Abstract
Banana xanthomonas wilt (BXW) has been successfully controlled in major banana growing areas between 2005 and 2008. This was due to combined use of participatory approaches for mobilising technology users such as farmer field schools and Integrated Agricultural Research for development (IAR4D) using cultural practices. However, the approaches focussed on small communities of about 30 to 300 farmers. Between 2010 and 2012, BXW prevalence in the region increased to 34 and 45%. In 2012, the strategy for BXW control changed from approaches that target technology users at community (village level) to those that target many technology users at regional level. Then the action plans of districts and sub-counties were designed to achieve the goal of the regional action plan rather than support action plans of a community. The overall implementation of the regional plan was spearheaded and coordinated by the regional taskforce, instituted by regional stakeholders. BXW prevalence reduced from about 45% in June 2012 to about 13% in September, 2013, with banana production recovery of 40% from the peak of BXW epidemic in all the 10 districts of the Ankole region. The approaches used have been described in this paper to hopefully contribute to scale out BXW control to other main banana growing areas in Uganda and beyond. Key words: Banana, BXW, participatory approaches, scale-out.
Highlights
Many large investments in research and development aim to achieve high rates of adoption but without strategy for encouraging the desired levels of adoption (Millar and Connell, 2010)
This paper describes the adjustments made in the approaches used to organise the various organisations to participate, build capacity for the players for Banana xanthomonas wilt (BXW) control, legislative support, monitoring and evaluating the activities and effectively communicating the successes to enable effective BXW control beyond the small pockets to a regional scale
Already scale-out of BXW control was being effected on the hotspot villages, the platforms of the sub-counties hosting the hotspots had formulated sub-county action plans to mobilise farming communities in all affected villages in the sub-counties using the skills gained in the regional meeting and training meetings at the sub-counties
Summary
Scaling out control of banana xanthomonas wilt from community to regional level: A case from Uganda’s largest banana growing region. Banana xanthomonas wilt (BXW) has been successfully controlled in major banana growing areas between 2005 and 2008. This was due to combined use of participatory approaches for mobilising technology users such as farmer field schools and Integrated Agricultural Research for development (IAR4D) using cultural practices. In 2012, the strategy for BXW control changed from approaches that target technology users at community (village level) to those that target many technology users at regional level. The approaches used have been described in this paper to hopefully contribute to scale out BXW control to other main banana growing areas in Uganda and beyond
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