Adoption Of Sustainable Land Management Practices Research Articles

Awareness and adoption of sustainable land management practices among smallholder maize farmers in Mpumalanga province of South Africa

ABSTRACT Sustainable land management practices (SLMPs) are important for ensuring environmental protection, food security, poverty alleviation, and economic growth in a nation. The study employed a triple hurdle regression model to analyze the drivers influencing farmers’ awareness and adoption and level of adoption of SLMPs. The results show that farm input source, availability of farm inputs, extension frequency, water sources and marital status, are vital for increasing awareness. It is thus, recommended that actions and policies at public and private levels should be aimed at promoting and improving SLMPs.

Does Information Acquisition Influence the Adoption of Sustainable Land Management Practices? Evidence From Mpumalanga Province South Africa

Agricultural information plays a vital role in adopting agricultural technology. The study explored if information acquisition is related to the adoption of sustainable land management practices (SLMP) and jointly decided in Mpumalanga Province of South Africa. Primary data were collected through face-to-face interviews, using a proportionate random sampling technique to get 250 smallholder farmers to participate in the survey. A seemingly unrelated bivariate probit (SUBP) model and a recursive bivariate probit (RBP) model were adopted to examine the objective. The statistical estimation of the SUBP showed that there is a relationship, an empirical association between information acquisition and SLMP; while RBP estimation showed that information acquisition was exogenous in the adoption model; thus, the decision to acquire information and adopt SLMP was not jointly decided. Therefore, the study presents the determinants of information acquisition alongside with the adoption of SLPM. The result from the SUBP model, indicated that the years spent in school; agricultural extension service; the number of extension visits and the years of farming, influenced both information acquisition and the adoption of SLMP. The cost attached positively influenced the adoption of SLMP; while gender, marital status and age only influenced the information acquisition.

Adoption of multiple sustainable land management practices among irrigator rural farm households of Ethiopia

AbstractUsing a household and plot‐level survey conducted in Ethiopia, this study analyses the difference in farmers' adoption of sustainable land management (SLM) practices between their rainfed and irrigated plots. The paper also investigates the varying influence of different types of irrigation water management systems and associated irrigation technologies on the adoption of SLM practices in irrigated plots. After controlling for heterogeneity among different irrigation water management systems and technologies, we found that access to irrigation play major role in enhancing farmers' motivation to adopt more SLM practices. Furthermore, the combined effect of irrigation water management system and irrigation technology on type and number of SLM practices adopted is quite varied and very significant. The evidence highlights that farmers adopt more SLM practices in their plots with pump irrigation compared with those plots where gravity irrigation is applied because pump irrigation systems enhance complementarities with SLM practices. Finally, the findings underscore that the type of irrigation water management and the irrigation technology applied play an important role in restoring degraded lands and maintaining soil fertility, even when farmers' adoption of irrigation was not explicitly triggered by concerns for soil health.

Does participatory farmer-to-farmer training improve the adoption of sustainable land management practices?

Human-induced land degradation currently threatens the livelihoods of over 3 billion people globally. While Sustainable Land Management (SLM) has emerged as a widely accepted approach for addressing land degradation in agroecosystems, the use of SLM practices remains low among smallholder farmers. Empirical research points to the potentially beneficial role of participatory farmer-to-farmer (F2F) training and knowledge sharing in improving SLM in resource-poor contexts. Drawing theoretical insights from social learning and using cross-sectional data from an agroecology intervention with smallholder farming households in Malawi (n = 609 farming households, comprising 463 households that received F2F training in agroecology and 146 households that did not receive F2F training), we examine the association between participatory agroecology training and the adoption of SLM practices. Findings from tobit regression analysis show that F2F training was positively associated with the use of SLM practices (β = 0.04 p < 0.05) two years following the intervention after accounting for demographic, agricultural and socioeconomic factors. These findings contribute to a growing body of literature that demonstrates the potential of participatory F2F training to improve the uptake and maintenance of SLM technologies. In the context of resource constraints and the associated low agricultural extension in sub-Saharan Africa, participatory F2F training may offer a cost-effective way to reach a wide range of smallholder farmers to promote the use of SLM practices.

Conservation agriculture and cover crop practices to regulate water, carbon and nitrogen cycles in the low-lying Venetian plain

Sustainable land management (SLM) practices, aimed at balancing competitive agricultural production and environmental protection, have been encouraged throughout the EU through policy and subsidisation. Adoption of SLM practices that regulate biogeochemical cycles requires further study, especially given the effects of local pedo-climatic variability. Conservation agriculture (CA) and cover cropping (CC) as opposed to conventional agriculture (CV), were carried out in field experiments and evaluated with modelling studies in order to mitigate the loss of soil organic carbon (SOC) and water and air pollution. All experimental treatments utilised a three-year crop rotation (maize, soybean, and wheat), and crop residues remained either atop the soil surface (CA) or were incorporated with tillage operations (CC and CV). As of March 2016, 17-month recordings from three soil-water monitoring stations per treatment (9 in total) were combined with climatic data to estimate water and N fluxes in the 0–60 cm layer. Carbon fluxes were quantified considering SOC and biomass contents. The biogeochemical model DeNitrification DeComposition (DNDC) was employed to evaluate long-term (105-yr) C dynamics and quantify greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions as affected by SLM practices and climate conditions. Experimental results showed significant differences in crop production between treatments, with lower average yields in CA (5.4 Mg ha−1) than in CC (7.9 Mg ha−1) and CV (8.5 Mg ha−1). Continuous soil cover in CA and CC determined the soil-water balance through increased evapotranspiration and reduced percolation (−30%) relative to CV. On the other hand, CC and CV tillage operations significantly affected NO3-N concentrations, with higher soil solution concentrations in tilled (CV = 74.6 mg l−1; CC = 58.1 mg l−1) than in untilled (CA = 14.0 mg l−1) systems. Model results emphasised that SLM practices responded differently in the short and long terms due to initial inertia to C changes and lower N2O fluxes, followed by higher SOC sequestration, and increased N2O emissions. These results demand time–dependent studies that weigh agro-environmental benefits provided by SLM practices against management alternatives to find a suitable compromise for stakeholders.

A communities Eden – grazing Exclosure success in Ethiopia

ABSTRACTThe traditional significance of livestock to rural communities in Ethiopia has resulted in intense pressures on available grazing areas, resulting in vegetation loss, reduced infiltration and increased runoff, greater erosion and land degradation. Unfortunately, the uptake of sustainable land management (SLM) practices in communal grazing land is constrained by a lack of land tenure security. Recently the International Fund for Agricultural Development, working with the Government of Ethiopia, has invested in the capacity of local administrations, to improve land demarcation and the issuance of both individual and community land certificates. This is concurrent with the promotion of improved SLM, particularly zero grazing of communal lands, known by communities as Exclosures. This pilot study reports the biophysical changes observed in four different Exclosures in the Amhara region compared to adjacent communal lands. Irrespective of age, it was found that vegetative cover, biodiversity levels and infiltration rates, all increased in Exclosures, enhancing ecosystem services and function. Results suggest that Exclosures are most effective for large sites with effective cut and carry forage systems. It is evident that the issuance of land titles increases the adoption of SLM practices. Further studies are required to assess the economic and social impacts of Exclosures.

Do Female Instructors Reduce Gender Bias in Diffusion of Sustainable Land Management Techniques? Experimental Evidence From Mozambique

Agricultural innovation is essential to meet the food requirements of Africa’s growing population. One pathway to increasing yields may be to enhance female farmer productivity. In many settings, married women cultivate plots separated from those of other family members. They face different challenges to productivity, such as deficiencies in inputs, weak property rights, and time constraints. It has long been argued that traditionally male-dominated extension services may also contribute to a gender bias in adoption of new agricultural techniques. If this is true, placing women in extension positions may help other women overcome barriers to adoption posed by inequitable access to agricultural extension services or exposure to inapt information. To better understand the role of gender in the dissemination of sustainable land management (SLM) techniques, this study uses a randomized policy experiment conducted in 200 communities in Mozambique. We examine the impact of training female messengers of SLM techniques on the awareness, knowledge, and adoption of SLM practices by other female farmers. Communities were randomly selected in 2010 to have a female messenger trained in SLM who was encouraged to teach other women the techniques. Using data from panel surveys collected in the experimental areas, we find women’s awareness of pit planting farming techniques increased by 9 percentage points in 2012 and adoption of the technology by 5 percentage points in 2013 in communities with female messengers.

Determinants of Farmers’ Preference for Sustainable Land Management Practices for Maize and Cassava Production in Ogun State, Nigeria

The need to focus policies on enhancing sustainable land management in Africa has become pertinent. This study analysed the determinants of farmers’ adoption of Sustainable Land Management Practices (SLMPs) in crop production in Nigeria. Multi-stage sampling technique was adopted. The SLMPs studied included Structural and Mechanical Erosion Control, Agronomic Practices (AP), Cultivation Practices (CPs) and Soil Management Practices (SMPs). Data from 338 farmers were analysed using descriptive statistics and logit model. Farmers had average of nine years of formal education, 45 per cent participated in cooperatives, 91 per cent accessed extension services, 55 per cent had land tenancy security, 81 per cent use AP more and 47 per cent cultivated undulating farmlands vulnerable to degradation. Farmers’ level of education and their participation in cooperatives positively influenced their adoption of the SLMPs. Overall results showed that the adoption of SLMPs can be enhanced by the development of policy arrangement that will increase farmers’ literacy and encourage them to participate more in cooperatives.