Fundamental changes needed to achieve sustainable agriculture

“Either sustainable agricultural intensification is adopted in the Central Africa region, or we may find ourselves in a situation of war, not because of politics or ethnic differences, but war for food and space.”

Rice farmers in Bugesera use a special type of fertilizer which is more appropriate for their crops. (photo Marie-Brigitte Kabalira)

That was the stark warning by the director general of the Interna­tional Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), Dr. Nteranya Sanginga, at the opening of a 4-day CIALCA (Consortium for Improving Agri­culture-based Livelihoods in Central Africa) conference on Challenges and opportunities for agricultural intensification of the humid highland systems of sub-Saharan Africa, in Kigali, where farm researchers, devel­opment experts and other stakeholders were gathered to take stock of agricultural development efforts in Central and sub-Saharan Africa and chart a path towards food security for the region .

The conference was highly relevant to the challenges that the Cen­tral Africa region is currently facing, like climate change, rapid popu­lation growth and intense land pressure. “In Rwanda and Burundi we have a huge population density with almost 400 inhabitants per square kilometer. Can the land support the population we have?” Sanginga asked, adding that it’s time to focus on practical, evidence-based solutions that will forever end the cycle of hunger, poverty and civil conflict.

The conference did not only focus on the existing problems, sev­eral practical solutions that would help move the region toward food security were identified and recommended. Participants agreed that agricultural research and development efforts should focus on sustainable agricultural intensification, which combines the most effective and sustainable approaches to improving farm yields. Challenges, problems and successes faced while trying to imple­ment sustainable agricultural intensification in different places were shared by a variety of speakers.

The research done by CIALCA on smallholder production systems in central Africa shows how small scale farmers and their large fami­lies are affected due to low productivity caused by poor soils, and their inability to improve that because of the limited availability of crop manure to improve the quality of the soil and financial con­straints to get access to mineral fertilizers.

Crop intensification

The need for and importance of research and scientific innovations in improving agriculture productivity was especially highlighted in the conference, and the deputy director general of Rwanda Agricul­tural Board (RAB), Daphrose Gahakwa, pointed out how Rwanda has been able to achieve great things because of them in just four years. “In 2007, 20 out of 30 districts in Rwanda were reported as be­ing food insecure. Today, as a result of increased public investment in agriculture and the country’s National Crop Intensification Program, all of Rwanda’s dis­tricts are now food secure. All that has been a result of being at the forefront of using research and scientific innovations to de­velop agriculture,” she said.

Ernest Ruzindaza, the perma­nent secretary for agriculture in Rwanda, noted the importance of linking research knowledge to the needs of farmers on the ground in order to find relevant and adequate solutions for them and taking a more systemic ap­proach to ensure food security and eradicate poverty. Boudy van Schagen, knowledge shar­ing specialist at CIALCA, echoed that sentiment by saying that “we need the researchers to be acutely aware of farmer realities. That way, scientific knowledge can have the kind of impact we all hope for.”

The participants in the confer­ence were able to witness what Rwanda is doing on a field trip to different regions of the country. In Bugesera in Eastern Province, they witnessed how rice farmers in Ruhuha are benefiting from technological innovations in im­proving their productivity.

The fertilizer that is used, Urea, is usually a powder. The Interna­tional Fertilizer Development Center (IFDC) in partnership with CIALCA and RAB, brought a new technology in form of a ma­chine that turns the powder into granules that they can directly put in the ground between plants of rice, and it will stay longer be­cause it dissolves more slowly and has more time to spread to the plants as it cannot be washed away by water.

Leah Mukamwiza, a 56-year old rice farmer who is using the new granules, said she prefers it to the powder that had to be applied several times in one sea­son. “With the granules, we only apply the fertilizer once in a sea­son. The productivity has also increased as I used to harvest 3 bags of rice, but I can easily get 5 bags now,” she explained.

Paradigm change

Grace Kanonge, from the uni­versity of Zimbabwe’s research team, was much impressed by what was being done. She said that the idea of transforming powder fertilizers into granules is something she was taking home with her and hoping to start applying it. “I believe it can be used for other crops besides the rice,” she pointed out.

Sustainable intensification of agriculture is possible and can be successfully implemented as the results in Rwanda have dem­onstrated. Daphrose Gahakwa commented on how Rwanda has been able to generate and develop demand driven agricul­tural innovative technologies all the while preserving natural resources. “The country is now able to export surplus crops to neighboring countries and is the only country in the region not dealing with food crisis,” she re­marked

Dr. Hans Herren, president of the Millennium Institute, said that this is the right time to de­cide which way to take agricul­ture in the future. He pointed out the need to find and imple­ment solutions that restore and protect the biodiversity, and ad­vised that the continued use of land for roads and house build­ing as the population grows should be controlled as it greatly reduces the land for cultivating and affects the livelihoods not only of the farmers, but also the whole population.

Herren showed that the pro­grams will be more successful when scientific research and policymaking are connected and work hand in hand. “Science has come up and is still coming up with a lot of good innova­tions but the policies have not followed,” he said. “Business-as-usual is not an option; we need to change the paradigm. We need a fundamental shift, some­thing different, not more of the quick fixes.”

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Posted by Marie-Brigitte Kabalira on Oct 31 2011. Filed under National. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.