The system of crop intensification: reports from the field on improving agricultural production, food security, and resilience to climate change for multiple crops

Abstract

In the past half dozen years, farmers and professionals working with them in several Asian and African countries have begun adapting and extrapolating what they have learned from and about the system of rice intensification (SRI) to a range of other crops -finger millet, wheat, sugarcane, tef, oilseeds such as mustard, legumes such as soya and kidney beans, and various vegetables -in what is being called the system of crop intensification (SCI). As with rice, the principles of early and healthy plant establishment, reducing competition between plants, increased soil organic matter, active soil aeration, and the careful application of water are proving able to raise the productivity and profitability of differently-managed crops. Recent reports from the World Bank in India and the Agricultural Transformation Agency in Ethiopia show such changes in crop management improving food security and being scaled up with hundreds of thousands of farmers. This review article reports on the productivity and other impacts being observed for many different crops in half a dozen countries for increasing food crop yields with lower cost and input requirements as well as more resilience to adverse effects of climate change. It also reports on mechanization innovations that reduce labor requirements for these methods.

Raising Crop Productivity in Africa through Intensification

“…Several years of SCI studies on major crops such as rice and wheat, as well as indigenous crops such as finger millet, tef, and mustard resulted in significantly higher yields compared to the conventional methods [84]. However, SCI could not be easily adopted by farmers cultivating small cereals such as tef.…”

Agricultural intensification in Ethiopia: Review of recent research

“…Improved agricultural productivity for smallholders can reduce poverty and improve household welfare (Abraham et al, 2014;Abro, 2014). A review of 40 projects of intensification in Africa suggest a number of key lessons ought to be integrated, shared and scaled-up in on-going and future work.…”

“…A set of principles are being tested and scaled-up by the Agricultural Transformation Agency in Ethiopia, which include techniques to reduce competition between plants, increasing organic matter in soil and soil aeration which Cochrane 2381 contribute to increased productivity and profitability (Abraham et al, 2014). These practices were first developed for rice intensification and are now being applied to a broad range of crops, which is on-going within Ethiopia.…”

Diversifying crops for food and nutrition security - a case of teff

“…Some of these underutilised crops, such as amaranth (Amaranthus spp.) and Bambara groundnut (Vigna subterranea), have features of higher in-field stability, allowing them to cope with harsher and more dynamic environmental conditions (Thies, 2000;Mwale, Azam-ali & Massawe, 2007;Mayes et al, 2011;Abraham et al, 2014). Moreover, these crops are already well adapted to the socio-economics of their region as they are preferred by both local farmers and consumers (Thies, 2000;Jaenicke, 2013).…”