Conservation agriculture and sustainable development in Africa: insights from Tanzania

In recent years, conservation agriculture (CA) has been increasingly promoted as the best solution to sustainable agricultural development in Africa. Proponents argue that it offers increased yields, reduced labour requirements, improved soil fertility and climate mitigation benefits. At the same ti...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Natural resources forum 2017-11, Vol.41 (4), p.209-219
Main Author: Scheba, Andreas
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Access
Agricultural conservation
Agricultural development
Agriculture
Availability
Case studies
Climate change
Conservation
Conservation agriculture
Demand
Economics
Farmers
Farms
Fertility
Fieldwork
Governance
Impact analysis
Infrastructure
Institutional constraints
Labor demand
Markets
Mitigation
Perceptions
REDD
Relevance
Schools
Small farms
Socioeconomic factors
Socioeconomics
Soil conservation
Soil fertility
Soil improvement
Sustainability
Sustainable agriculture
Sustainable development
Tanzania
Transformation
Villages
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Summary:In recent years, conservation agriculture (CA) has been increasingly promoted as the best solution to sustainable agricultural development in Africa. Proponents argue that it offers increased yields, reduced labour requirements, improved soil fertility and climate mitigation benefits. At the same time, a growing number of scholars have questioned its promises, impacts and applicability to small, resource‐poor African farmers. To add to the debate, this paper draws on fieldwork from two case study villages in the Lindi region of Tanzania. It scrutinizes CA farmer field schools’ performances, the impact on villagers’ perceptions of core principles and socio‐economic/institutional constraints related to its adoption. It demonstrates how farmer field schools failed to meet initial expectations because of challenges associated with economic benefits, labour demand, availability and accessibility of inputs, infrastructure, governance, and stakeholder relations. It argues that the applicability to and adoption of CA depends on the transformation of individual perceptions as well as structural constraints, including credit facilities, markets for inputs, infrastructure and availability of labour, which has long been a limitation of donor‐initiated programmes. Under constraining socio‐economic and institutional conditions, questions continue to loom large over the long‐term applicability of CA to African smallholder farmers.
ISSN:0165-0203
1477-8947
DOI:10.1111/1477-8947.12123