Opportunities and Challenges for Sustainable Agricultural Land Management in Kenya
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Date
2006
Authors
Waswa, F.
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
School of Environmental Studies and Human Sciences,
Kenyatta University
Abstract
Despite technological advances in land management (i.e. use, care and
improvement) across the world, land degradation not only persists, but
also continues to escalate, thus threatening the livelihood of many
agriculturally dependent communities. Projections of world food situation into
2020for instance singles out potential scarcity of maize - an important cereal in
Kenya, whose demand will have to be met by a 40% increase in grain production,
however on a steadily deteriorating land resource (Pinstrup-Andersen et al., 1999).
Estimates from the Global Assessment of Soil Degradation (GLASOD) indicate
that degradation of crop land and pasture land is most extensive in Africa,
affecting 65% and 31%of the two systems respectively (Scherr and Yadav, 1996).
In Kenya, 73% of land degradation is attributed to overgrazing and arable
agriculture, while conversion of arid and semi-arid lands to other uses accounts
for some 14% of land degradation (Mutiso, 1991). With increasing population
pressure, only little evidence exists to indicate that this condition may after all
not be disadvantageous as conventionally understood (Tiffen et al., 1994).
In the past, soil erosion and subsequent fertility decline, diminution of agricultural
productivity and decline in environmental quality were normally attributed to
the effect of natural phenomena like climate. Emphasis on the attainment of
optimum resource management and productivity was thus put on biophysical
factors, which however was met with little success as earlier mentioned. This
indicated that other factors hitherto ignored were equally critical. Therefore, since
the 1980s, there has been growing recognition that persistent land degradation
results from the failures on the part of conventional research, policy and
development approaches to recognise the importance of the participation of the
land users and the total human dimension at all levels of decision making in
resource management. Further, programmes with spontaneous support of the
target group stood a better chance of success, especially when such interventions
were accompanied with tangible short-term benefits (FAO, 1995; Mcclelland,
1998;Steiner, 1998). However, a considerable gap still exists between conceptual
acceptance and real implementation on the ground. Widespread failure on the
part of the target groups to adopt what would be appropriate technologies
(Fujisaka, 1994, Ashby et al., 1996; Thomas, 1996) and tendencies of II experts" to
address symptoms rather than root causes and hence persistence of land
degradation in many tropical agro-ecosystems attests to this
Description
Book Chapter