National governments, International Fund for Agricultural Development’s (IFAD) , Nigerian Forestry Department, National Agricultural Research Institute of Niger, Maradi Integrated Development Project, Aguie Desert Community Initiative and others
Nutrition context
High undernourishment in dryland farming systems due to limited agricultural productivity, on-going land degradation, highly variable climate and lack of enabling institutional environment to improve nutrition conditions
Key characteristics of the food system(s) considered
Smallholder farming systems in the drylands of western Africa where land degradation and severely limits agricultural productivity and remoteness from decision-making challenges sustainable food production. Food systems are highly vulnerable to climate variability/change and price fluctuations demanding urgent action to improve local production of nutritious food through soil and water conservation.
Key characteristics of the investment made
- Direct investments and food-for-work based initiatives to improve soil and water conservation as a key strategy for improved food and nutrition security.
- Multi-stakeholder and participatory approaches used to design and implement soil and water conservation practices
Key actors and stakeholders involved (including through south-south/triangular exchanges, if any)
Multi-stakeholder process involving local smallholder farmers, NGOs, national governments, international development agencies.
Key changes (intended and unintended) as a result of the investment/s
Soil fertility improved, erosion controlled, agroforestry systems established
Challenges faced
- Partially limited continuity of investments.
- Local natural resources, agro-ecology, institutions and market impacts often not differentiates according to pronounced diversity of local farming contexts. However soil and water conservation depends largely on the suitability of specific practices in a given biophysical and socio-economic context. Limited knowledge of biophysical and institutional pre-conditions has restricted comparative analysis on agricultural intensification.
- It remains largely unknown/under-investigated in which ways farmers creatively fine-tune and combine trade-offs in space and time to find the best possible way of integrating the high variability in natural resources, markets and institutions with the scarce resources they have available.
- The perceived importance of particular factors that facilitate soil and water conservation can vary significantly between farmers, extension staff and other stakeholders.
Lessons/Key messages
Four principles are proposed to advance future implementation and research on soil and water conservation as a land-based adaptation strategy:
Assess socio-ecological drivers of soil and water conservation: The fundamentally interwoven biophysical and socio-economic drivers need to be fully captured to improve our understanding of soil and water conservation. Scale issues and critical thresholds need to receive particular attention.
Investigate farmers’ management of resource variability: Due consideration needs to be given to assessing the ways in which farmers manage biophysical and socio-economic variability in the context of soil and water conservation and how they balance trade-offs in the input of labour, organic material and other scarce resources, based on their local knowledge. This requires an in-depth understanding of the relation between local and scientific knowledge.
Understand the key dynamics of soil and water conservation: In framing soil and water conservation as a dynamic process, major efforts are required to go beyond static assessments of factors that drive the uptake of particular practices. Gaining insight into the motivation, rate and time of intensification, modification, abandonment and replacement would provide the missing links in order to better understand crucial dynamics in soil and water conservation.
Test and integrate diverse research methods: It is imperative for future studies to systematically test the role of different methods of analysis, including quantitative and qualitative approaches, in determining the dynamic socio- ecological drivers of soil and water conservation. Besides statistical methods such as Tobit models, which offer valuable opportunities to account for the intensity of adoption, configurational comparative methods such as Qualitative Comparative Analysis should be explored more systematically to support the assessment of conjunctural causation and other complex causal relations.
Reference: Sietz, D. and Van Dijk, H. (2015) Land-based adaptation to global change: What drives soil and water conservation in western Africa? Global Environmental Change 33: 131-141.
Dr. Diana Sietz
Proponent
Date/Timeframe and location
1980–2012, Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger and Nigeria
Main responsible entity
National governments, International Fund for Agricultural Development’s (IFAD) , Nigerian Forestry Department, National Agricultural Research Institute of Niger, Maradi Integrated Development Project, Aguie Desert Community Initiative and others
Nutrition context
High undernourishment in dryland farming systems due to limited agricultural productivity, on-going land degradation, highly variable climate and lack of enabling institutional environment to improve nutrition conditions
Key characteristics of the food system(s) considered
Smallholder farming systems in the drylands of western Africa where land degradation and severely limits agricultural productivity and remoteness from decision-making challenges sustainable food production. Food systems are highly vulnerable to climate variability/change and price fluctuations demanding urgent action to improve local production of nutritious food through soil and water conservation.
Key characteristics of the investment made
- Direct investments and food-for-work based initiatives to improve soil and water conservation as a key strategy for improved food and nutrition security.
- Multi-stakeholder and participatory approaches used to design and implement soil and water conservation practices
Key actors and stakeholders involved (including through south-south/triangular exchanges, if any)
Multi-stakeholder process involving local smallholder farmers, NGOs, national governments, international development agencies.
Key changes (intended and unintended) as a result of the investment/s
Soil fertility improved, erosion controlled, agroforestry systems established
Challenges faced
- Partially limited continuity of investments.
- Local natural resources, agro-ecology, institutions and market impacts often not differentiates according to pronounced diversity of local farming contexts. However soil and water conservation depends largely on the suitability of specific practices in a given biophysical and socio-economic context. Limited knowledge of biophysical and institutional pre-conditions has restricted comparative analysis on agricultural intensification.
- It remains largely unknown/under-investigated in which ways farmers creatively fine-tune and combine trade-offs in space and time to find the best possible way of integrating the high variability in natural resources, markets and institutions with the scarce resources they have available.
- The perceived importance of particular factors that facilitate soil and water conservation can vary significantly between farmers, extension staff and other stakeholders.
Lessons/Key messages
Four principles are proposed to advance future implementation and research on soil and water conservation as a land-based adaptation strategy:
Reference: Sietz, D. and Van Dijk, H. (2015) Land-based adaptation to global change: What drives soil and water conservation in western Africa? Global Environmental Change 33: 131-141.