Conservation Agriculture (CA) is being advocated to enhance soil health and sustain long term crop productivity in the developing world. One of CA’s key principles is the maintenance of soil cover often by retaining a proportion of crop residues on the field as mulch. Yet smallholder crop–livestock systems across Africa and Asia face trade-offs among various options for crop residue use.
In sub-Saharan Africa problems associated with water scarcity are aggravated by increasing demands for food and water, climate change and environmental degradation. Livestock keeping, an important livelihood strategy for smallholder farmers in Africa, is a major consumer of water, and its water consumption is increasing with increasing demands for livestock products.
In its broadest sense, water productivity (WP) is the net return for a unit of water used. Improvement of water productivity aims at producing more food, income, better livelihoods and ecosystem services with less water. There is considerable scope for improving water productivity of crop, livestock and fisheries at field through to basin scale.
We use experimental data collected in 8 African countries to investigate whether a decentralized approach can promote the adoption of agricultural innovations. This participatory model is based on the creation of so-called ‘innovation platforms’ where local stakeholders meet and seek to identify problems and prioritize solutions.
This paper contributes to the literature on Indigenous health, human dimensions of climate change, and place-based dimensions of health by examining the role of environment for Inuit health in the context of a changing climate.
Climate has obvious direct effects on agricultural production. The reverse is more apparent than ever as greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture are tallied. The development and effective diffusion of new agricultural practices and technologies will largely shape how and how well farmers mitigate and adapt to climate change.
This paper contributes to the literature on Indigenous health, human dimensions of climate change, and place-based dimensions of health by examining the role of environment for Inuit health in the context of a changing climate.
Rain-fed agriculture will remain the dominant source of staple food production and the livelihood foundation of the majority of the rural poor in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Greatly enhanced investment in agriculture by a broad range of stakeholders will be required if this sector is to meet the food security requirements of tomorrow’s Africa.
Effective responses to climate change require innovation. ► The concept of social innovation highlights collective action in local climate adaptation. ► Institutional and technological aspects of climate adaptation are inextricably interlinked. ► Individuals adapt and practice innovation through complex interactions between institutions and actors at multiple scales.
History shows that farmers and their supporting institutions have been successful in introducing technological innovations to respond and adapt to environmental and socioeconomic challenges. Innovation itself is a mechanism by which society adapt to changing resource endowments, and which is in turn driven by social and cultural values.