Tales of barren soils in Malawi never fade without lamentations of chronic hunger and runaway food prices.
Nthaka inaguga has become a familiar refrain as yields dwindle amid skyrocketing fertiliser prices.
A new study shows farmers’ coping techniques are still based on indigenous knowledge and motivated by experiences, especially raging climate crises such as drought and flooding.
Vi c toria Chimasula and Mulalo Rubumbulu, from the University of Johannesburg in South Africa, interviewed 100 farmers in five villages across Balaka District to understand how indigenous and scientific knowledge can help tackle land degradation and enhance climate change adaptation.
The findings show that the farmers from Khwisa, Liwawadzi, Uchendausiku, Mchenga and Kachenga use multiple indicators to determine whether their land is degraded, but the top three are soil fertility, crop quality and yield size.
The report shows that 31 percent mentioned crop failure, 28 fertiliser reliance and 16 declines in crop productivity.
“Though most farmers know scient i f i c l a n d management practices, current adaption strategies rely on expensive resources and are inappropriate for indigenous farmers,” they report.
L ike many Af r i c an c o u n t r i e s , Ma l awi i s exper iencing land degradation due to climate change and unsustainable farming methods.
The country loses about 30 tonnes of topsoil per hectare annually, reports the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations.
Africa is the worst hit by the crisis, with 75 percent of its farmland degraded.
This affects agriculture, which employs about eight in every 10 Malawians and accounts for 30 percent of Malawi’s gross domestic product.
However, only a third of the country is considered cultivable, with about 11 million small-scale farmers farming 5.3 million hectares to feed tthe nation.
The researchers report that farmers in Balaka recognise that human ac t i v i ty causes land degradation.
T h e r e s p o n d e n t s identified five primary causes: unsustainable practices (42 percent) extreme weather conditions (33 percent) chemical inputs (20 percent), population growth (three percent), and urban expansion (two percent).
“Farmers believe that unsustainable farming is caused by deforestation, prolonged farming and shifting cultivation through agricultural burning,” the researchers report.
This hints that they are aware of the changes in their environment, they state.
“Farmers with more years of farming experience displayed a better awareness of land degradation markers. They also employ more indicators and adaption measures than farmers with less experience,” Chimasula and Rubumbulu report.
Land degradation is frequently viewed as an environmental issue but rarely addressed as a social one.
They recommend that the social aspect would be farming in groups and relying on extension service providers such as field assistants.
The scarcity of extension workers has given rise to peer sharing of farming tips through lead farmers, radio messages and digital technologies to boost harvests amid climate change and barren soils.
Today marks Wor ld Soil Day, highlighting the importance of healthy soil andefforts to conserve the vital resource.
“Our planet’s survival depends on the precious link with soil,” FAO reports. “Over 95 percent of our food comes from the soil. Besides, they supply 15 of the 18 naturally occurring chemical elements essential to plants.”
The FAO Conference unanimously endorsed World Soil Day in June 2013 and the UN General Assembly adopted the observance the same year.
This year’s theme—Caring for soils: measure, monitor, manage—underscores the importance of accurate soil data in decision-making and sustainable soil management for food security. Learning from experience, communities are leading the way in conserving and restoring soil health, which is almost everything to their livelihoods and futures.
