Conservation agriculture Tanzania_casestudy.pdf - Sokoine ...

conservation agriculture technology was based on animal traction, requiring goodand confident draught animal handlers—youths; wealthy female household headswere not among them. Their participation was limited to buying draught-animalimplements, mainly rippers and ox cultivators, since they expected their sons orneighbouring youths to operate them.Land tenure system and adopting conservation agricultureAmost 70% of the land is owned, through inheritance or purchase, by the concernedfarmers; the remaining 30% is rented. Around Njelenje village, land rent variedfrom TZS 15,000/ha in the lowlands to TZS 30,000/ha in the highlands. Thestudy found that farmers were hesitant to plant beans or cover crops in rentedplots. Planting beans risked the owner revoking the rent contract to benefit from theresidual nutrients. If they planted beans, they strove to rent it the following seasonto plant maize, if the owner did not revoke the contract. Dry weather, low soilfertility and family land ownership drove farmers to adopt conservation agriculture.Therefore, conservation agriculture encouraged land ownership.Entry points and pathwaysFrequent drought offered a challenge for conservation agriculture in Wanging’ombeWard. Most land, over 80%, was ploughed by oxen, presenting an opportunity tointroduce animal-drawn water-harvesting rippers and subsoilers. Presently, morethan 200 households are involved in conservation agriculture in the study area.Most belong to farmer field schools, which build household and group capacity.They attempt to empower farmers to demand, adopt and scale up conservationagriculture and disseminate it.Government policies affecting conservation agricultureThe government started promoting conservation agriculture through interventions,including two villages by NAEP/SOFRAIP, 12 villages under the Soil FertilityInitiative (2001–2003) and nine villages under the Technical Cooperation Project(2004–2006) (table 4).Government regulations also influenced conservation agriculture. Free and liberalizedsupply and produce markets have resulted in more expensive chemical fertilizers andother supplies. At the same time, tractors and animal-drawn implements are tax exempt,making them more affordable. At this early stage, it is difficult to determine what impact,if any, government policies have had on conservation agriculture.Conservation agriculture equipment was expensive for the poor and very poorhouseholds. Although loans for equipment were available, some poor farmers wereafraid they might not be able to repay them. Poor farmers were not likely to buyequipment on credit without high government financial support to groups. In thiscase, government policies negatively affected conservation agriculture adoption.Also, when the government has no control over agricultural product prices andthey are lower than supply prices, the adoption of conservation agriculture will benegative. The income expected from crops grown using conservation agricultureequipment will be insufficient to pay off the equipment.136 Mkomwa et al.