Changing lives and landscapes
By Wambui Kamiru In Ethiopia and Malawi farmers are creating canopies of trees from natural regeneration that provide cover for crops growing beneath them, nutrients for the crops, fodder for animals, firewood and other indirect benefits like carbon sequestration. Over 100 million nitrogen-fixing ‘fertilizer trees’ will be planted on Ethiopian farms, according to an announcement [...]
When the pioneer of Farmer Managed Natural Regeneration (FMNR), Tony Rinaudo held a workshop in Kijabe, Kenya, the invited participants from the Beating Famine conference were baffled by the simplicity of what they heard and saw. During the FMNR tour, the message was clear and simple.
By Elizabeth Kahurani, ASB Communications At the opening of Beating Famine: Sustainable Food Security through Land Regeneration in a Changing Climate conference in Nairobi, participants heard that land degradation is a major factor responsible for increased frequency of drought spells in sub-Saharan Africa. The drivers are many and varied. For example, it was noted that [...]
By Mieke Bourne and Yvonne Otieno Environmental degradation can only be reversed by addressing direct and indirect drivers of change. The said drivers of change include public participation in decision-making, cultural factors and technological change. Collectively these factors influence the level of production and consumption of ecosystem services and sustainability of the production base. This [...]
A recent article by environmental writer David Njagi addresses a welcome trend happening in parts of rural Kenya, especially around the Mt Kenya area. The female farmers who in many cases are part of women farmer groups are “increasingly adopting of agroforestry” claims David. Studies carried out at the World Agroforestry Centre show that adopting [...]
Websites and blogs that feature quality information about indigenous fruit trees are few. As organisations such as the World Agroforestry Centre continue to increase their research output regarding indigenous fruit trees, communication of information about indigenous tree species as an aid to crop productivity, land health and livelihoods needs to continue. Therefore it is terrific [...]
A consortium of international partners, known as the African Orphan Crops consortium, plans to identify at least two dozen African food crops and tree species that have been neglected by science because they are not economically important on the global market. The idea is to genetically sequence and breed some of the continent’s most important, [...]
Bioversity International has released a series of excellent booklets on priority African tree species such as the Baobab and the Shea Butter tree, complementing the Agroforestree database; both aim to provide information on important species that are native to sub-Saharan Africa.
