Market-oriented farmers play a significant role in the rural agricultural sector in Uganda. However, these trader-farmers are often disadvantaged by limited access to information, services, appropriate technology and capital. These factors restrict their capacity to effectively participate in the marketing of their produce. In many instances farmers, including those in the potato innovation platforms (IPs) of Southwestern (SW) Uganda are relegated to the lower end of value chains where they are price takers with little bargaining power. Therefore they end up earning little margins while giant chain actors along the chain like middlemen have the power to determine prices paid by the final consumer and thus extract huge marketing margins. This study aimed at identifying marketing channels of potatoes from the farm to consumption; identifying marketing constraints faced by farmers and traders in the potato marketing chain in SW Uganda; and assessing the marketing performance of potato markets. Data were collected in July 2010 from 291 respondents in 2 IPs in SW Uganda. Descriptive statistics were used to characterise potato traders and farmers while Gross Margin Analysis was used to determine the market performance for different potato varieties. Purchase prices varied by district between UgSh350/kg for Rwashaki variety and UgSh531/kg for Kinigi variety. Sutama and Victoria varieties had the highest marketing margins in Kabale and Kisoro districts respectively.

Forest cover has been converted to agricultural land use in and around the protected areas of Uganda. The objectives of this study were; to examine the dynamics of forest cover change in and around Bwindi impenetrable forest between 1973 and 2010 and to identify the drivers of forest cover change. The trend in forest cover change was assessed by analyzing a series of orthorectified landsat imageries of 1973, 1987 and 2001 using unsupervised and supervised classification. Land use/cover map for 2010 was reconstructed by analyzing 2001 image, validated and/or reconstructed by ground truthing, use of secondary data and key informant interviews. A series of focused group discussions and key informant interviews were also used to identify drivers of land use/cover change. Policies and institutional arrangements that could have affected forest cover change for the studied time period were also identified. Results showed that protected forest and woodlot in unprotected area had declined by 7.8% and 70.7% respectively as small scale farming and tea plantations had increased by 13.9% and 78.3% respectively between 1973 and 2010. The conversions were attributed to land use pressure due to population growth, change in socio-economic conditions and institutional arrangements. The severe loss of woodlot outside the protected area not only poses a potential threat to the protected forest but also calls for intervention measures if efforts to mitigate climate change impacts are to be realized. @JASEM

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This study assessed sediment and nutrient loads in Lwiro river, Lake Kivu basin in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Water discharge was measured and water samples were collected twice a month from 6 sites in Lwiro river system and analyzed for total suspended sediment (SS), temperature, pH, dissolved oxygen (DO), chemical oxygen demand (COD), five-day biological oxygen demand (BOD 5 ), alkalinity and nutrients (P, N, PO 4 3-, NO 3 -and NH 4 + ) using standard methods. Results show that the concentration of BOD 5 was low (1.08 ± 0.83 mg/L); but COD (13.13 ± 6.26 mg/L) and SS (1.15 ± 0.36 mg/L) were high in the industrial effluent than in agricultural effluent (2.7 ± 0.77 mg/L for BOD 5 ; 9.05 ± 3.55 mg/L for COD and 0.81 ± 0.36 mg/L for TSS). It was observed that all these values were low compared to the standard limit proposed by UNECE and Uganda standard. TSS, nutrient and other chemicals parameters load analyzed were high in agriculture effluent than in industrial effluent except for NH 4 + load. Temporal variation and site difference between TSS and nutrient load were significantly different (F=5.54, p< 0.005 for SS; F= 8.59, p< 0.005 for TP and F=7.63, p< 0.005 for TN). Techniques for reducing nutrient and TSS loads should be initiated in the microcatchment to protect the Lake Kivu.

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