Climate-Smart Agriculture Technologies for the Sahel and Horn of Africa. Clearinghouse Technical Report Series 009

Abstract

This catalogue describes a suite of farming solutions for drylands in the Sahel and Horn of Africa useful to climate change adaptation and mitigation. It is based upon the interventions of the Technologies for African Agricultural Transformation Program ( TAAT ). This program is led by the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture ( IITA ) that has pioneered new approaches for the deployment of proven technologies to African farmers. TAAT arose as a common effort of IITA and the African Development Bank (AfDB), and is an important component of the latter’s Feed Africa Strategy. TAAT is currently advancing over 76 technologies through 88 interventions in 28 countries including nine countries in the Sahelian agro-ecological zone: Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Senegal, South Sudan, Sudan and Ethiopia. Innovations brokered by TAAT and featured in this catalogue also extend to countries located in the Horn of Africa (Djibouti, Eritrea, Somalia and Somaliland) as an extension of the Sahel. This zone is hugely impacted by climate change in terms of intensified drought and extreme weather, and this catalogue combines TAAT technologies that are useful within climate action efforts, including those being organized by The African Development Bank. TAAT organized around 15 “Compacts” that represent priorities in terms of achieving Africa’s potential in achieving food security and advancing its role in global agricultural trade. Nine of these Compacts relate to specific priority value chains of rice, wheat, maize, sorghum and millet, cassava, sweet potato, bean, fish and small livestock. Weaknesses in the production of commodities are viewed as responsible for Africa’s food insecurity, need for excessive importation of food, and unrealized expansion of Africa’s food exports. This catalogue assists in the designing toolkits for rural development projects in African drylands and is intended for extension supervisors, project managers and investors. The Programme for Integrated Development and Adaptation to Climate Change in the Niger Basin (PIDACC) operates through the Niger River Authority to directly address climate change adaptation and livelihood improvement in Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Cote D’Ivoire, Guinea, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, and Chad. This catalogue was produced in part to contribute to its training efforts. Sahelian farmers that adopt and exchange improved crop varieties, proactively manage pest outbreaks, better utilize water resources, and maintain soil fertility are in a much stronger position to secure food and income for their families and participate in meaningful climate actions. Sustainable intensification of dryland agriculture generates mitigative effects by increased biomass productivity and standing carbon stocks leading to carbon sequestration in soil organic matter, actions that further avoid greenhouse gas emissions from fertilizers the Horn of Africa is an AfDB regional project to deploy proven climate-smart agriculture technologies in Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan, and Sudan. This catalogue is intended to assist it to improve agro-sylvo-pastoral productivity and profits and enhance the adaptive capacity of the populations to better prepare for and manage climate risks. An important outcome of better managed and more productive lands is to reduce human conflicts in some of its countries. TAAT partners with the Horn of Africa to provide technical backstopping.