Institute for Sustainable Development

Addis Ababa, Éthiopie

An Overview Of Our Solution

ISD’s first project supported by TWN was given the title of ‘Sustainable Development and Ecological Land Management with Farming Communities in Tigray’. The aim of the project was to find out if a community-based ecological approach to rehabilitating the land, afforestation and improving crop production through the application of ecological principles could reverse land degradation and improve the livelihoods of smallholder farmers. The project motivated local communities to develop their own by-laws to apply ecological principles. But, by 2017, its impact had spread far outside of Tigray. ISD has been introducing new technologies to reverse challenges smallholders are facing with a principle of sustaining the production capacity of the soil; compost and Push-Pull Technologies are among them.

Who is this solution impacting?

Community Type

Rural

Organization type

À but non lucratif

Ecosystem (select all that apply)

Grasslands

Population impacted

>2500 smallholders

Size of agricultural area

200 Ha

Production quantity

6-10 ton/hectare

People employed

>2500 smallholders

Describe your solution

The use of synthetic pesticides to control weeds and pests leads to decreased capacity of ecosystems in making available a range of goods and free services. Synthetic pesticides are deliberately made poisonous to destroy agricultural pests. Sprayed hazardous insecticides and herbicides can reach a destination other than their targeted species. For example, In the four PPT project districts of Amhara region (Tehuledere, Ambasel, Werebabu and Kombolcha) 19,985 hectares of land was allocated for production of maize and sorghum: 10,165 ha was infested by stem borer. Diazinon 5% was sprayed on 7,285 ha of land to control the outbreak of the pest costing ETB 497,400 equivalent to USD 27,630 by government in 2013. Two oxen and a cow died as a result of grazing on sorghum where the chemical had been applied. The continued use will also promote resistance to pesticides, destroys natural enemies, creates new pests, harms other non-target species and contaminates food and feed of both humans and livestock. ISD, therefore, has introduced Push-Pull Technology in 2011 to main production areas of maize and sorghum in Ethiopia to improve food & nutrition security and productivity of smallholders by combining with farmers’ traditional knowledge and practices. The technology is 100% biological, as it uses companion plants both to decrease pest infestation and increase in productivity of crops and livestock.

Describe your implementation

Push-Pull Technology (PPT) is a biological pest control system based on planting drought resistant Brachiaria (a forage grass) and Desmodium (a forage legume) as companion crops with maize or sorghum, mainly in rainfall scarce areas, in order to control the damage to yields by stem borer pests and the parasitic striga weed. ISD started implementing PPT project in 2011 in two districts of Central Tigray and one in South Wollo of Amhara where six demonstration plots were established and the results were encouraging. Over the 4 years, 2011-2014 inclusive in South Wollo, from 1 female farmer and 2 FTCs (Farmers Training Centers) in the same wereda in 2011, the number of farmers had risen to 273 (28 female) and 13 FTCs in 8 weredas by 2014. Also in Tigray, there was a similar rapid increase in the number of farmers implementing PPT from 2 farmers (no female) and 2 FTCs in 2 weredas in 2011, to 374 farmers (41 female) and 43 extension personnel (2 female) in 11 weredas in 2014. In 2014, at the end of the cropping season, yield data was collected from 28 farmers’ PPT fields and from 5 FTCs. These results show that a farmer with a minimum yield from PPT maize field got more yield by 0.75 t/ha than a farmer who got a maximum yield from a non PPT maize field. For the improved variety of sorghum, the farmer getting a minimum yield of 3.25 t/ha on a PPT sorghum field got 1.45 t/ha more than a farmer with a maximum yield from a non PPT sorghum field. Activities included in the dissemination of the technology are , training on the implementation of PPT, both theoretical and practical, seed distribution, farmers field days, ex-ante and socio-economic survey, crop data sampling, evaluation workshops,…etc. There has never been sufficient seed of Desmodium to supply all the farmers who have participated in PPT training. ISD has been encouraging farmers to produce the seed for them to earn money from the sale of Desmodium seed at an attractive price of up to 500 ETB (US$ 26) per kg.

External connections

• International Centre on Insect Physiology and Ecology (icipe): In 2011, ISD became a partner in an EU-supported project coordinated by icipe to introduce PPT in Ethiopia. • Agriculture Transformation Agency (ATA): The government of Ethiopia decided in 2014, through the ATA, to expand the technology to about 20,000 farmers. ISD joined hands to train farmers on PPT and also in distributing seeds. • The McKnight Foundation: Through its program, CCRP (Collaborative Crop Research Program), ISD secured a development research project with two public universities in Ethiopia on PPT since 2015. This project is based on ISD’s previous efforts to disseminate PPT. It aims to bring farmers, extension personnel and researchers into a partnership to combine traditional and modern scientific knowledge of agricultural practices for increased and sustained production in harmony with ecological dynamics so as to build the resilience of farming communities to the impacts of climate change. Wollo and Woldia Universities: These are the two partner public universities in Ethiopia to work closely with smallholder farmers and extension personnel with the project entitled ‘Push Pull Plus’, in short. The main focus of the Push-Pull Plus Project supported by the McKnight Foundation CCRP is the research question – “If a farmer alters the number of grass border rows but retains Desmodium as the intercrop, can she/he benefit from the control of stem borer and striga weed?

What is the environmental or ecological challenge you are targeting with your solution?

Ethiopia as a geo-political entity is building its development on its agricultural sector through a strategy called ADLI (Agricultural Development Led Industrialization). It is also working towards being food self-sufficient by 2020. Large scale agriculture contributes less than 5% of the total production of the country. Hence, the production base for both internal food security and ADLI is the communities of smallholder farmers that comprise over 80% of the population estimated to exceed 100 million in the coming few years. Ethiopia also hosts one of the eight Vavilov Centers for agro-biodiversity in the world with over 190 plant species recorded as being used as food plus as forage, fibre, in construction, cultural materials and events.

Describe the context in which you are operating

The farming sector is characterized by low yields (average 1.76 t/ha in 2014), lack of improvements in agricultural tools, particularly for the work of women, and high vulnerability to environmental shocks due to land degradation and changes in climate. Over the past 20 years, droughts have become more frequent, but ISD has observed that farmers making and using compost and other agro-ecological practices have been able to resist these challenges. Maize and sorghum are among the major five crops in terms of production and area coverage. However, the yield of these crops is severely affected by larvae of stem borer moths and the parasitic weed Striga. Striga is also parasitizing finger millet and teff in some areas. Many control options, including pesticides, have been tried to control these biotic problems with much expense and little success.

How did you impact natural resource use and greenhouse gas emissions?

The use of PPT technology dramatically decreases the intensive use of synthetic chemical inputs application on farm lands. This is mainly the legume Desmodium fixes nitrogen which replaces the use of Urea. The intensive application of chemical inputs, as indicated above, is adversely affecting the biodiversity by externalizing its cost to the environment. The current deterioration of honey production in Ethiopia due to contamination of bee forages is a very good indicator of the process.

Language(s)

English, Amharic

Water

PPT retains soil moisture, as Desmodium acts as mulch. This enables farmers to utilize the scarce water especially in irrigable areas.

Food Security/Nutrition

Farmers are benefited from PPT not only from the potential of the technology in increasing the yield, which may double production where both strig and stemborer are found at the same time, but also from its side benefit for forage to livestock. The two companion plants are very forages to livestock, one as a grass and the other as a legume. Farmers are reporting an increase in lactation stage of milk cows and milk yields. Milk products are both for household consumption and sale.

Economic/Sustainable Development

Ethiopian smallholder farmers’ economy is mainly depending on agricultural produce and their scarce land’s ability to sustain in production capability. PPT is found to achieve both, increasing yields by decreasing the infestation of pests and improving soil fertility at the same time.

Climate

Desmodium as a legume improves soil fertility by harboring Rhizobia bacteria in root nodules. These ‘fix’ nitrogen as nitrate that can be taken up by the crop avoiding the use of chemical nitrate fertilizers that produce nitrous oxide, the most damaging of greenhouse gases (GHG). Research in icipe has found Desmodium can fix up to 110 kg of nitrogen per hectare in the soil in a year, and so save on fertilizer costs for the farmers as well as mitigate climate change.

Sustainability

ISD’s experience is that once the farmers see the advantages of an improved technology, such use of compost and PPT, they continue to implement without any repeated support. All agricultural interventions depend on building and maintaining the health and fertility of the soil. The biggest challenge in sustainability is the social make-up of and pressure on farmers themselves to commit to new and improved agricultural production methods. Once a farmer has implemented and seen the benefits of PPT in his/her own fields, they continue both to continue implementing for themselves and sharing with their neighbours. Farmers are also very willing to supply testimonials in public meetings, through media and in the evaluation processes.

Return on investment

The costs in PPT dissemination are mainly from capacity development activities. Therefore, it is always important to include as many farmers as possible to share knowledge and activate learning process among farmers. Other costs are related to follow-ups and evaluations. The return from all these are, in farming terms, increasing food and nutrition production, enhancing the soil fertility, accessing quality forage for livestock, which in turn benefit the environment by avoiding over grazing, maintain and improving biodiversity, … etc

Entrant Image

How could we successfully replicate this solution elsewhere?

The technology is appropriate and economical to the resource-poor smallholder farmers in the Africa as it is based on locally available plants, not expensive external inputs, and fits well with traditional mixed cropping systems in continent. Currently, it has been adopted by over 131,229 smallholder farmers in East Africa, Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Ethiopia. Compared to the number of sorghum and maize producing farmers and the intensity of crop damage by stemborer and striga infestation in Ethiopia, the uptake is very minimal and needs more intervention for scale-out. Technology dissemination requires a package of capacity building trainings, both to farmers and their development assistances (DAs) and also a close follow-up. It is also important to record data on crop, forage and infestation yields and level to validate benefits of the intervention. All these needs additional funds as financial input is always a bottleneck to run interventions.

Overview