adminMalvern Mupandawana
AFRICA is one of the most vulnerable continents to climate change and climate variability, a situation aggravated by the interaction of ‘multiple stresses’, occurring at various levels, and generally low adaptive capacity due to lack of resources. As is the case in many sub-Saharan countries, Zimbabwe economy is vulnerable to current climate sensitivity, with huge economic impacts, and this vulnerability is exacerbated by existing developmental challenges such as endemic poverty, complex governance and institutional dimensions; limited access to capital, including markets, infrastructure and technology; ecosystem degradation; and complex disasters such as the 91 /92 drought and Cyclone Eline.
These in turn have contributed to Zimbabwe’s weak adaptive capacity, increasing the country’s vulnerability to projected effects of climate change.
To counter impact of climate change, farmers have adopted a myriad of strategies, some with more success than others. Some of these strategies are explained below.
Open pollinated varieties (OPV)
OPVs have a long time been proffered as optimal for use by resource poor farmers under adverse weather conditions. OPVs perform as well as hybrids or better under the low-input conditions of many smallholder farmers in Zimbabwe, but farmers need information and training about how to use them properly.
An OPV variety is produced by random cross pollination (there is no pollination control).
The pollination of the plants in the field is not controlled, which means the crop will not be uniform, for example the crop will vary in plant height, the colour of silks will vary, the cobs will not be the same size and shape and the plants will mature at different times.
A study by a maize and wheat research centre, CIMMYT to assess the effectiveness of a large-scale maize seed relief effort in Zimbabwe during 2003-07 showed that, even among vulnerable, small-scale farmers living on the edge of survival under the most difficult conditions, a livelihood-saving technology like quality seed of open-pollinated maize varieties (OPVs) is not enough, without knowledge on how best to use it. Farmers can save grain of OPVs from their harvest and sow it the following year without the yield or other qualities of the variety diminishing substantially.
Hybrids normally yield more than OPVs under favourable conditions, but “recycling” the seed in subsequent seasons will result in a significant loss of that yield and of other advantages; farmers must purchase fresh seed each season to retain them.
Drought tolerant varieties
Zimbabwe has a long history in hybrid seed production. In fact, it was the second country after US to produce hybrid seed. Over the years a lot of drought tolerant varieties have been developed to mitigate the effects of droughts. An example of this are the short season varieties, dwarf maize seed among others.
Research has shown that in drier parts of the country such as Matebeleland North and South and Masvingo provinces, even these so called drought tolerant varieties may not necessarily thrive.
Drought tolerant crops combined with conservation agriculture practices had some degree of success but most farmers often found the latter to be quite tedious hence adoption was limited.
Conservation agriculture (CA)
Conservation agriculture is claimed to be a panacea for the problems of poor agricultural productivity and soil degradation in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). It is actively promoted by international research and development organisations, with such strong advocacy that critical debate is stifled.
Claims for the potential of CA in Africa are based on widespread adoption in the Americas, where the effects of tillage were replaced by heavy dependence on herbicides and fertilisers. CA is said to increase yields, to reduce labour requirements, improve soil fertility and reduce erosion.
Yet empirical evidence is not clear and consistent on many of these points nor is it always clear which of the principles of CA contribute to the desired effects.
Although cases can be found where such claims are supported there are equally convincing scientific reports that contradict these claims.
Concerns include decreased yields often observed with CA, increased labour requirements when herbicides are not used, an important gender shift of the labour burden to women and a lack of mulch due to poor productivity and due to the priority given to feeding of livestock with crop residues.
Despite the publicity claiming widespread adoption of CA, the available evidence suggests virtually limited adoption in Zimbabwe.
Enterprise diversification
Apart from CA a lot of the communal farmers are increasingly adopting crop diversification as a strategy to mitigate the deleterious effects of drought. Drought tolerant crops such as millets, sorghum are becoming a major part of the crop mix for resource poor farmers.
Malvern Mupandawana is a Research Economist and Consultant with a keen interest in Macro-Economics, Agriculture, Development and New Business Models. He has presented and published his work in USA, UK, Zimbabwe, Canada and China. You can email him on [email protected]. His twitter handle is @malmupa
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