Improved food production by use of soil fertility amendment strategies in the central highlands of Kenya

Abstract

Declining soil and crop productivity is a major problem facing smallholder farmers in eastern and central highlands of Kenya. This is caused by continuous cropping without addition of adequate external soil fertility inputs. A multidisciplinary and farmers participatory trial is being implemented in the main maize growing areas of the central highlands of Kenya to address the above problem. The trial is farmer-researcher managed with a general expected output of offering small-scale resource poor farmers feasible soil management techniques for combating soil nutrient depletion. Results for the two seasons reported here indicate that the general maize performance may be improved by combining fast decomposing plant biomass (e.g. Tithonia diversifolia) and half the recommended rate of nitrogen fertilizer.