Drivers of land use change and household determinants of sustainability in smallholder farming systems of Eastern Uganda |
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Authors: | Peter Ebanyat Nico de Ridder Andre de Jager Robert J Delve Mateete A Bekunda Ken E Giller |
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Institution: | (1) Department of Soil Science, Makerere University, P.O. Box 7062, Kampala, Uganda;(2) Plant Production Systems Group, Wageningen University, P.O. Box 430, 6700 AK Wageningen, The Netherlands;(3) Wageningen University and Research Centre-Agricultural Economics Research Institute (LEI), P.O. Box 29703, 2502 LS Den Haag, The Netherlands;(4) Tropical Soil Biology and Fertility Institute of International Centre for Tropical Agriculture (TSBF-CIAT), P.O. Box 30677-00100, Nairobi, Kenya |
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Abstract: | Smallholder farming systems in sub-Saharan Africa have undergone changes in land use, productivity and sustainability. Understanding
of the drivers that have led to changes in land use in these systems and factors that influence the systems’ sustainability
is useful to guide appropriate targeting of intervention strategies for improvement. We studied low input Teso farming systems
in eastern Uganda from 1960 to 2001 in a place-based analysis combined with a comparative analysis of similar low input systems
in southern Mali. This study showed that policy-institutional factors next to population growth have driven land use changes
in the Teso systems, and that nutrient balances of farm households are useful indicators to identify their sustainability.
During the period of analysis, the fraction of land under cultivation increased from 46 to 78%, and communal grazing lands
nearly completely disappeared. Cropping diversified over time; cassava overtook cotton and millet in importance, and rice
emerged as an alternative cash crop. Impacts of political instability, such as the collapse of cotton marketing and land management
institutions, of communal labour arrangements and aggravation of cattle rustling were linked to the changes. Crop productivity
in the farming systems is poor and nutrient balances differed between farm types. Balances of N, P and K were all positive
for larger farms (LF) that had more cattle and derived a larger proportion of their income from off-farm activities, whereas
on the medium farms (MF), small farms with cattle (SF1) and without cattle (SF2) balances were mostly negative. Sustainability
of the farming system is driven by livestock, crop production, labour and access to off-farm income. Building private public
partnerships around market-oriented crops can be an entry point for encouraging investment in use of external nutrient inputs
to boost productivity in such African farming systems. However, intervention strategies should recognise the diversity and
heterogeneity between farms to ensure efficient use of these external inputs. |
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