P.A. (Pablo) Tittonell: "Soil productivity and food security in Africa – farmers are not all the same" - Wageningen UR


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21 Jan 2008 16:00

Unit: Wageningen University

Location: Aula, building 362, Gen. Foulkesweg 1, Wageningen

Organisation: Wageningen University

Promotor: prof.dr. K. Giller (Plant Production Systems)

Co Promotor: Dr. M.T. van Wijk, Dr. B. Vanlauwe (?)

While human population in sub-Saharan Africa grows by 3% a year, yields of the major food crops only grow at 1% a year. With decreasing areas of land available for cultivation and severe rates of soil fertility decline in cultivated lands, addressing the problem of poor soil fertility is imperative to achieve food security and improve rural livelihoods. During the Fertiliser Summit of 2006 in Abuja, Nigeria, African leaders agreed that “development will not be achieved without fertilisers” (Le Courrier International on April 14, 2006) and proposed that mineral fertilisers should be promoted to achieve average use intensities of 50 kg ha-1 (against the less than 7 kg ha-1 in use today). However, smallholder farms in sub-Saharan Africa are highly diverse and heterogeneous, and operate in complex and dynamic socio-ecological environments. This affects the potential of such ‘green-revolution’ type of technologies, their accessibility and their adoption by smallholder farmers. Rural families face tradeoffs when making decisions on the allocation of their limited resources for agricultural production, constrained by their agroecological and market opportunities and in line with their longer-term livelihood goals. Such decisions are mostly made around Msimu wa Kupanda, the time to plant. This PhD thesis analyses the major drivers of heterogeneity and diversity of farming systems to identify niches to target alternative interventions for an integrated management of soil fertility.

Title thesis: "Msimu wa Kupanda Targeting resources for integrated soil fertility management within diverse, heterogeneous and dynamic farming systems of East Africa"

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