An analysis of technical and socio-economic factors in adoption of alley-cropping in the high rainfall zone of Siaya district Kenya

Abstract

One of the main lessons from the past studies on adoption of alley-cropping in Siaya district is that farmers have used highly variable design and management practices to adapt the technology to their farm and socio-economic conditions. It has also been shown that the technology is partially adopted by the farmers. This study attempted to identify the key technical and socio-economic factors underlying the adoption and adaptation of the technology in the high rainfall zone of the district. The main objectives of the study were to:- a) assess the relationship between socio-economic characteristics of households and the adoption of alley-cropping technology. b) describe the range of current modified designs and management strategies used by adopters. c) identify the main technical and socio-economic reasons behind these management strategies. d) look at the implications of these technical and socio-economic factors on the improvement of adoption. Information was collected on the socio-economic characteristics of the households on a total of 62 farmers (adopters and non-adopters) through formal survey. The adapted designs and management practices of the technology were investigated on 31 farmers (adopters) and technical and socio-economic reasons for these adaptations sought through both formal and informal surveys. Descriptive statistics and students t-test were used to analyze the quantitative data. The chi-square and logistic regression analysis were used to test the maximum likelihood of adoption using the parameters which had only binary answers. No significant differences were found between adopters and non-adopters with respect to average landholding size, household size and available land at 0.1% level. However, the fact that only 27% of the household menbers were economically active had serious constraint on timeliness of field operations. There was a significant difference in the average ages of adopters and non-adopters at 0.1% level. Younger and more able-bodied farmers were not adopting the technology and this was seen as a big hindrance to alleycropping development in the area. Level of education, sex of the farmer, use of hired labour and land tenure had positive correlation with adoption but not significant at 0.05% level. Non-farm income of the male head of the household had negative correlation with adoption although it was not significant at 0.05% level. Only non-farm income of the respondent farmer and cultivation of crops for sale had significant negative correlation with adoption at 0.05% level. Cultivation of kales, tomatoes and beans for sale on the local markets was found among 68% of the non-adopters as opposed to only 22% of the adopters. The higher relative advantage of raising crops or tree seedlings for sale was also mentioned by the non-adopters as the main reason for discontinuation of managing the technology. This study therefore, found that only these two variables explained non-adoption of the technology in the high rainfall zone of Siaya district. The most common tree species managed through cutting back (pruning) in alleycropping technology was Leucaena /eucocepha/a (91% of adopters). However, the hard stem of leucaena was a constraint to cutting back management by female adopters (77%). The adopters expressed a need for shrubs/trees with softer stems and manageable through pollarding a practice with which most farmers in the area are conversant. All the adopters except three had no experience with other trees like Ca//iandra ca/othyrsus, G/iricidia sepium, Leucaena diversifo/ia and the Sesbanias. Some of these multipurpose tree species have shown better potential for alley-cropping than Leucaena /eucocepha/a and should now be extended to farmers to test their potentials in solving the cutting back problem. The within row spacings used by the farmers ranged from 0.5 to 2.0 m with a mean of 1.2 m. The most frequent ranges were 0.5-1.0 m (11 out of 31) and 1.1-1.5 m (9 out of 31). The adopters attributed these variabilities mainly to repeated termite infestation of planted seedlings. The between row spacing variation was mainly due to use of different paces by different household members during tree establishment. However, these spacing ranges were reasonably close to the recommended ranges. The adopters were found to prefer cutting heights below 45 cm because of convenience and reduction of shading of the inter-crop. However, all the adopters were still trying different cutting heights depending on the farm production goals. Cutting back operation was mainly done by men fIrstly because leucaena tree was hard and secondly due to traditional specialization of family labour. This situation contributed to delay of fIeld operations as most of the adopters were females (77%) whose husbands had migrated to urban centres. Whereas all the cutting height ranges used by the adopters could give adequate green leafy mulch (using on- station results), the tree densities on most plots were too low to have any positive effect. Eighty four percent (84%) of the adopters had below 2000 treesha-1 • This suggested inadequate mulch production from only one cutting back per season used by the adopters. No adopter did second cutting back because it coincided with the time for fIrst weeding. Only side pruning was done during that period instead of the second cutting back due to shortage of labour. Generally the adopters expressed satisfaction with adapted frequency since it enabled generation of more woody sticks for fuelwood and it also reduced labour requirement The adopters did cut back at different times mainly to enable practice of staggering planting and to reduce labour input. 74% of the adopters had cut back after land preparation, 16% before land preparation and 9% during fIrst weeding period. However, none of the observed strategies seemed to synchronize time of mulch application with the crop nutrient requirement regimes. It was found that more than half of the nutrient released from the already inadequate green leafy mulch was lost through leaching before the inter-crop reaches critical time for nutrient need. The adopters generally lacked understanding of the underlying principle behind timing of mulch application and the need for supplementing green leafy mulch with manure or fertilizer. There was also unawareness about tree root management to reduce below ground competition despite the fact that most adopters had observed some below ground competition on their plots. On the overall, the major constraint to adopters receiving benefIts from the present design and management strategies appeared to be the low tree densities (1348 treesha-1 ) and poor timing of green leafy mulch application. There was a need for more interpersonal contact between the adopters and the extension personnel to enable easy understanding of their needs and constraints to adaptation of the current management Using the Ruthenberg,s fanning systems progression model, it was found that the current farming systems in the study area will fall over to fanning systems with trees as the major component. However, the current generation of adopters were unlikely to adopt intensive alley-cropping management since they still had less labour requiring systems. This concept explained the observation that the adopters used only an average of 3.5% of their total available land for practising the technology. The adoption of the technology could be enhanced by considering the current needs, constraints and production goals of the adopters in the generation of design and management recommendations. The need for incorporation of the design and management practices used more frequently by adopters into the on-going research and/or demonstration for further development and fine tuning was suggested. It was also recommended that long term research should involve a phased approach to design and management intensification of both alleycropping and border planting systems to facilitate smooth fall over to the future systems. The scope of this study could not unravel all the mystery why some farmers adopted and others in apparently similar comparable situation did not. More studies on constraints to adaptation process, evaluation of the effectiveness of the current communication channels and the social impacts of the technology were also recommended.