for fruits and fuelwood
Indigenous knowledge on F. albida as fertilizer trees is common but not many other species
The few planted trees mainly sourced from project and school nurseries
Farmers lack knowledge on CA and little on AF and few have attended training on farming technologies
Few private nurseries recorded and seedling purchase not common
Characterizing typologies
Traditional practices tempered with science
Approaches for germplasm supply
• Rural resource centres
• Satelite nurseries and demonstrations in schools – healthy learning approach
• Group nurseries• Individually operated
nurseries (pseudo-extension)
• FMNR approaches
Approaches for extensionGovernment as the default and most sustainable – ministry of agriculture (not forestry?)
NGOs network – KENDAT, World Vision, others in Tanzania
Approaches – Landcare, rural resource centres, satelite nurseries (with healthy learning), farmer field schools
Demonstrations
Innovative farmers and nursery operators
Demonstrations and participatory trials
• At rural resource centres, satelite nurseries, ATCs
• At least one per demonstration per intervention village
• Also serve as participatory on-farm trials to test acceptance of technology
• High replication to allow biophysical measurements with sufficient precision
Knowledge management and communication
• To enhance scaling up and out• Conducting knowledge needs assessment, designing information
sharing tools like print, electronic/digital and live folk media.• Developing appropriate knowledge and information sharing
products (KISP) - include, print media; electronic/digital media to enhance information flow, learning and sharing at different levels of governance
• Facilitating promotion of rural resource centres at district levels to enhance cross regional knowledge and information sharing.
• Setting up of web pages within the ICRAF and other partner organizations websites and interactive sites such as phone-web system.
• Communication strategy developed with all stakeholders
Ecosystem degradation can rarely be reversed without actions that address one or more indirect drivers of change:
– public participation in decision-making– cultural factors– technological change
Collectively these factors influence the level of production and consumption of ecosystem services and sustainability of the production base.
DRIVERS OF CHANGE
AHSANTE
Creating an Evergreen Agriculture