Jonathan Muriuki: Evergreen Agriculture in East Africa #BeatingFamine

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)

– d.garrity@cgiar.org

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