Africa Research in sustainable intensification for next generation

Sustainable intensification of mixed crop livestock systems is a key pathway towards better food security, improved livelihoods and a healthy environment. As part of the US government’s Feed the Future initiative to address hunger and food security issues in sub-Saharan Africa, the US Agency for International Development (USAID) is supporting three multi-stakeholder agricultural research projects to sustainably intensify key African farming systems.

Horticulture is one of the fastest growing subsectors of agriculture in Tanzania with vegetables increasingly produced as cash crops. A recent study published in the European Journal of Development Research (February 2020) analysed the ways gender inequality has affected agricultural production and trade in northern and central Tanzania.

Constructing contour bunding helps to retain soil and nutrients, reduce land degradation and increase crop productivity. Significantly, implementing contour bunding reduces soil loss by 163%, and the majority of farmers (78%) perceive that they earned a higher income from crops sown in bunded fields.