Sustainable Agriculture and Food: Four volume set (Earthscan Reference Collections)

388 Modern Agricultural Reforms

Table 16.2 Sustainable soil and water conservation highlights

Australia More than 2000 community groups involving one third of all Australian

farmers are now able to tackle local environmental problems that

cannot be solved within a single farm boundary; new forms of collective

action are emerging, with farmers trying to be visionary about the future

rather than victims of circumstance; these land-care groups are formally

linked to existing institutions, including national-level policy makers

Brazil A government programme, EPAGRI, in Santa Catarina has pioneered

the use of more than 60 species of green manures and cover crops

through its micro-watershed programme; some 38,000 farmers have

been reached, with yields more than doubling and farmers needing less

labour for weeding and ploughing

Burkina

Faso

A government programme, Projet d’Aménagement de Terroirs et

Conservation de Ressources (PATECORE), working with farmers in 240

villages has so improved 10,000ha of unproductive drylands with

conservation measures that the average family’s food deficit of 645kg

year–1 at the beginning of the programme has been turned around to a

150kg surplus

Honduras Green manures and cover crops have so improved organic matter in

soils that crop yields have more than tripled for several thousand

farmers

India A wide range of non-government and government initiatives throughout

India have led to substantial benefits for local people. New linkages

between external agencies and local communities are resulting in the

recovery of barren lands, an average doubling of crop yields, increased

crop diversity, improved well-water availability, greater social cohesion,

alternative forms of credit management by local groups, and the

federation of local groups to ensure influence over higher-level

institutions and political interests. Notable successes are in Karnataka

(by MYRADA), Tamil Nadu (by The Society for People’s Education and

Economic Change with local government), Rajasthan (by Government

of Rajasthan), Uttar Pradesh (by Doon Valley Integrated Watershed

Management Programme), Gujarat (by Aga Khan Rural Support

Programme) and Maharashtra (by Indo-German Watershed

Development Programme)

Kenya The government is pioneering a participatory approach to soil and water

conservation; with the mobilization of communities, some 100,000 farms

are now conserved each year, on which there have also been increases

in food production, diversification into new enterprises, reduction in

resource degradation, and increases in labour demand and land prices

Lesotho

and Malawi

The innovative rural action learning areas initiative is building upon the

best practices of farmers and linking them to research and extension

organizations; new forms of collaboration are emerging between

institutions throughout southern Africa, with a particular focus on

learning loops to improve performance